Consumers have become accustomed to flexible payment options when they are shopping online. This includes consumers in every industry, purchasing both products and services, and runs the gamut from payment options like crypto and online wallets all the way to financing options that help them break their purchases up into payments.

The latter is what we will discuss today. While many white-label lending platforms also make it easier to accept different forms of payment, one of the most in-demand fintech products are platforms that allow businesses to offer flexible payment plans to consumers.

To help businesses understand how to offer these payment plans, we are going to cover:

• The benefits of flexible payment plans
• The most common white-label lending offers
• How to offer flexible payment plans

Let’s dive into each to get a better idea of what these platforms have to offer.

The Benefits of Flexible Payment Plans

As mentioned above, the market has widely embraced flexible payment plans as a way to make bigger and more premium purchases accessible. As a result, there are several benefits to offering them, which include:

• Higher conversion
• Higher average order value
• More repeat business
• Better customer satisfaction
• More modern customer experience

This covers the three main KPIs for most sales-driven businesses: Conversion, AOV, and repeat purchases. By increasing all of these at once, flexible payment plans set themselves apart as an exceptional option when considering new ways to grow a business. What they need to know, though, is what options need to be offered to consumers to maximize these benefits.

The Most Common White-Label Lending Offers

Not all lending options work as well as others, and there are a few offers that every quality lending platform should have. These include:

• Installment financing
• Co-branded credit cards
• Consumer loans

Each of these options lends itself to a different sales situation, so let’s discuss where each is best used.

Installment Financing

This is the most popular of all the options on the list, and its rise has largely driven the adoption of white-label lending platforms. These installment financing plans offer similar structures to loans, with a predictable payment schedule and pre-determined funding amount, but they offer low-to-no interest and aren’t reported to credit bureaus in the same way that traditional loans are.

They are versatile and work in most purchasing situations. They are best made for purchases that can be broken into four or fewer payments since this is usually the payment structure that allows for zero interest.

However, this may change as regulators begin to fiddle with how installment financing providers have to disclose, structure, and report these payment plans. As of now, though, these plans are easily the most popular and important for businesses to offer.

Co-Branded Credit Cards

Co-branded credit cards have been a standard sales tool for a while now, and the best white-label lending platforms can allow businesses to offer their own. These are pretty much the same as any other credit card, but they offer special rewards or promo interest rates when purchasing from a specific vendor.

Since credit cards are a more permanent arrangement, they work best for industries that rely primarily on repeat customers that will continue to benefit from the card’s promotions throughout their entire membership. They can also be used as credit-building tools since credit cards don’t immediately report as debt, and they will only report what is used and left unpaid.

Consumer Loans

The most traditional option on the list, consumer loans offer a predictable and pre-determined payment structure and amount that makes repayment simple and easy to plan. The only drawbacks are the interest rate and the fact that they are reported in full to credit bureaus, usually resulting in a ding to the user's credit score in the short run.

Offer Flexible Payment Plans With Skeps

Skeps offers a comprehensive, end-to-end consumer financing platform that helps businesses modernize their entire payment process. Working with an entire network of established lenders, we go above and beyond one-click payment, also offering a one-click application process for several different types of consumer financing, including:

• Installment financing payment plans
• Co-branded credit cards
• Consumer loans and leases

If you’re looking to partner with a forward-thinking fintech company that will get your financial products in front of as many consumers as possible, Skeps is the perfect fit.