Episode 20: Maximize Revenue and Customer Retention through Streamlined Payments with Kevin Salerno, Billing and Payments Architect at Newfold Digital/Constant Contact

In this episode of the Subscriptions: Scaled podcast, Nick Fredrick, President of Rebar Technology Solutions, sits down with Kevin Salerno, Billing And Payments Architect of Newfold Digital. 

Who is Newfold Digital?

Newfold Digital serves nearly seven million customers and owns popular brands Web.com, HostGator, Bluehost, and many other digital presence providers. Constant Contact is a newer acquisition, and Kevin has been with Constant Contact for 16 years. 

For the past five years, Kevin's role has been building out a payment and billing infrastructure that can support Newfold through acquisitions and optimize the payment strategy for the whole enterprise. 

Consolidating International Billing Systems 

Kevin's original task was consolidating 16 different billing systems. As a result, not only were the billing systems unique, but the teams that worked on them were also unique. 

The companies that they've brought together are from all over the world, so they had to overcome the challenges of building a congruent system and working with people from across the globe. 

International Payment Methods

The real challenge when dealing with international markets came in deciding on payment methods. 

The predominant payment method in every region is not adequate for every product. Kevin's team mainly works with recurring billing products. Unfortunately, a lot of the payment methods in certain areas don't support recurring payments. 

International Expansion Mistakes

A mistake many business owners make is believing that what works in their home country will work everywhere. Kevin's team found that most of their companies' systems that worked well in local markets didn't work well in other markets across the board. 

One strategy that helped them make progress was focusing on the small gains they could make immediately. They focused a lot on the payments side, allowing them to have a more significant impact faster. 

Multiple Problems, Multiple Brands, Multiple Locations

When you're trying to solve multiple problems for multiple brands in various locations, the stair-step ladder approach to focusing on small gains is critical. 

Kevin's team built out their solutions in segments. They focused on payments, order management, product catalog, taxation, fraud, and other areas separately. He emphasized the importance of not treating every brand the same. Instead, each brand has different problems to overcome to bring all the systems together. 

Prioritizing Problems and Solutions

Many times there's a laundry list of improvements you can make. 

ROI and risk are two prominent factors Kevin's team considers when assessing what problems to tackle. 

They also had to think about the resources each brand had available. One of their biggest challenges was that everyone at the different companies didn't know how to use the new technology they were trying to implement.

They also had to consider changes that the company is forced to make. Sometimes the changes were compliance violations or other factors that would affect the company beyond just their department.  

Compliance Requirements and Education

Their goal was to streamline the process across all their brands. The challenge was operating in so many different markets with different rules and regulations. Kevin's team works closely with finance stakeholders so the business and technical teams can be on the same page. 

A big part of staying up to date with compliance and regulations is embracing the role of being an educator to others in the company. Kevin says his team spends much of their time educating others on the value of what they do and understanding how it impacts them. 

Importance of the Payments Ecosystem

Platforms like PaymentsEd are important for the success of payments teams. And Kevin believes that if individuals want to succeed in payments, they have to learn from other industry professionals. 

He even brings his team to industry events and conferences. He also encourages company leaders to invest in their payments team's personal growth. 

Kevin says you have to understand the role you want your payments team to play. For example, he doesn't expect his developers to know and understand every rule that compliance people know. But he does want them to be informed, so they have a better understanding of what they're building. 

Unique Billing Systems

Constant Contact uses a pre-pay model—but it's a nuanced pre-pay that every billing system can't handle. 

Kevin has found that throughout different industries, there is no one right billing system. Even the systems like Stripe that developers love and can be deployed quickly are often not the best solution for companies. 

Bringing on Payments Experts

Kevin advocates for every startup to have someone focused on payments early on. It can be a challenge to have someone focused on payments, but the challenges that arise from not having someone focused on payments can be costly.  

Many people work with providers that are easy to set up initially and then realize what it costs in fees and potential compliance issues later. 

For some startups, it's perfectly okay to go with a "plug and play" option but never rely on it being a "set it and forget it" style solution. At a minimum, you should have milestones in place to revisit how efficient your payments and billing system is. 

The Importance of Payments for Subscription Businesses

In the subscription business, you have to realize and accept the reality of your business. You're in the business of taking payments, and the sooner you can collect and keep as much money as possible, the better your business will be. 

You also have to understand what data is essential to streamlining payments. That's the data that should be measured and evaluated. 

Kevin found that one of the issues for their brands was measuring the wrong data. Measuring the wrong data is just one more reason to have a payment professional on your team and stay educated on payments and billing. 

To hear more from Kevin, tune into this episode of the Subscriptions: Scaled podcast.

—

Ready to get started with Rebar?

Head to rebartechnology.com or email info@rebartechnology.com to schedule a call today.