SaaS Leaders, Are You Thinking About Adding Payments?

How many times have you looked at Stripe and thought about integrating payments into your application? Sometimes it’s the idea of more revenue. Sometimes a customer asks for payments solution within your platform.

Whatever the case may be, getting into payments is like losing 30 pounds; it sounds simple until you get to the hard work. If you are starting to look at the payments challenge, here is my cheat sheet of things to think about:

Your use case. What is your use case and customer? Are you collecting fees, or are you selling a SaaS app? A great use case will make paying and collecting simple for parents and providers.

Your revenue model. Are you collecting payments for your services? Do you enable someone else to collect money? Are you looking to make money off the collection of money, or lower your cost of transactions?

Your level in the food chain. Your costs for payments depends on where you are in the food chain of payment processing. How much volume do you think you have will help pick where you should end up.

Your level of risk. How much risk are you willing to take on for security and fraud? Security is a big thing to manage for payments, as is fraud. Managing both can generate a lot of savings.

Your tech stack. Is your tech stack up to date and secure? Are you mobile, Web, or hardware? Payments come with a development cost, and ongoing management.

Your costs. Are you looking at 2.9% and $0.30, flat rate, interchange plus, or surcharging? Understanding the pricing and reporting of ACH and credit cards payments is key to negotiating a good deal.

Your partner. Depending on your volume and needs will help you pick a processing partner. When choosing the right partner keep in mind factors such as  technology, onboarding, and rates.

Your team. Is your team open to the idea, and can they get all the details for successful payments collection?

If you have a good use case and understand your revenue model, you should look at getting into payments. It might look daunting. But it doesn’t have to be. I’m going to break down each of the areas into the details you need to make an informed decision. My goal is for you to understand if and how you could get into payments with your FamilyTech platform. Payments isn’t for every company. For the right ones, however, it can be a major revenue source.