These days, to retain customers, Internet Service Providers should have a wide range of different plans and packages to ensure a great customer experience.

Unfortunately, there are a few impediments that most of you might face down the road:

• You have limited resources or don’t have a clear vision of customer demand to introduce new services quickly.
• You fail to put together network management and billing. 
• You get by without software, so you end up handling all crucial parts of your business processes manually. There’s also an aspect of human error to take into account.
• You have software, but there’s something odd about it: it’s old and cumbersome and doesn’t really meet your needs, or you use self-developed software that constantly needs tweaks and the developer’s involvement. 

With Splynx, you can quickly get around these hiccups, set up new customers, get them on board, and get them charged for your services. In this blog post, you’ll delve into the nuts and bolts of how a flexible tariff plan configuration can bring your business to the next level. 

1. Introduce new plans and update all existing customers in one click

In Splynx, no tariff plan is set in stone. You can configure custom service packages with different prices and speeds and tie them to a specific customer or apply batch instructions for all customers for the important services for your business. Let’s say you need to create a tariff plan for those customers who want their internet to be fast enough to binge streaming and share large files. You can give them a faster download speed in the evening but block when the amount of data is reached.

You may also want to be more lenient with your customers and create a plan with a handful of perks such as delayed payments options, data top-ups, unlimited traffic on the weekends, etc. Splynx eases the creation of custom and automated experiences for the end-users.

In the tool, you can create and manage five different plans that go in line with recurring, prepaid, and postpaid billing types. Let’s take a look at them:

• Internet plan. You can create various services, set them a monthly price and tax, control internet speed, manage bandwidth usage, regulate data usage, and set different FUPs. 
• Voice plan. You can charge clients a monthly fee for phone services used for CDR processing.
• Recurring plans. You can charge customers regularly for services like IPTV, public IP addresses, etc. 
• One-Time plans. You can use them to charge for the services on a one-time basis. It’s mainly used for installation or call-out fees, used materials, labor, etc.
• Bundles. Here, you have a wiggle room to group internet, VoIP mobile, TV, and any recurring service into a single plan with one price. It allows you to sell different combinations of services in one package that could be the right fit for your business strategy. 

Read more about internet plan configuration in our guide: ‘Configuring Tariff Plans.’ 

2. Pack your services in bundles

Many people find it’s convenient to have all of their services housed by one provider. That makes bundle packages an excellent choice for them. A bundle pack can include two, three, or four different services: any combination of internet, TV, phone, recurring services such as public IP addresses, server rental, etc. It throws everything into one pot for one low monthly price.

End-users may opt for various triple-play bundles that often combine internet, home phone, and TV as a single access subscription.

Bundle packages work great for: 

• Small and middle-sized businesses — a lucrative niche that often requires low maintenance and results in long-time relationships.
• Families or individuals who enjoy a lot of entertainment options, including access to premium channels, such as HBO.

Here’re some pros of using bundles:

• It’s a one-stop selling — you can charge one price for two or more bundled services.
• Set up multiple services in one go.
• Give promo offers such as free installation, faster download speeds, premium programming, or bonus features.
• Offer package deals for different tiers — much-needed to target your offers to the right audience.
• Apply contract settings if needed (you can manage contract duration, activation fee, cancellation fee, prior cancellation fee)

3. Sign contracts with benefits for a long-time commitment

Many internet providers shift from traditional contract policy, which stipulates heady early termination fees. Still, if you want to build strong relationships with customers for the foreseen future, you’ll devise a binding term agreement. 

For instance, you can suggest introductory offers and lower cost per megabit per second to those ready to sign the agreement and commit to using your service for a year or two. The premium plan, data caps, or higher rates can be assigned to those customers who opt for pay-as-they-go plans.

In Splynx, you can easily and quickly check into a contract and other agreement documents in the ‘CRM’ module → ‘Documents’ section. Use a predefined template, change and save it as a new template for further assignments. Another option is to upload a pdf file.

This step-by-step guide will help you figure out the drill: ‘Documents’.  

Here you’ll find templates for contracts: ‘Variables for templates’.

4.Give individual or time-limited offers

The billing system is the pillar of Splynx when it comes to effective business management. You can create or update new services, introduce time-limited offers and tie them to any billing type: recurring in a prepay or postpay mode, or charge your customers only for a specific time frame in a prepay billing type. By combining these two forces, you can devise a powerful marketing strategy:

• Throw a promo offer for a month / your company anniversary / Christmas, etc. 
• Update the existing plan if a customer agrees to be charged a higher / lower price.
• For instance, create loyalty programs, give a 50% discount for the first three months of service for new customers, or encourage regular customers to stay with you longer.
• Entice customers to sign up with some incentive, whether it’s a free subscription or premium service, or another extra.

5. Create short-term plans with different time intervals

There are many instances when users seek a temporary broadband solution (a day / week/ month): travel purposes, conferences or festivals, construction sites, or maritime industry. 

ISPs concentrated in the countries that experience the influx of tourists during high seasons should deem short-term plans to be a win-win solution. 

With the RADIUS server, Splynx can provide one-time access via prepaid voucher generation.

Take a look at the process of generating a prepaid voucher: ‘Prepaid Vouchers’.

Bottom line

Here’s a brief takeaway:

• Set up new plans with advanced rules and tie them to convenient billing types.
• Bundle services and present them as an all-in-one deal.
• Create short-term plans for temporary relationships with customers or those who prefer a ‘pay-and-go’ model.
• Stand out to new customers with clear win-win contracts.

Whichever plan you choose to create, just make sure it aligns with your business goals.