A recurring revenue line that bills itself, from month one
Alumni and the wider school community advertise their businesses to the network, on standard and premium listings that recur automatically via Stripe. Members verify with a one-time code and list themselves, so the revenue compounds with zero admin per listing.
Included in the Pro plan ($949/mo).
Listings that sell and bill themselves, versus invoicing every business by hand. Forty listings at $30 average is $14,400 a year of predictable recurring revenue, from one module.
Alumni-owned businesses are an underused asset: graduates running restaurants, agencies, financial services, trades. And the community is wider than alumni, parent-owned businesses, staff ventures and partner organisations all want visibility too. Without a system, that willingness to pay goes uncaptured, and any attempt to run it manually drowns in vetting and invoicing.
The Business Directory opens the marketplace to the whole community and automates the money: members list themselves, Stripe bills them on a recurring cycle, and you simply approve.
Parents and local businesses verify with a one-time code and list themselves, no alumni account needed. They upgrade, downgrade and cancel their own plans. Stripe handles the recurring billing. You set the prices and approve, and the revenue line compounds from month one.
Open to the whole community — not just alumni
Alumni, current and past parents, families, staff, associations and local businesses can all list. The marketplace is the entire school community, which is where the reach — and the revenue — actually come from. A directory of only alumni businesses is a fraction of the potential.
Build a recurring income stream — paid to your Stripe
Set the price for Premium and Standard listing plans (or offer them free) and connect your own Stripe, so listing income lands directly in the school’s account, in your currency — no third-party skim. Members choose a plan and can upgrade, downgrade or cancel it themselves, so a listing becomes a revenue line that keeps paying until a member cancels — not a one-off sale.
Rich listings — photo gallery, offers and more
Each listing is a proper advertisement, not a line in a phone book: business name and category, contact details, a gallery of images, a description of services and customisable promotional content such as special offers. The Premium plan unlocks the fuller presentation — giving members a concrete reason to pay for the upgrade, and giving you the higher-value tier.
Embed the directory on your main school website
Copy one embed code and the directory appears on your school’s official site — or any external platform. Now parents, staff and local businesses can find it and list their business without ever logging into the alumni site, widening the community that sees it and pays for it.
Self-serve listings, no account required
Non-alumni verify with a one-time email code — no alumni login needed — then complete a simple three-step listing: business details, advertisement content, publish. They manage it themselves afterwards with the same email, so the school never becomes the data-entry clerk.
Auto or manual approval — you stay in control
Choose whether listings go live instantly or wait for your approval, with an email alert on every new submission. Review pending listings, approve or reject, and view, archive or remove any approved listing. Quality control over who represents the school, without the admin becoming a bottleneck.
A revenue channel that runs itself. Members submit, you approve, Stripe collects, the platform renews.
Open the moderation queue. Two new listings pending: an accountant and a cafe, both paying the standard $30 a month. Approve. Stripe begins charging on Monday. By month-end, the directory contributes $480 in recurring revenue from sixteen listings, with zero manual collection effort.
A new strategic revenue line that strengthens alumni relationships rather than asking for donations.
Some alumni would rather pay $50 a month for a business listing than donate $600 a year. The directory captures revenue from a different motivation, commercial visibility, not charitable support. It is additive to fundraising, not a substitute for it.
Predictable monthly recurring revenue, automatically billed, in the same dashboard as Fundraising and Shop.
Forty listings at $30 average is $1,200 a month, $14,400 a year of predictable recurring revenue. The Business Directory pays for the Pro subscription several times over from a single revenue line.
The Business Directory sits in Pro, alongside Custom Pages. It is the module most likely to pay for the plan itself: even a modest number of listings generates recurring revenue that comfortably exceeds the Pro subscription, which is exactly why schools ready to monetise their community move up to it.
Set up the Business Directory with your pricing tiers. Invite your most prominent alumni businesses to list first. Watch the recurring revenue line start in month one and compound from there.