Migrating from FileMaker Pro to a Billing Platform: The How’s and Whys

FileMaker Pro is great for organizing databases and inventory. But that’s the most it can do for growing subscription businesses. It is absolutely not built for recurring billing, invoicing, or any sort of payment automation in any way. Therefore, businesses shouldn’t waste precious time trying to manage their customers’ bills inside FileMaker Pro.

In this age, we have specialized solutions in market that are known as subscription billing software. Billing software provides businesses with customizable databases, payment automation, communication automation, and far more functionality than FileMaker Pro.

Therefore, making the switch from FileMaker Pro to a billing platform like SubscriptionFlow is essential for keeping up with today’s billing needs.

Modern Billing Needs Have Outpaced what FileMaker Pro Can Deliver

When subscription businesses grow, their billing requirements become more complicated. They can’t be expected to be handled manually, especially if we have thousands of customers in question. That’s why FileMaker Pro can’t be truly relied upon. The app doesn’t support any recurring payment logic, turning billing into a process that needs to be handled manually.

Businesses did use to work with FileMaker Pro for organizing their billing flows as the app was adaptable and affordable. Startups are especially attracted to this app as they can manage their basic needs in there. For example, creating customer profiles, linking them to different tables like ‘payments’ and ‘subscription plan’ for tracking purposes, segmenting subscribers, and so on.

But once your subscriber count climbs past a hundred and approaches a thousand, cracks in your FileMaker Pro setup begin to show. Your billing cycles grow more frequent, customers demand instant access to everything, and new operational demands emerge constantly.

When that happens, know that you’ve outgrown FileMaker Pro, and now need a purpose-built billing platform.

Limitations of FileMaker Pro for Billing

FileMaker Pro struggles to keep up with the modern billing landscape due to these factors:

1. Requires custom scripting

Businesses can create an invoice layout inside FileMaker, but can’t generate it the way a billing platform does. This layout creation too requires custom scripting that needs a developer. After the invoice is developed, it has to be sent manually, as nothing is natively automated. 

2. Manual customer data entry

All customers’ data has to be entered in FileMaker’s tables manually. It doesn’t get entered into the right fields itself when customers fill out a checkout form. There’s no workflow or checkout integration supported like that, which slows down subscription activation for customers.

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Because as long as a business doesn’t have the required customer data in its database, it can’t activate their subscription. Moreover, employees have to be extra cautious typing customers’ information, as errors in that can cause bigger problems in the future.

Hand typing information like that doesn’t seem like an issue when acquisition rate is slow, and you have a small customer volume. But once this volume starts to expand, things get out of hand pretty quickly unless managed through an automated platform. 

3. Lack of integrations and automation

The platform can’t be integrated with payment gateways, or other essential software like accounting platforms. Neither does it support the automatic data syncing function with external software.

This means that even if you want to keep your customer data inside FileMaker, you won’t be able to share it across your software ecosystem. That creates data silos where companies have to manually keep an eye on their data existing separately in each system, and ensure that it’s consistent.

4. Basic reporting

FileMaker can generate basic reports based on the data that a business stores in it. For example, it can calculate the churn rate or renewal rate for a month. That is based on how many customers are flagged as renewed and how many are flagged as cancelled within its internal tables.

Similarly, it displays all totals too which can be accessed monthly. For instance, total active customers, total monthly earnings, etc. But advanced reporting, such as real-time customer behavior patterns and revenue recognition are not supported. And the lack of these insights reduces your improvement potential.

How a Modern Billing System Assists

Billing systems like SubscriptionFlow cater to the evolving requirements of expanding businesses. They come with solutions like:

• Automation

Automation is the secret to smooth-flowing, precise workflows. That’s also the main advantage of levelling up with a billing platform. With this feature, you can automate customers’ billing cycles and charge them exact amounts.

You can create professional, flawless invoices and insert tax calculations into them. You can also retry unsuccessful payments, and make real-time subscription plan adjustments.

• Scalability

With a scalable platform, you can grow beyond boundaries. There’s no set subscriber limit that can you can’t surpass, and no limit to the number of countries you can expand into. Robust platforms support global expansion and provide all the means for it: suitable gateways, multi-currency invoicing, auto-tax compliance, and so on.

