If your business maintains a website or other internet presence and you worked with a professional web design company, then you may have heard of website API integration. But it was probably one of a hundred technical terms thrown at you that you didn’t bother to understand. You probably just nodded your head and said, ‘Yes, I need that.’ If you did, good for you because you do need it. But what exactly are APIs?
APIs are application programming interfaces and they are essentially sets of programming instructions and requirements that govern how one application can communicate with another. For example, if you’re using Google Shopping and you find a product you like that’s available from Amazon, the current Amazon price is displayed along with a ‘Buy’ button. APIs make this interface between Google and Amazon possible. Another example that you’ve probably seen a million times is social media buttons for Facebook or Pinterest or Twitter displayed on news or video sites that invite you to share the story or video.
Website API integration is a way for bigger services – like Amazon, Google, Facebook, etc. – to let other applications piggyback onto them. These bigger services do this by exposing some of the functions of their program to the public, allowing these other applications to share data with them and it allows them to take actions on each other’s behalf. What they expose is a specific set of features – just enough to allow for seamless, time-saving interactions.
As a business owner, having website API integration is essential because it allows you to let your customers share what they see on your website with social media interfaces (see above). It allows customers to purchase directly from your website through an interface with a payment processing site like PayPal. It allows you to show your customers how to find you with a Google Maps interface that shows your location on a map on your website. There are almost an endless number of ways that website API integration can benefit your business.
Axis Software Dynamics
To find out more, call us at Axis Software Dynamics at (469) 535-7500. We are custom software developers with many years of experience in integrating different API systems on the internet. Visit us online at axissoftwaredynamics.com to find out more about what we can do for your business.
