Today, the recurring payment or subscription model is helping many online businesses all over the world. Content Management giants, WordPress, has also made recurring payments feature available for its users.
The new recurring payment feature will allow WordPress users to earn money for their content, directly from any page on their site. The payment feature is also available for self-hosted WordPress users who have the Jetpack plugin installed.
WordPress recurring payments with Stripe payment, therefore WP users must have a connected account to receive payments on their website. Stripe provides services for over 30 countries around the world, including Malaysia.
The best things aren’t always free. Therefore, the recurring payment feature isn’t free. The feature is only available to premium WordPress users. For every 2.9% + $0.30 payment that Stripe collects, WordPress.com has a tiered fee table based plan for its users.
- WordPress for eCommerce users – No fee
- WordPress for Business users – 2% per sale
- WordPress for Premium users – 4% per sale
- WordPress for Personal users – 8% per sale
Users in the lowest tier will see nearly 11% of sales go into WordPress and Stripe fees. If your business receives large payments, it’s more sensible and affordable to upgrade to a higher plan to offset the charges.
The charges for each tier seem reasonably priced since the infrastructure is handled by WordPress.
However, for self-hosted users, they can bypass the WordPress fees with many existing payment plugins. But, the self-hosted users will have to decide whether the tools and support offered by WordPress are enough of a value-add to opt for their service.
The Jetpack team first came up with a beta test for this new feature last year (May 18, 2019). At the time it was first introduced, it was called “membership block.”
The announcement that followed the beta test version was that users can provide ongoing subscriptions, site memberships, monthly donations, and more.
However, the features offered by members-based content seems to be limited when compared to other fully-featured membership plugins and would need extra manual work to limit access to a site’s premium content.
WordPress’s recommendation is to password-protect posts and email out the password to subscribers or set up a newsletter.
This system is far-fetched from a true membership system but could be enough for the average blogger who wants to make a few bucks as a side income.
However, the system is open for improvement if the WordPress and Jetpack teams would like to develop the system.
Recurring Payment Blocks
The WordPress recurring payments feature is available for at least Jetpack version 7.4. The feature comes in the form of a block for the block editor and is located under the “Jetpack” tab when inserting a new block.
The block shows four fields and can be customized. They include:
- Currency
- Price
- Description
- Renewal Interval
There is no limit to the number of payment blocks you can add. A user can create a new payment plan by adding a new block.
How to activate Recurring Payments on your WordPress website?
1. Connect and create a Stripe account
Go to your Earn Page, click Connect to Stripe to Get Started — from there, you’ll be guided through the entire setup process. You’ll also get help on how to set up a Stripe account if you don’t have one already.
2. Customize the details of the recurring payment
After connecting a Stripe account, you can proceed to create as many different payment plans as you want to. You can choose different currencies, amounts, payment frequencies, and names. With this, you can offer different tiers and subscriptions for your readers.
When adding a new Recurring Payments block, you can select an already existing plan without going through the entire setup process. You can even ask your WordPress hosting service provider in Malaysia to add the new payment block for you.
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