Four Numbers That Look Contradictory Until You Read Them Together
PYMNTS Intelligence, working with Enigma, published a study of 509 Main Street small businesses on September 29, 2023, and it produced four figures that seem to pull in opposite directions at first glance. 59% of respondents said they would switch payment processors for lower transaction fees. 42% said they would switch for ease of use. But only 15% said they are likely to actually switch processors within the next 3 years. And 85% reported satisfaction with their current processor.
Those numbers are not actually contradictory. They describe two different things: what would theoretically move a merchant (price, ease of use) and what merchants are actually doing right now (mostly staying put, mostly satisfied). A merchant can be satisfied with their current setup and still say yes to a hypothetical "would you switch for less fees," because most people answer a hypothetical price question in the direction of saving money, without that answer translating into active shopping behavior.
What This Means for the Statement-Analysis Pitch
This is the exact gap the statement-analysis pitch, the standard opening move across merchant services sales, is built to close. If 85% of merchants are satisfied and only 15% are actively likely to switch, cold outreach that simply asks "are you looking for a new processor" is targeting a market where the honest answer is no most of the time. A pitch built around showing a merchant a specific, real savings number pulled from their own statement works differently: it does not ask a merchant to already be shopping, it gives them a concrete reason to reconsider a decision they were otherwise satisfied with. That is consistent with why practitioner sources treat statement analysis as the door-opener rather than a straightforward "are you interested in switching" ask.
Why the Caveats Matter Here Specifically
Two things about this study deserve to stay attached to the numbers whenever they get cited. First, it is 2023-vintage, the most recent public switching-rate study of its kind found in this research, but two years old relative to a 2026 pitch, and processor-switching sentiment can move with rate environments, new dual-pricing rules, or high-profile enforcement actions in ways a static 2023 snapshot cannot capture. Second, the sample is 509 Main Street small businesses, a real, named methodology, not an anonymous online poll, but still a specific, bounded sample rather than a full census of US merchants. Neither caveat makes the numbers wrong. Both mean the honest use of this data is as a directional signal about merchant sentiment, not as a precise, current-year market statistic.
The 59% Versus 15% Gap Is the Real Story
The most useful number pair here is not the headline "85% satisfied," it is the gap between 59% (would switch for lower fees, in principle) and 15% (likely to actually switch, in the next 3 years). That roughly 44-point spread is the entire market for anyone selling merchant services outreach: it is the distance between a merchant who would say yes to savings if the case were made concretely and a merchant who is actively out shopping on their own. Passive inbound marketing only reaches the second group. Direct outreach, statement analysis, dual pricing conversations, a booked meeting, is what reaches the first.
Where This Leaves the Outbound Pitch
Read plainly, this data is an argument for outbound over inbound in this specific niche, not a discouraging one. If only 15% of merchants are actively shopping, a marketing page waiting for inbound interest is fishing in a small pond. The other roughly 44 points of theoretically price-sensitive merchants are only reachable by someone making direct contact and making the savings case specific and concrete, exactly what a statement-analysis-based conversation is built to do. VA Horizon's merchant services meetings are booked through exactly that kind of direct, SMS-based conversation, run by Human + AI SDRs on the VA Horizon Private CRM, qualified against a written standard you set, exclusive and double-confirmed before they happen, published at $250 to $450 per meeting plus one $300 setup fee.
Sources
The external data in this article draws on the sources below. Figures described in the text as estimates or industry triangulations are directional and are not attributed to a single dataset.
- PYMNTS, "59% of Small Businesses Would Switch to Cheaper Payment Processors" (2023)
- CCSalesPro, "Does Cold Calling Still Work Selling Merchant Services?"