• Real-time analytics

FileMaker only supports reporting based on the data that is present inside its tables. And that data is human-entered. But billing software doesn’t require any manual data entries. It can be connected with the businesses’ checkout flows so that when customers fill checkout forms, their data flows from there into the software’s database automatically.

What’s more, this software tracks customer activity across various touchpoints on its own, and generates visual analytics that are easier to comprehend.

How to Migrate from FileMaker to Billing Platform in 4 Steps

By following these steps, you can make the switch efficiently:

1. Auditing and cleaning existing data

The first step is to clean all data stored inside your FileMaker Pro tables. Since that data has been entered by hand, it is error-prone, and can contain mistakes such as duplications, two names assigned to the same customer, incorrect billing dates, etc.

If this unrefined data is transferred to the billing software as it is, it can lead to faulty billing flows. The billing platform, for instance, can create two separate subscription accounts for the two customer names linked to the same customer profile in FileMaker. Hence, auditing is the primary task a company needs to perform.

2. Choosing the most suitable billing solution

Different billing platforms exist in the market that address different client needs. Some provide niche-specific features, while others offer more general solutions. Businesses need to analyze each software according to what they want in it, and adopt a solution according to their requirements and budget.

For those looking for suggestions: try SubscriptionFlow. It’s a leading billing software catering to businesses belonging to multiple niches. It has got what is needed to keep billing efficient, and data records clean and auditable.

3. Mapping and migrating data

Once you choose your billing platform, mapping starts. Data from FileMaker has to be mapped to equivalent fields in the billing software. For instance, the customer payment info has to be mapped to the payment data fields in the software, and so on.

Mapping has to done with precision, so that all customer and payment information is transferred accurately to the software.

4. Testing and going live

When you’re sure that you’ve migrated your entire data to the billing platform, your testing phase starts. Try generating test invoices, and running test billing cycles. Testing gives you a better grasp of the software’s capabilities, and also helps you identify any occurring errors timely.

If errors are spotted, such as incorrect proration, you can have it fixed before going live. Once everything is fixed and your test billing cycles are smooth and stable, you can start billing your actual customers with confidence.

Why Choose SubscriptionFlow as Your Billing Partner

If you’re looking for a reliable billing partner, choose SubscriptionFlow. SubscriptionFlow makes billing pain-less, cuts down manual processes, and fast-tracks invoice management. These are some reasons why successful businesses adopt SubscriptionFlow:

• Native payment gateway integrations

Unlike FileMaker, SubscriptionFlow lets you build a robust gateway-stack. It supports multiple gateways natively that target different markets around the world, and accept payments in different currencies. By integrating with these gateways, you set your business up for global expansion.

• Automated payment cycles

Billing is entirely automated. Meaning, you no longer have to spend hours on day-to-day payment tasks. The software keeps customers’ payment data in its secure database, and uses that to charge them automatically. It auto-processes payments through the gateways of your choice, and updates invoice statuses in real-time.

When an invoice status changes from unpaid to paid, the software triggers subscription renewal for the concerned customer. In other words, renewals happen in real-time, as soon as payments are completed. This gives customers right what they expect: instant and seamless access.

• Customizable workflows

Businesses don’t need to keep FileMaker to create customizable flows. SubscriptionFlow itself is highly customizable. It doesn’t only let businesses customize workflows, but also run them on automation. For example, you can customize an invoice format and assign it to one customer segment only.

The software ensures that the customers belonging to that segment always receive their invoices in the desired format.

• Support for failed payment recovery

SubscriptionFlow facilitates execution of smart dunning strategies, such as payment retries. It lets businesses develop their own custom retry schedules as well, and then carries out payment attempts based on those. This feature increases payment success chances so customers can proceed with renewal as soon as possible.

• Real-time dashboards

Via smart dashboards, businesses are given a bird’s-eye view of all their operations. They can easily zoom in to access the specifics too. Such as their customer profiles. Each profile is updated in real-time, according to the latest customer activity. For instance, if a customer changes their email from their self-service portal, it can be seen in their profile on the business’s dashboard too.

FileMaker Pro isn’t built with your recurring billing needs in mind. But SubscriptionFlow is. Migrate to SubscriptionFlow today and future-proof your billing operations.