Some of the most common questions we receive from developers revolve around payment. How do we sell WordPress maintenance services to our clients? How do we price these services? And once we’ve figured out the tactics and numbers, what’s the best way to collect payment?
We’ve covered the first two questions in the email course we put together to help you get ready for StagingPilot. That last question, though, can be tricky!
Less busy work, more billable work
Many developers rely on an invoicing system to receive payment, but that’s not necessarily sustainable when the client list starts growing. The whole purpose of StagingPilot is to help you do less tedious work for your development business–not more. If you’re still relying on sending invoices to get paid for ongoing services, you’ll end up doing a ton of admin work, which just takes you away from your valuable development time.
That’s why we recommend setting up recurring payments with Stripe. Take out the hassle entirely and automate, automate, automate.
Rake in the money
Stripe offers an autopilot solution for billing subscriptions that makes it super easy for you to set up recurring payments. All you have to do is add a client to a plan and select how they will be billed: monthly, weekly, yearly, etc.
Stripe also handles the calculations; if one of your clients decides to change plans mid-billing cycle, Stripe will do the math and adjust their bill accordingly. Stripe allows add-ons, which means you can even throw in additional development hours or content management for purchase. For example, one of our clients doesn’t like getting into their site at all, so we handle their content updates as a part of their services.
Lastly, if you have clients looking for multiple sites to be managed, Stripe makes it easy to provide multiple subscriptions for each customer as needed.
Another major benefit of Stripe: you only get charged when you earn money. That means that there aren’t any setup fees, monthly fees, or surprise charges for you. The money you’ve earned is transferred to your bank account within a week or less, so you get that cash fast.
WordPress and Stripe
There are options for integrating Stripe into your WordPress site, too. We recommend WP Simple Pay because it’s so easy to get up and running. It focuses on payments via Stripe, so it’s incredibly simple and inexpensive to set up. The business & Elite tiers support subscriptions which will get you going.
Of course, there’s also WooCommerce Stripe plugin, which supports WooCommerce Subscriptions, if WooCommerce is your jam.
WPBeginner also has a great (and very specific) rundown on different WordPress tools you can use as well.
Is this a paid plug for Stripe?
It’s not! We strongly believe that Stripe is the best option for recurring payments, and that recurring payments are the way to go. They create the least amount of hassle and ensure that you get paid on time.
StagingPilot aims to make this simple
Whether you run your own agency or you’re working independently, you know how much of a struggle it is to chase invoices for your average development project. We’ve all been there, and it is both stressful and tedious. Recurring payments solve this problem. Once they’re set up, you’ll have minimal management duties from there on. You won’t be bogged down with administrative work or chasing down late payments for ongoing services.
We want you to be able to offer maintenance services, preserve your development time, and bulk up your bank account without a lot of overhead and hassle. It’s a goal that informs how we’ve set up StagingPilot in the first place and plays a role in our recommendations to you.
Take the first step and sign up now.
