Since the expansion of the internet is growing and reaching more countries and more people around the world uses it, the companies are taking their web site globally, especially those that run ecommerce (Yunker, 2007). There are few challenges to aboard this potential online audience: develop web sites for foreign markets optimized for regional buyers, the local language, culture and laws, the exchange rates, the delivery if the company sells goods, the level of trust of the local agencies, etc. However, payment seems to be the most important issue for the marketers.

According to a survey made to the Affiliate Summit East conference in New York City in August 2009 (Entropay, 2009), the 98 percent of the US marketers primed for expansion overseas, but most were unprepared to manage the delays and costs of international payments, 63 percent were dissatisfied with the speed and costs, thinking that more than 95 percent considered with great potential doing oversees business.

Part of this problems are the administrative costs associated with international transactions, not only for the companies, but the customers also have to pay commissions to the bank for this transactions and pay more local money for the exchange rates, because the banks uses more expensive ones.

Another thing is the shipping charges, if a customer is buying goods overseas, think for example in a book, depending on the location and price of it, the shipping charge could even be higher than the cost of the book.

No less important are the security of the transactions and the delivery of the products or services. If the payment is made by credit card or bank wire transfer, the mayor risk is for the customer, because the marketers always deliver the good after collecting the money, that doesn´t mean that the customer is not going to repudiate the transaction. Since the credit cards are international and the bank has similar agreements in a lot of the countries, the protection for repudiation is the same that is US.

Difficulties between a US customer and an international one who each make a purchase from a US ecommerce company:

There are differences between them; for the non-American the disadvantages are the language (not all the foreigners’ domain English language), if he is buying goods, the delivery is more expensive. Depending on the prices, sometimes the costs of shipping are higher than the good itself, or the currier company doesn´t have a local office, they use a local company that increases the time of delivery and the risk of lost. The exchange rates are often higher and finally some countries are considered more risky and not available for US Banks.

Sources
Laudon, Keneth & Traver Carol Guercio (2011), E-commerce 2010: Business, Technology, Society. Seventh Edition, Publisher Prentice Hall.

Quik, Darren (2010, 6), Wi-Fi and 3G could become competitors for mobile internet access, Gizmag. Retrieved September 19, 2011 from http://www.gizmag.com

Yunker, John (2007), Ecommerce Across Borders, Ccaps Newsletter. Retrieved September 18, 2011 from http://www.gala-global.org

Improving Payment Delivery within Affiliate Marketing (2009, 9). Entropay. Retrieved September 19, 2011 from https://www.entropay.com