Merchant accounts accept credit cards, debit cards, and other common types of online payment options, and having the right one can make the transaction process reliable and smooth for your customers. However, without the right merchant processing solution, your customers can become frustrated, and you can lose money through lost businesses, fees, and chargebacks.

This is especially true in the nutraceutical space, and you need a merchant account and payment processing company you can trust. Customers can't trust your product if they can't even trust your payment options, so maintaining a flexible, trustworthy merchant account is crucial.

Keep reading to see why proper merchant accounts are essential when selling nutraceutical products. Learn about some key steps you can take to optimize your processes.

Nutraceutical goods have a few complications that can make credit card processing more challenging than in other industries. Let's take a look at them:

• FDA Regulations: Nutraceuticals can fall into a bit of a gray area. Sometimes they are considered food, and in other cases, they are not. They are certainly not pharmaceuticals. This gray area means some nutraceutical products have FDA regulations that can govern their marketing, purchases, and sales. Some may even be eligible for HSA and FSA spending accounts, creating complications for most credit card processing services. Other times, nutraceuticals do not fall under FDA regulations, making people more skeptical about them. This opens the entire industry up to increased risks of chargebacks, returns, and accusations of fraudulent behavior.
• Chargebacks: Many nutraceutical companies follow a format of offering a free trial to start off a subscription service: customers get a 30-day supply of product for free, and their subscription automatically renews. This can result in unhappy customers issuing chargebacks, and the company's credit card processing service loses trust in them.

To minimize the complications of these issues, choose a merchant account specifically built for nutraceutical companies, such as MID Kingz.

Cleaning up your merchant account and processes is a good time to optimize everything related to your credit card processing. Make these three changes along the way:

• Choose a Certified Merchant Services Process Your Clients Will Trust

There's a lot of online distrust, especially in the nutraceutical niche. Make sure your payment processes are clean and simple on the customer-facing side and that everything looks exactly how users would expect. Good payment processing services shouldn't interfere with this or make users put information into a popup window.

• Put Clear Payment Information and Graphics on Your Website and in Reminder Emails

This is a great strategy for minimizing chargebacks. Make sure your customers know that they are purchasing a subscription or renewing a product, and send them friendly reminders before you charge their card. Chargebacks and credit card disputes result in fees for your business, not just poor standing with merchant services, so taking this step can radically improve customer relations and cash flow.

• Look for Solutions Specifically Tailored to Your Business Model and Prices

Standard merchant account services will charge "high-risk" businesses much more through fees and higher minimum cash reserves. This can slow your business's growth. Instead, shop around for services that are tailored to your needs as a nutraceutical company. Look for options that don't have unreasonable contract lengths and fees that seem like preemptive penalties. If your service provider works with nutraceutical companies often, then they understand your operations, sales, and need for chargeback mitigation without it being a sign your business is fraudulent.