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Summary
This article, written by Allen Kopelman of Nationwide Payment Systems, uses satire to highlight “10 stupid ways to lose a sale” in the competitive payment processing industry. Based on a challenge from four MLSs (Merchant Level Salespeople), the piece ironically details poor sales practices. These include selling only on price (not product value), giving away residual income (“pay to play”), using unprofessional materials (cheap cards/generic emails), pushing one-size-fits-all solutions, ignoring networking and follow-up, offering vaporware, badmouthing competitors, making onboarding overly complicated, and, most severely, committing fraud. The core message is that success requires professionalism, relationship building, offering tailored products, and ethical conduct, rather than focusing solely on cutting costs.
10 Stupid Ways to Lose a Payment Processing Sale (Street Smarts for ISOs & MLSs)
By Nationwide Payment Systems – Your Partner in Seamless Payments
10 Stupid Ways to Lose a Sale in Payment Processing
Payments is a competitive business. Consumers have more ways to pay. Merchants have more ways to accept payments. And ISOs and merchant level salespeople (MLSs) have more challenges convincing merchants to choose their brands.
In this environment, where we need to work smarter, not harder, why work stupider? Here are 10 top ways to lose a sale, as demonstrated by the mistakes often seen in the field:
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1. Sell Processing, Not Product
March in and sell savings and service. Ignore the fact that merchants care more about products than processing. Shout over their objections by explaining how much you can save them in processing fees, so your competitors can say the same thing tomorrow and take away the sale or account.
2. Pay to Play (Give Away Residuals)
Drop your pants (figuratively speaking) by offering discounts and money to get accounts. Make it harder for the rest of us to earn an honest living by sharing residual income with the merchants you sign up. Merchants who go along will disrespect you for giving away your own residual streams.
3. Use Cheap Cards, Generic Emails
Hey Mr. Gmail with cheap business cards and no website, you know who you are. Keep handing out those cheesy cards and generic emails without a dot.com address. Keep telling merchants about your cutting-edge technology without bothering to invest in a small one-page website and professional email address, which are more affordable than ever.
4. Sell One-Size-Fits-All Solutions
Keep selling shiny all-in-one solutions that look like they rolled off an assembly line. Keep pushing cash discount to people who don’t want it, and don’t listen when they try to tell you the problems they’re facing.
5. Avoid Networking, Community Service
Stay on the couch, surfing the web, commenting on merchant Facebook groups and checking your portal every fifteen minutes to track your sales pipeline. Don’t attend networking events at the local chamber or happy hours where you could meet potential prospects and partners. Don’t bother to volunteer in your community.
6. Offer Complicated Apps, Onboarding Procedures
Make it harder for people to do business with you. Avoid fintech and embedded finance solutions that make it easy to apply for services and merchant accounts. Have an onboarding process that makes them feel like a contestant on America’s Got Talent.
7. Do Not Follow-Up
Forget Rule Number One of responding quickly to leads and inquiries. Make it your mission to never return a merchant’s call. Avoid having an active blog or newsletter that would make you discoverable. Stay undercover and out of reach.
8. Make Up Stuff (Sell Vaporware)
Never sell what you have, which is way too boring. Offer merchants vaporware or products that your company has no plans of ever offering. Then tell your sales manager and underwriter it’s their fault you lost the sale because they don’t have the right product mix.
9. Badmouth Your Competitors
Insult merchants by telling them they picked a real loser to process with, but you can fix that problem right away by switching them over. Make up stories about others competing for the same account, about how unscrupulous they are, which will not be hard because you wrote the playbook.
10. Be Late and Dress Inappropriately
Show up late and unshaven or wet from a recent soak in the hot tub, or better yet, dress like a banker to let the world know you still think it’s 1999. Dress to impress and avoid looking like a copycat by mirroring your prospect’s dress code.
🚨 Bonus: Commit Fraud (The Dumbest Way to Lose Everything)
Go along when a merchant shows you fake documents and fake websites, and think about all the new friends you will make in jail. Follow the money; don’t worry about inconvenient things like ethics. Make friends with scammers and scale your bank account.
How to Get Started
Ready to join the fintech revolution? You can sign up directly through our merchant onboarding link and live in as little as 24 hours.
👉 Schedule a Call with Allen Kopelman
👉 Visit NationwidePaymentSystems.com
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1. What is Payments as a Service (PaaS)?
PaaS allows businesses to use a single platform or API for all payment functions — processing, settlement, invoicing, and reporting — without building or maintaining the underlying payment infrastructure from scratch.
2. How is NPS different from Stripe?
Nationwide Payment Systems (NPS) offers the same deep API flexibility as Stripe but is differentiated by providing significantly lower fees, dedicated U.S.-based support, and highly customizable integrations tailored for specific industries.
3. Can I integrate NPS payments into my own software or CRM?
Yes. Our NPSONE API is designed specifically to enable developers to embed secure card and ACH payments directly into their proprietary SaaS, CRM, and ERP systems, creating a seamless user experience.
4. Does NPS support ACH and eCheck payments?
Absolutely. NPS offers full ACH and eCheck processing capabilities alongside traditional credit and debit cards, making it an ideal solution for B2B transactions, large payments, and recurring billing models.
5. Can you get a white-label NPS solution for my clients?
Yes. We offer white-label payment solutions allowing Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) and software companies to provide payment portals and services branded as their own, while relying on our secure, robust back-end infrastructure.
6. What industries does NPS serve?
NPS serves a wide range of industries including retail, restaurants, hospitality, healthcare, B2B wholesalers, various service companies, and specialized SaaS platforms nationwide.
7. Is NPSONE PCI compliant?
Yes, NPSONE is fully PCI-DSS compliant. Furthermore, it incorporates tokenization technology to ensure maximum data security and simplify compliance requirements for all our merchants.
8. What kind of reporting tools does NPS provide?
Our payment gateway delivers robust reporting, including real-time transaction data, downloadable reports for reconciliation, and detailed analytics to efficiently monitor sales and settlement activities.
9. Can I connect NPS with QuickBooks?
Yes. The NPSONE platform features two-way QuickBooks synchronization, ensuring that all your transactions, invoices, and payments are automatically updated and reconciled, saving time and reducing manual errors.
10. How can I get started with NPS Payments as a Service?
You can schedule a free consultation and API walkthrough by visiting NationwidePaymentSystems.com/contact or by calling our sales team directly.
