A subscription fee is a recurring payment made by a user to your marketplace business. The subscription purchase includes some form of unique permission, service, or capability not available to non-subscribers.
You can monetize your Sharetribe marketplace with subscriptions. Doing so requires determining your exact subscription offering, configuring tools to support this offering, and integrating the offering and tools into your marketplace for a smooth user experience.
This article introduces how charging a subscription fee works on Sharetribe.
How monetizing via a subscription fee works
When thinking about setting up a subscription offering on Sharetribe, consider the offering in two distinct pieces. The actual rights, permissions, or special services and the ability to exercise them is one piece. These are the features offered to someone who purchases a subscription. The second piece comprises functions that enable payment for the subscription, including things like the price and payment terms. This is the subscription payment system.
Determine what you are offering first. You have many options for what exactly you offer your subscribers. One example of an ability you can monetize is the right to join the marketplace and use it: purchasing a subscription grants you full access to the marketplace.
When considering what offerings you want to monetize via a one-time fee, review what user capabilities you can control in Console. Only certain marketplace capabilities of a user can be granted or revoked without coding in Sharetribe. The exact capabilities are described in the section below.
An important consideration in determining your offering is what user capabilities you can control in Console. Only certain marketplace capabilities of a user can be granted or revoked without coding in Sharetribe. The exact capabilities are described in the section below.
The second piece of your offering is the actual system where your subscription offering can be purchased. This is where you create the offerings, setting their price and writing out their terms. This is also where you make them available for purchase through a checkout page. Finally, this system also handles the billing logic, like recurring payments and invoicing.
Such a payment system must be set up externally and integrated into your marketplace. Sharetribe has a built-in payment system that enables customers to pay providers through your platform, but a subscription fee works differently, requiring payments between users and your platform directly. We recommend using Stripe’s tools called Checkout and Billing as your subscription payment system, but there are other solutions for such payments on the market.
Integrating your marketplace platform and subscription system together for a seamless user experience involves linking between the two systems and keeping the information between them in sync. Zapier can help keep these platforms in sync automatically, but you also have the option to manually keep the system on track.
What permissions can you grant to your subscribers
Sharetribe includes Access control features that enable you to control what functions a user can or cannot do on the marketplace. Permission to perform these core marketplace behaviors can be included in your subscription offering. Subscribers can gain rights that non-subscribers do not have.
Below are all the marketplace capabilities that can be controlled from Console by the admin for each user or listing and examples of how they can be included in your subscription offering.
Joining the marketplace - any new user must be approved in order to create new listings or initiate transactions. You can require a subscription to access the marketplace.
Posting rights - a user cannot create a new listing without receiving permission from the admin. You can require a subscription to receive posting rights. Posting rights can be revoked when a subscription lapses.
Listing viewing rights - a user cannot view listings without receiving permission from the admin. You can require a subscription to receive listing viewing rights. Listing viewing rights can be revoked when a subscription lapses.
Transaction rights - a user cannot start a new transaction without receiving permission from the admin. You can require a subscription to receive transaction rights. Transaction rights can be revoked when a subscription lapses.
Approve listings before publishing - a listing is not published (visible to other users) until it is approved. You can require a subscription for listings to be published on your marketplace. Follow our guide to set up a listing fee to publish listings.
Your offering may include perks, services or features not available explicitly in Console. Your challenge with these would be to figure out how to provide them to users, which will depend on the exact offering itself. Moreover, you may use custom code to introduce additional functionalities and features for your subscribers.
How to set up a subscription fee on your marketplace
Subscription fees are supported through an interplay of two systems: your marketplace and a subscription payment system. The following sections introduce how to set up the marketplace and subscription system and how to integrate them so that, together, they enable a subscription offering. Each section links to more detailed resources that you can follow for step-by-step instructions and examples.
Configure Access control permissions in Console
If your offering includes certain marketplace capabilities that can be controlled in Console, you must first turn on Access control to these capabilities. Turning on an Access control feature enables you to grant or revoke a user’s permission to use the feature. In addition, you can require that new listings must be approved before they are published.
Access control features are turned on in Console > General > Access Control
Individual user permissions are managed in Console > Manage > Users. Listings can be reviewed and approved in Console > Manage > Listings.
Configure the subscription payment system
You need to set up a subscription payment system to make your subscription offering available for purchase and to handle billing. There are numerous systems available for such a use case, but we recommend using Stripe. Their offering is robust. Moreover, because you may already be using Stripe for payments in your marketplace, using Stripe lets you keep all billing information in one place.
In Stripe, you’ll set up your subscription offerings that will live on a Stripe-hosted page. Users can purchase through this page. You can then view and manage their billing through the Stripe dashboard.
Integrate the two systems
The final set up piece is making your marketplace and payment system work together. There are two parts: linking to your checkout page and connecting your marketplace database to the payment system.
First, you must direct your users to the checkout page where they can purchase the subscription. Since your subscription system is external to your marketplace, the page where the subscription can be purchased is also external to your marketplace. You must direct users to that external page. You can do this by linking to the checkout page from your marketplace.
You have different options for where you present these links. If you are controlling access to a particular capability, such as the permission to post listings, you can configure a call-to-action button that leads to the checkout page. The button is presented on a page when users try to access the ability without having permission. You can also modify the information texts on this page using Marketplace texts.
Another option is to set up a content page describing your subscription offering and linking to the checkout from there. You could introduce the offering in a newsletter or through more targeted messaging. Regardless of the communication medium, a direct link is a great way to give users access to the subscription checkout page.
Second, you must connect your marketplace database to the subscription system so that you can update your marketplace whenever new subscriptions occur. You must connect them yourself because they are not connected by default.
You can update your marketplace manually: whenever you notice a subscription payment occurs, you can grant the necessary permissions in Console.
You can also automate this connection using the Sharetribe-Zapier integration. Zapier can update your marketplace database as a result of a purchase event in a subscription payment system. Specifically, Zapier can grant a user the same permissions automatically you’d otherwise need to manually grant through Console.
Custom code is another way to integrate your subscription billing system with your marketplace. Using custom code opens up more thorough integration capabilities, such as hosting the checkout page on your marketplace website rather than hosting it with the payment system. It can also enable you to create, and monetize, capabilities or features beyond those described in this article.
Charge a membership fee for access to the marketplace
Charging a membership fee is a common way to monetize your marketplace. Users pay a subscription fee in order to have access to the marketplace. Non-subscribed users do not have access to some, or all, core marketplace features such as viewing listings or starting transactions.
You can monetize membership to your marketplace using the approach outlined in this article. After deciding the membership offering, set up the necessary Access control configurations, configure a subscription payment system, and then connect your marketplace and payment system.