Stripe recently announced Atlas, stating that it is “a new way to start an internet business anywhere” – and we agree.
Starting a business that collects revenue online requires a merchant account and a payment gateway. Businesses located in countries such as the United States, Canada, Australia, and many within the European Union may take for granted how easy it is to obtain a merchant account/payment gateway.
But with a growing global economy, many entrepreneurs worldwide face hurdles when trying to start up their own online businesses. One of the biggest difficulties centers around obtaining a merchant account and payment gateway since availability depends on your business’ geographic location.
At Maxio, we have a BYOG policy – bring your own gateway. Once you plug in a payment gateway, you can configure your product subscriptions and start collecting recurring revenue. Here is an overview of how it works:
Even though we support over a dozen popular payment gateway providers (including Stripe), it is not uncommon to receive requests from entrepreneurs in countries outside of the supported countries.
Stripe’s Atlas program aims to eliminate this hurdle by breaking the geographical barriers, especially for startups in Africa, Latin America, the Middle East and parts of Asia. Patrick Collison, co-founder and CEO of Stripe, said “That includes about 6.2 billion people we don’t reach yet, and that’s a huge missed opportunity if we didn’t try to do so.”
How It Works
Atlas is starting out in beta, and entrepreneurs can apply for access at: stripe.com/atlas or be invited by one of the more than 60 accelerators, investors, and partners in the Atlas network. For businesses that are approved, Stripe will help with the following for a one-time fee of $500:
Incorporate a company in the U.S.
Open a U.S. bank account and get you a tax ID number.
Start a Stripe account to accept payments from around the world.
Get guidance about U.S. law and taxes from Orrick and PwC.
Provide access tools and resources from Amazon Web Services (AWS) including a $15,000 in AWS promotional credits for beta users.
This means entrepreneurs with subscription-based businesses outside supported countries can now use Maxio to manage their subscribers and streamline their recurring billing!
Be More Productive with Stripe + Maxio
Once you have a Stripe account, simply plug your credentials into Maxio and you’re quickly up and running without any costly development – we’ve done all the work so you can concentrate on growing your subscription business.
Some key features of using Maxio with Stripe include:
Maxio supports a variety of billing scenarios, and our interface makes it easy to fine tune and test different products/plans to optimize conversions and revenue.
Marketing and sales will have the tools to succeed and can quickly create coupon codes for marketing campaigns or apply discounts on the fly to close deals faster.
Gain instant access to customizable credit card expiration notices, card retry logic, and dunning emails that are proven to reduce churn and recover lost revenue.
Provide better customer support by giving your team access to plan information, account history, and the ability to quickly issue credits, process refunds, and make account changes.
Monitor the health of your business with customizable reports and analytics.