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Education

Using the cloud to overcome

COVID-19's impact

By Ronny Yakov been able to soften the blows of the pandemic by revamp-
OLB Group Inc. ing ecommerce and bolstering delivery services to keep
business flowing. Smaller merchants that are more be-
hose of us serving the retail and hospitality holden to budget and technology constraints do not pos-
industries are well aware that COVID-19 has sess the resources to make these pivots, and, as a result,
battered these sectors. Not only have consum- have had a much tougher time transitioning to the "new
T ers been asked to stay away from their favorite normal."
retailers, restaurants and hotels to comply with social
distancing mandates, but the disruption caused by the Finding new strategies
pandemic has also played havoc with suppliers, staff
and managers, all of whom have been forced to change In all likelihood, the impact of the pandemic will be felt
business processes to make sure that all safety protocols for decades. Merchants are frantically searching for new
and local regulations are followed. This seismic shift has strategies and solutions that can help draw customers,
resulted in staffing issues and product shortages, misap- improve revenues to at least acceptable levels, and, most
prehension, and anxiety, all of which manifests in frus- importantly, claw their way back toward profitability. For
trated customers, brand erosion, and loss of market share. a growing number of merchants, cloud-based ecommerce
technology represents the best option to regain their foot-
The problem has been even more pronounced for small ing. These solutions—which can address critical business
and midsize merchants. Big-box retailers and chains have workflows like mobile ordering and processing, contact-
less payment acceptance, secure payment processing,
automated marketing and other services—are rapidly
gaining traction among midsize merchants. In the
small and midsize enterprise setting, the cloud is
now recognized as a reliable and flexible architecture
that can reduce the disruption caused by COVID-19
and actually accelerate the recovery.

Merchants deploying these solutions are now experi-
encing a jumpstart on their return to normalcy, and
many now feel that profitability is not far off.

There are a multitude of cloud commerce provid-
ers in this space, so the challenge for merchants is
to identify a solution that aligns with their business
needs, offers the capabilities that are not just useful
today, but also will remain relevant tomorrow, and
offers the robust security and data privacy capabili-
ties that will satisfy merchants, banks, consumers
and regulators.
The cloud: a quick primer

Cloud technology is simply a virtualized network
that hosts mission-critical applications and servic-
es—like payment processing, mobile marketing, and
commerce management functions—and ensures their
availability to all authenticated users, regardless of
where they are located or when they want to access
these capabilities.

Instead of having to download software to worksta-
tions or PCs, employees can access their preferred
tools through a web browser which can reside on a
desktop, tablet, or mobile device. All work applica-
tions and features are available wherever there is
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