No more stacks of paper on your desk, missing invoices, or chasing down people for payments. Save time, money, and valuable accounts payable resources by automating and streamlining the entire invoice process from creation to settlement. We are witnessing a fundamental change in the way customers purchase everyday products and services. There is an overwhelming preference for the convenience and peace of mind of memberships, subscriptions and other forms of recurring billing related products or services. Consumers would rather subscribe than buy, or rent than own, which makes automating your invoice and payment process an attractive time saver.
PayWhirl can help businesses in nearly every industry automate their billing and invoicing processes. Some common examples include: donations, subscription billing, services billing, subscription boxes, membership programs, clubs, layaway programs, etc. Let’s also not forget any businesses with loyal customers who purchase on a regular and seasonal basis.
You can save time by storing custom payment methods securely for future use. This helps both the business and the customer, since both have access to the information by default. Customers will love that they will be able to make changes to their account without having to contact anyone at your business and you’ll save time (aka money) on customer service.
Here are a few reasons why automating your invoicing and payment processing is the right move to make.
1. Streamline Bookkeeping
PayWhirl is a recurring payments solution that can help you automatically create invoices once every week, month, or any predefined period of time. This makes revenue more predictable leading to better cash flow management.
This will allow you to spend more time on tasks that make you money. You will save an estimated 65% on invoice processing costs and 90% of processing time. Once your customers’ information is saved and the recurring invoices are being created automatically, you will spend less time on customer management, and more time on your core business.
Choosing the right invoicing or payment platform for your business is key in making the automation process work seamlessly and successfully. Among the basics you should get from a subscription commerce platform are: a customer portal, and customized emails. You should be sure the platform can accommodate your more specific needs.
For example:
if you work with foreign clients, accepting foreign mailing addresses and dealing with foreign currencies will be important. Another important factor is customization.
This will help streamline your bookkeeping and will vary depending on your industry or business model.
2. Predictable Revenue
Whether you are a small business or have investors, one thing everyone wants to know are the estimated revenues. Recurring payments and automated invoicing allows merchants to charge a customers’ stored payment method on file for goods or service, on an arranged recurring schedule. This take responsibility off the customer having to remember to pay each invoice manually. It also allows businesses to get paid faster and provides customers with more convenience.
Having even a portion of your customers on an automated invoicing helps you lower costs, and build customer loyalty. Having the right tools to manage automatic payments will free up a lot of your time. Additionally, scheduled payments are predictable in nature, therefore help with predicting monthly revenues (MRR) and inventory needs. Tools, like PayWhirl, make it easy to see statistics like MRR, ARR, LTV, Churn, Customer Acquisition Source & more.
3. Business Forecasting
Automating invoices not only saves time with billing, it provides valuable information for business analytics. Analyzing invoice data can provide valuable information. PayWhirl’s built-in reporting tools and data exports make it easy to access. PayWhirl automatically tracks the key statistics related to invoices. You can also track customer data and interactions using custom scripts from 3rd party systems to gather even more data.
The system also provides information on your CLTV (customer lifetime time value) and allows you to keep an eye on your customer churn rate as well.
All the information is there for the various financial reports you would want to run from: tracking cash flow, revenue loss and retention, to product sales, profitability by subscription plan and invoice aging information. You can also audit your accounts with real time visibility and permanent transaction history for all your customers.
Importance of Customer Metrics
Studies show many companies don’t keep track of important customer metrics. As Smart Insights reported, research from Totango found: only 35% of businesses track the cost of retention, 46% track customer health, 49% track customer lifetime value, and only 54% monitor revenues per customer.
With PayWhirl tracking these data and metrics already, you can forecast future revenues, growth rate, churn rate, and revenue trends. This way you can make sure your business is headed in the right direction.
Time Is Money
Automating invoices streamlines billing and simplifies the payment process. This allows businesses to direct their focus to customer experience thus improving retention and customer acquisition. It also lets customers and businesses focus on their core services and products at hand. A lot of companies provide these types of services today, so make sure to compare and review what each platform has to offer.
Ready to give it a whirl? Sign up now for free! PayWhirl has flexible pricing for all business sizes; including a free monthly plan so you only pay when you sell.
