Monetize

Monetize

Turn a product into revenue. Run BEFORE building most features — what people pay for defines the MVP.

Step 1 — Foundation (answer honestly before anything else)

Delegate to the biz-strategist agent with the product idea and target user:

• Who exactly is the customer, and what painful problem does this solve?
• What do they use today (including "nothing"), and why switch?
• Competitor scan with real current prices.

If the answers are weak, stop here and report that — integrating Stripe into a product nobody pays for is wasted work.

Step 2 — Model & pricing

From the biz-strategist output, lock in: ONE monetization model, 2-3 price tiers max with concrete numbers, and the "needed to charge the first customer" feature list. Everything not on that list is deferred.

Step 3 — Payment integration (when there's something to sell)

Default: Stripe. Standard shape for a SaaS webapp:

1. Stripe Checkout (hosted) for purchase — do not build custom card forms.
2. Webhook endpoint (checkout.session.completed, customer.subscription.updated/deleted) that updates the user's plan in the database; verify webhook signatures; make handlers idempotent.
3. Stripe Customer Portal for self-serve cancel/upgrade — don't build billing UI.
4. Gate features by the plan column in the database (server-side checks, not client-only).
5. Test end-to-end in Stripe test mode with test cards before going live. Fetch current Stripe docs via the context7 MCP tools — API versions change.

Implementation goes to backend-builder; keys are env vars, never in code. Anything beyond this standard shape (usage-based billing, invoicing, marketplace splits) goes through /product-spec's feasibility gate before implementation.

Step 4 — Landing page

biz-strategist writes the copy (headline = customer outcome, pain, 3-step how, proof, one CTA); frontend-builder ships it. Include: pricing table matching Step 2, and analytics (choose a simple one, e.g. platform analytics or a lightweight script — no heavyweight suites for v1).

Step 5 — Launch checklist

• Payments verified live with one real transaction, refunded after. Switching to live keys and making the real charge require the user's explicit go-ahead — never run them unprompted (a refunded charge still costs the Stripe fee); until then, test-mode evidence is the bar.
• Legal minimums: terms + privacy pages (templates fine), refund policy stated.
• Money-path actions only here — the first 3 with dates; channel planning and announcements belong to /launch.
• Metric to watch weekly: visitors → signups → paid conversion. One number per stage, tracked from day one.

Report (use exactly these sections)

• Model & prices: chosen model and tiers with concrete numbers.
• MVP-to-charge list: features required to charge customer #1; everything else deferred.
• Integration status: built and tested vs planned (Stripe test-mode evidence when built).
• Launch actions: the first 3 concrete actions with dates.
• Assumptions to validate: market/pricing assumptions not yet backed by real users.