Why we've chosen features as the building block for monetization?

Imagine you're launching a new AI tool. You've built a pricing structure that looks like this on a spreadsheet:

From the outside, this pricing plan looks clean and easy to understand. But what looks simple on paper becomes complex when you start implementing each feature in a real product.

Let’s break down what it takes to make this plan work:

• To manage access to features like "AI Clips & Captions" or “Advanced AI analytics”, you'll need a feature flag system like LaunchDarkly or internal toggle logic that integrates with your authentication layer.
  
  

• For "Storage", you need real-time usage tracking. You’ll need to integrate your backend (like S3 or GCS) with a billing system that can ingest and reflect this usage accurately. Tools like Stripe Billing or Chargebee are commonly used here, provided your infrastructure streams real-time usage data.
  
  

• "Credits per month" require a wallet-like setup. Every action that consumes credits needs to reflect instantly. This means setting up balance tracking, enforcing credit deductions per operation, and triggering alerts or upgrades when thresholds are hit. Most of this logic has to be built in-house based on your product’s logic.
  
  

• Features like "Priority support" are often hardcoded on your pricing page and tied to your support tools like Zendesk or Intercom, usually through routing rules or SLA configurations.

And finally, you’ll need a billing system to generate invoices that combine fixed and variable charges, with clean summaries for both you and your customers. That typically means building custom logic and stitching together multiple tools.

Now imagine making even a small change like increasing credits for the Lite plan or adding a new feature for Growth users only. You’d need updates across the billing system, entitlement logic, frontend UI, and probably migrate customers between plans.

It’s like assembling IKEA furniture with parts from different boxes. Each part fits somewhere, but there’s no shared instruction manual. And when something breaks, good luck figuring out if it’s a billing issue, a product logic bug, or an access control mismatch.

This is what pricing looks like today for most companies. You’re trying to create something coherent for your users, but behind the scenes, it’s a patchwork of disconnected systems. One tool tracks usage. Another gates features. A third handles invoicing. None of them speak the same language.

This complexity doesn’t just slow down engineers. It affects product and finance too. Pricing experiments get blocked. Customer success can’t answer basic entitlement questions. Finance teams struggle to forecast revenue accurately. And as your product evolves, you end up with brittle, inconsistent pricing infrastructure.

The root of the issue

Most conventional billing tools were designed to handle seat-based pricing. The new-age billing tools are designed to handle usage-based billing only. That made sense when pricing was simple. You had a few plans, and each plan had a fixed price or a single usage metric.

But that’s not how modern products work.
A single plan today might include:

• Boolean features: they represent capabilities or functionalities that customers either have access to or don’t like a simple on/off switch.
  
  

• Static features: they represent fixed attributes or configurations of your product that don’t dynamically change based on usage. They are generally consistent and predefined per pricing plan or tier.
  
  

• Metered features: these features track quantifiable usage by customers, allowing you to bill them based on how much they use. These features capture dynamic, variable usage over time and form the backbone for accurate invoicing, usage analysis, and flexible pricing plans.

These different types of features need to be bundled together and priced clearly. But if your system doesn't treat them consistently, you end up hardcoding logic, duplicating data, and managing separate systems for each one.

Our approach: Features as the core building block

At Flexprice, we chose to simplify this by making features the foundational building block. This approach makes it easier to:

• Experiment Faster: Roll out new features without overhauling your entire billing stack.
  
  

• Manage Margins: Prevent overuse without creating a poor customer experience.
  
  

• Unify Billing and Access: Avoid managing different types of features in separate systems.
  
  

• Improve Customer Retention: Offer clearer pricing and feature-based upsells.
  
  

• Enable Personalization: Create more personalized plans without adding complexity.

This flexibility means you can innovate without the constraints of legacy billing platforms, providing a seamless experience for both customers and developers.