From restaurants to landscapers to healthcare providers, businesses of all sorts are rapidly adopting digital solutions to the challenges specific to their industry. The second week of 2022 saw news about digital strategies, the deployment of new technologies and acquisitions and partnership among companies.
Tom Priore, CEO of Priority Technology Holdings, joined PYMNTS’ Karen Webster to discuss the happenings for This Week in Payments.
The evolution of digital and its effects on customer experience this new year. The quick service restaurant (QSR) space is one that has shifted, evolved and developed new things during the pandemic. Shake Shack, for example, sees digital, self-service kiosks as a way to offer convenience to consumers.
Read more: Shake Shack Sees Digital Experience Driven by Dynamic Kitchens
In an opinion piece posted during the week, Webster wrote that technology has eliminated the constraint of proximity, and that the physical store experience at checkout with payment will move to the cloud.
Read more: 10 Things Will Define the Digital Transformation in 2022
Priore said hospitality companies have been leaders in the move to a connected commerce world. They extended the reach of restaurants with delivery, and they created a customer-facing ordering experience with kiosks like those used by Shake Shack.
He added that even small businesses are now expected to have tools like these that deliver a modern experience for the consumer and help them maximize workforce efficiency.
“Consumers are accustomed to shopping online, just having a very connected experience, and they kind of want that while they’re out too,” Priore said.
Read more: JPMorgan: Super Apps Set the Stage for ‘Commerce That Follows Consumers’
“The way modern commerce is being transacted just argues for a modernization of the payment rails and how money moves, which I think is kind of fantastic for our industry — it really makes it an interesting place to be,” he added.
SMBs Remain Scrappy and Creative
There’s been strong growth in the adoption of digital strategies among small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) like landscapers, HVAC companies and contracting businesses that have traditionally had small digital footprints.
“Now, with the current environment being what it is, office staff perhaps being compromised and the need to accelerate revenue, we’ve seen them just adopt digital strategies,” Priore said.
Read more: US Plan $10B in Funding for SMB COVID Aid
Like other SMBs, they’re scrappy and creative, he added. They’re adopting “extensions of the transaction” into delivery, curbside pickup and mobile payment applications for contractors and mobile businesses.
See: Two-Thirds of US Main Street Businesses Show Optimism Despite Inflation, Economic Uncertainty
The networks deserve credit for this, too, with Mastercard and Visa promoting card on file and other mechanisms to help expand the reach of digital transactions for small businesses, Priore added.
“They’ve responded quickly — and they probably have a reputation for not doing so — so I think amid this pandemic, I would commend them for a lot of the energy they’ve put forth in that regard,” Priore said.
Read also: Uber Teams with Visa to Offer $1M in Small Business Grants, Resources
Healthcare Looks to Solve Complexity with Technology
Healthcare, too, has seen digital transformation on both the consumer-facing side and on the provider side. This week saw Johnson & Johnson Medical Devices Companies team up to integrate Microsoft’s cloud computing capabilities across JJMDC’s medical ecosystem.
See: Johnson & Johnson-Microsoft Pact Shows Transformative Potential of Connected Healthcare
Healthcare companies have also been pursuing acquisitions to bring the digital and physical experience together, including diagnostic tools that provide data to doctors as well as tools that make providers’ interactions within their own financial supply chain easier.
Learn more: Healthcare Firm Owens & Minor Buys Apria for $1.6B
Healthcare is highly complex and from a payment provider’s point of view, things like having metadata travel with payments are just table stakes. There’s also the Internet of Things (IoT) aspect to the healthcare space, which may lead to medical equipment being sold as a service.
Read more: Why Protecting Health and Financial Data Is Not About Your Sprained Ankle
“The kind of neat thing from our perspective as payments providers is, all of that functionality sort of pushes you towards this acceleration of cash flow,” Priore said. “So, if you can facilitate and transact in that world of kind of Internet of Things, as things are happening and clicking, and you’re able to collect, store and send money in that world — how that promotes cash acceleration is, that’s the differentiator toward being a player, if you will.”
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