GoCardless And Piano Partner to Help Publishers And Brands Drive Recurring Revenue

As part of its strategy to enable merchants to access direct debit payments through software they use already, GoCardless, a London-based provider of account-to-account payment solutions, is partnering with analytics and activation-platform provider Piano to deliver debit capabilities on the automated clearing house network to publishers and brands.

The ability to offer ACH debit is expected to help subscription-based businesses, which are founded on recurring payments, convert and retain more subscribers by pulling a payment straight from the payer’s bank account when the bill comes due.

“Because bank debit payments are made directly from a bank account, which payers are less likely to change and which have account details that don’t expire, failure rates are lower,” a GoCardless spokesperson says by email. “While card failure rates are in the 7%-9% range, those for bank debit are 6% or less—and with GoCardless, failure rates are under 3% on average. This makes a big difference, especially for subscription-based businesses which need to maximize lifetime customer value.”

A recent study from GoCardless found that 39% of Americans make a digital payment at least once every day. Based on that data, it is crucial that subscription-based businesses keep up with the shift toward digital to continue growing their customer base, GoCardless says.

GoCardless will integrate Piano’s platform with its bank-debit network to enable subscription-based businesses to offer ACH direct debit. To offer the payment option, GoCardless customers connect their account to Piano via the Piano customer portal. The partnership will also pave the way for adoption of future GoCardless offerings, such as open banking.

Piano’s platform leverages data, artificial intelligence and commerce features to help brands and publishers achieve revenue growth by serving up relevant content and experiences based on a consumer’s behavior and profiles.

“[Piano’s] platform is perfectly suited for integration with account-to-account offerings like GoCardless,” Karl Stjernstrom, head of enterprise partnerships for GoCardless, says in prepared statement. “With this integration, Piano’s clients can also gain access to the latest payment technology as GoCardless introduces new features harnessing the power of open banking.”