In its bid to enable next generation billing solution for digital merchants, the Tartu, Estonia based mobile payments company Fortumo has launched a voucher management platform for the sale of digital goods.
The platform supports running marketing campaigns, enabling the vouchers to be used for cross-platform license management for other accounts and user acquisition.
Fortumo’s voucher platform has built-in support for giving users access to content for multiple accounts on several platforms through a single voucher. This provides a seamless purchase experience for users who consume digital magazines, music and video streaming services, anti-virus solutions and social network services across desktop, mobile and tablet devices.
In addition, digital and virtual content providers using the platform do not need to build a separate infrastructure to handle carrier billing relationships with the users. This allows merchants who have previously only been using credit card payments for their paid content to immediately launch carrier billing without the need for additional third party integrations, CMS tools or payment platforms.
“Carrier billing has significantly bigger user reach and better conversion compared to credit cards, especially as smartphone growth is increasing rapidly in emerging markets. The launch of Fortumo’s voucher platform means merchants are able to take advantage of the benefits of carrier billing in a quick and scalable way across all platforms,” said Martin Koppel, CEO of Fortumo.
The same platform can be used by merchants for marketing purposes. For example, merchants can issue free vouchers to new users acquired through an advertising campaign or deliver free voucher codes through a text message to users who have stopped using their service.
Fortumo’s direct carrier billing platform is used by leading app stores (Google Play, Windows Phone Store), game developers (EA Mobile, Gameloft, Rovio) and digital media companies (Times Internet, Ditto TV, Box TV, Gaana).
In order to enable global carrier billing for these merchants, Fortumo has partnered with more than 350 mobile operators across the world, including mobile operator groups Telefónica, Telenor, Singtel, Turkcell and Kyivstar, as well as leading mobile operators in India and China.