Recently, in one of the Facebook groups I participate in, the question arose again. Should one use PayPal or a merchant account in one's business? I used to run marketing teleseminars weekly for a merchant North American Bancard Agent account vendor and this question came up on almost every call.

PayPal: Let's Review

You're probably all quite familiar with PayPal. It's a third party processor. You, the merchant, never see your customers' credit card information. PayPal collects it and puts the money into your PayPal account. From there you can spend the money by paying for things with PayPal, using the PayPal debit card to spend the money, or transferring it to your bank account, which takes about 2-3 days.

You don't need a shopping cart to use PayPal - you can create buttons right in PayPal to use on your site or in emails. There are many carts that will integrate with PayPal, however, should you want to use one.