PanelAlpha Documentation
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# Free Trial Period

  • Offering free trial period
  • Workflow
  • Configuration in PanelAlpha
  • Configuration of server in WHMCS
  • Configuration of product in WHMCS

Before proceeding further to find the gist, it is of utmost importance to ensure that you are already familiar with the "Introduction" article. This article discusses the necessary steps that must be completed* prior to utilizing the information provided in this section.

*Go back to "Introduction" now.

# Offering free trial period

Would you like to enable a free trial period for your clients on PanelAlpha? Simply ensure proper configuration of a PanelAlpha product on your billing platform through our dedicated PanelAlpha For WHMCS module.
Follow these steps to seamlessly offer trial experiences.

# Workflow

  1. End-customer orders a new service in the WHMCS system, in our example that will be: "WordPress - Free Trial"
  2. They go through the standard ordering process.
  1. Since payment isn't applicable during the free trial, the product is instantly activated:
    • The end-customer will receive an email message with details about their service
    • From the client area in WHMCS they can directly proceed to the new PanelAlpha user page. Simply use the "WordPress Management" section in the menu - it uses SSO to automatically authenticate them into PanelAlpha
    • Alternatively, they can go to their service page and click "Log In To PanelAlpha" - it uses SSO to automatically authenticate them into PanelAlpha as well
  1. Once they are redirected to PanelAlpha, again SSO is used to for automatic authentication.
  2. The first page that they see is the option to create the first instance.
    • clients may either create a brand new site or migrate their instance from an already existing hosting
    • for a migration workflow, read more about Migration here
  1. When they choose to create a new site, the system will ask them to name their site and present them with the available themes to choose from. Press the "Create Site" button and the site will be provisioned right away.

Keep in mind that this flow will very depending on the service plan configuration and slected method of onboarding that has been applied to the free trial product.

  1. After a moment needed for insatlaltion, the new site is ready for the client to manage!
  1. When the trial period is coming to an end, the end-user must upgrade their plan not to loose the access to their PanelAlpha.
  1. If no action is taken, the service will be automatically terminated in WHMCS, and access to the PanelAlpha client area will be restricted.

# Configuration in PanelAlpha

  1. Plan Configuration - Provide basic details to create a new plan dedicated to trial services:

  • Plan Name - for example "WordPress - Free Trial"

  • Instances Limit - in the case of free trial it might be "1"

  • Upgrade Link - this step is important, if you want your clients to be able to upgrade their plan after the trial period, you must enter here the hyperlink that directs to a page where users can upgrade their free plan

  • Label Color - indicates a visual identifier associated with a specific plan, usually used to point the difference between several plan types.

  1. Go on with plan configuration as described in the dedicated article.

# Configuration of server in WHMCS

Configure the server according to the documentation. That is:

  1. Go to 'System Settings' → 'Servers' and press the 'Add New Server' button.

  2. Next, choose 'PanelAlpha' from the 'Module' dropdown menu.
    Remember not to use SSL Mode for Connection, keep this option disabled or otherwise you will encounter errors when testing the server connection.
    Fill in the following fields:

    • "Name"
    • "Hostname" - remember to always add the port number, as on the screen below
    • "API Token" - the "API Token" can be generated in PanelAlpha in 'Configuration' → 'Admins' → 'Enable API Token' action.

  3. After configuring your server, you can check the connection.
    In order to check the connection with a PanelAlpha server, edit the server configuration and press 'Test Connection' as shown on the screen below.

  4. The next step is creating a server group. To do so, click on 'Create Server Group'.

  5. Enter the name, click on your previously created server, press 'Add' and 'Save Changes' afterwards.

# Configuration of product in WHMCS

Proceed to create and configure the product:

  1. In order to create and configure a product, go to 'Setup' → 'Products/Services' → 'Products/Services'.
    Click on 'Create a New Group'.

  2. Enter the product group name and press 'Save Changes'.

  3. Once you have a product group, you can assign your product to it.
    To create a product, click on 'Create a New Product'.

  4. Next, choose your the product type, assign it to a group of similar products.
    Enter your product name, select module: 'PanelAlpha' and then press 'Continue'.

  1. Now, proceed to the 'Pricing' tab and select 'Free' as the payment type.
    After setting the payment type, find the 'Auto Terminate/Fixed Term' option. Here, specify the number of days after activation for automatic termination of this product. For instance, entering '14' will result in automatic termination of the product unless the client chooses to upgrade the product to one of the paid options.

  1. Finally, you may proceed to the 'Module Settings' section, choose both 'PanelAlpha' and your previously created server group from dropdown menus.
    Configure product settings to offer a limited-time free trial, allowing clients to explore the features PanelAlpha has to offer

    • PanelAlpha Plan - A plan should be assigned to the service on the basis of which the service will be created.
    • Automatic instance provisioning - If enabled, a new instance will automatically be created with the selected theme when the service is created.
    • Manual termination - When enabled, service termination will only occur after manual action by the admin. For a free product, this means that terminated by WHMCS services will not be automatically deleted in PanelAlpha until the admin initiates the deletion process.
    • PanelAlpha SSO in main menu - If enabled, the user will receive a link to his or her PanelAlpha account on the main client area menu.