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Business software providers are seeing their customers become more cautious in a tough economy.
Citing recent comments from executives at companies such as Salesforce, Okta and Crowdstrike, the Wall Street Journal (VSJ) reported a shift in sentiment on Sunday (Dec 4).
“Certainly, the customer environment has changed in the market. It’s become more measured,” Brian Millham, Salesforce’s chief operating officer, said on an analyst call.
Reports say these companies are seeing buyers take longer to sign on to jobs, or in some cases are forgoing hiring to cut costs.
This trend is not only followed by large companies. VSJ said Okta saw a drop in demand from small businesses as customers abandoned purchases.
And while Okta CEO Todd McKinnon said the company had one of its best quarters ever for major deals, he also warned of a “global macro environment that we expect to get worse before it gets better.”
The report says the strain has put out a fire in the tech industry after the pandemic forced companies to embrace more digital tools.
But that embrace didn’t completely disappear.
In a recent conversation with PIMNTS, Jo Jagadish, executive vice president of innovation at TD Bank, spoke about the rush among businesses to adapt their payment infrastructure to the challenges of the pandemic.
It was a change that was most pronounced among small businesses, said Jagadish Karen Webster of PIMNTS. She said that “a lot [small] businesses were trying to keep their lights on, so they relied heavily on digital payment engagement alone.”
That enthusiasm remains in the post-pandemic era, she argued, as she has seen many Treasury departments “secure the funding and investments they will need to automate, improve and digitize their back office.”
Factor in the rocky nature of the current environment, and Jagadish said many CFOs are once again looking for long-term investments that will become relevant in a few years, rather than smaller, niche “hobby projects” that could soon be forgotten.
How consumers pay online with stored credentials
Convenience prompts some consumers to store their payment credentials with merchants, while security concerns give other customers pause. For “How We Pay Digitally: Stored Credentials Edition,” a collaboration with Amazon Web Services, PIMNTS surveyed 2,102 U.S. consumers to analyze the consumer dilemma and discover how merchants can win over those who wait.
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