I'd appreciate any comments on the site, which provides advice and recommendations for businesses seeking merchant accounts and credit card processing.

It's brand new and I'm not a webmaster - although I do have a cursory knowledge of SEO, etc.

Thanks, in advance.

Colin
www.merchant-account-explorer.com

Not bad for a Dr*amw*av*r (censored because DW is a swear word to me) site. The colours are simple and contrast nicely with each other, and although the clouds aren't really all that appropriate, they make a nice background anyway so it's cool with me.

I think your biggest issues are going to come with content. I can't speak to the content of the rest of the sections, because I don't know, but the Canadian and International writeup has some errors in it.

• You're missing two of the largest players, Internet Secure and BeanStream. I'm guessing that's because the links that you provide to the four "leaders" are affiliate links. I'd even put Moneris in there, even though they employ some of the most ignorant people I've ever met in my life and provide subpar customer service to companies unless they do $1,000,000 or more per month in revenues.
• The problem with bank merchant accounts isn't the oligopoly that presently exists in Canada (although it damn sure doesn't help)). Internet merchant account rates have slowly been coming down over the last 12-18 months as banks have begun to realize that people are discovering companies such as WorldPay and even PayPal, so they've put their discount rates relatively in line with those of PayPal's. One of my clients recently filled out a merchant app and, once all the Is are dotted and the Ts crossed, will get a merchant discount rate of 2.9%.
  
  It's the bureaucracy associated with said oligopoly that's the problem. The banks have chosen to outsource a lot of their application processes (specifically, the security audits) and I recently had a company attempt to DoS my web server on their own interpretation of instructions from a major bank to do so. They proceeded to file a "major security issues" report that outlined all of the errors on my web server. It was so bad that they didn't even have the type of server that I was using correct!
  
  Naturally, the bank accepted the security report blindly before my client showed it to me asking why I had so many problems with my Novell server. When I proceeded to tell him I didn't have one and asked him what the heck he was talking about, he showed me the report.
  
  I can understand the need for security, but if you're going to pay a company that's outsourced $1000 or more to do an audit of this nature, you'd better pay someone that can get the job done properly and not send repeated DoS requests to a server.
  
  That's the problem...the application process, not the fees. The fees themselves are, when compared to those of Canadian merchant account provider/payment processors, are pretty reasonable. They still pale in comparison to US fees, but they are getting better.

It would also be nice if the "solutions" were comparable somehow. I realize to a certain extent it's apples to oranges, but at least the basic fees are comparable. To get an idea of what i'm talking about, look at http://www.tophosts.com/ and their Fast Find feature. That would work well.

Also, I'm not feeling the blog concept. Forums might work here instead, but a blog is a personal journal. The concept has just been completely bastardized to the point where it has no meaning anymore.

Anyway, those are my thoughts.

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Toronto Web Design | Search Engine Friendly, Standards-Compliant Layouts | Walk on my Path (my blog)

A very nicely produced site. Clean authorative and thoroughly credible. Clearly a lot of work has gone into this and this will prove a useful resource.

Being a bit of a cynic I wonder, when clearly you are in various affiliate schemes and receive commission of sales you refer how true this statement can be:

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Paul Bilton design services ~ Sites not Sights

Thanks for your thoughts.

In the not too distant future I'll be adding info on the discount rates, etc. for each Canadian & International provider.

I agree with your comments on blogs...but my SEO guy says that's the way to go.

Thanks again.

Colin
www.merchant-account-explorer.com

Thanks.

Yes, many of the providers are affiliate relationships. But over the last 4 years (through a similar website we operate), we have had a lot of experience with US providers with affiliate programs - and through trial and error now are very confident in the providers we choose to recommend. We have never received a single complaint from our visitors about any of them. We speak regularly with many of them, as well. Obviously we have not obtained a merchant account from them all - but no-one has.

Appreciate your comments. Thanks again.

Colin
www.merchant-account-explorer.com