This is a common one: you want the predictability and cash flow of an annual contract, but your customer says, “We love it... but we can’t pay it all up front.”
So what do you do?
Option 1: Offer monthly billing
Sure, you could just switch them to a monthly plan. But that usually means:
- Losing the upfront cash
- Risking higher churn
- Potentially missing your sales targets
Not ideal.
Option 2: Spread payments manually
Some founders break up the annual amount into 12 monthly invoices. It works, but:
- You’re still on the hook for chasing payments
- It’s a collection risk
- You haven’t actually solved the cash flow issue
Option 3: Offer customer financing
This is where it gets interesting. With customer financing, you can let the customer pay monthly while you still get the full annual amount up front.
With Lemon:
- You offer financing as part of the deal
- The customer pays Lemon back in monthly instalments
- Lemon pays you the full contract value on day one
No loans, no risk, no weird workarounds. It’s like Buy Now, Pay Later - but for SaaS.
You get the cash flow stability of annual billing. Your customer gets the payment flexibility they need. Everyone wins.
