case study · real merchant

whomi.bio × crypt.pe

whomi.bio is a link-in-bio built for engineers — live GitHub, Stack Overflow, LeetCode and npm stats on one page, plus a qualified inbox that turns visitors into offers. It's built by the crypt.pe founder, and — as with hackastra and hacking.community — that connection is disclosed up front: the product's builder, running his own gateway in production.

link-in-bio for developerslive proof-of-work widgetspro $7/mofounder $99 lifetimeaudience: engineers worldwide
the problem

whomi.bio sells small, global and impulse-priced: a $7/mo Pro plan, a $70/yr annual, and a one-time $99 lifetime Founder seat capped at 200 people. The audience is engineers — everywhere. That combination exposes the weak spots of a cards-only checkout:

  • A meaningful share of developers — especially across South Asia, Africa, Eastern Europe and Latin America — hit international card declines, missing card schemes, or banks that block foreign SaaS charges outright.
  • The $99 Founder seat is exactly the kind of one-time cross-border purchase banks love to flag: a first-ever charge, foreign merchant, three-digit amount. A decline usually means a lost seat, not a retried payment.
  • Developers are the single most crypto-native mainstream audience there is — many would happily pay from a wallet in seconds rather than fight a card form.
the integration

whomi.bio kept its card checkout and added a crypto option powered by the crypt.pe gateway API — the same integration pattern as any Stripe-style processor:

  • Choosing crypto at checkout creates an order server-side (POST /v1/payments) and hands the user a hosted checkout — pick a coin, scan, pay from any wallet.
  • A signed payment.confirmed webhook unlocks Pro or claims the Founder seat automatically on on-chain confirmation — the upgrade path is identical to the card path from the app's point of view.
  • Settlement is non-custodial: funds land directly in the company's own wallet with 0% platform fees — no processor balance, no payout schedule, no percentage off a $7 plan.
what changed

every engineer can pay

A developer whose card declines cross-border — or who never had an international card — pays in whichever of 24+ coins they already hold. Same checkout, every country.

one-time $99, zero friction

The lifetime Founder seat settles on-chain in one pass — no bank risk-review roulette on a first-time three-digit foreign charge.

identical upgrade path

Webhooks flip Pro and Founder exactly like the card flow — the billing code doesn't care which rail the money took.

users become merchants

whomi bios are made of links — and whomi promotes crypt.pe to its own users: freelancers and OSS maintainers add their crypt.pe payment page to their bio and start accepting crypto for gigs, consults and tips.

the result

A product priced for impulse and sold worldwide no longer loses the sale when the card rail says no. And the flywheel runs both ways: the bio product accepts crypto through crypt.pe, and its users showcase their own crypt.pe links on their bios — the payment page becomes one more link that proves the work.

"Developers are the easiest crypto checkout sell in the world — they already have the wallet. whomi.bio takes their $7 or $99 in any coin, and then their bio links out to their own crypt.pe page so they can get paid the same way."

— prakash shinde, founder, whomi.bio & crypt.pe
your turn

Selling a SaaS to a global audience? The crypto rail takes an afternoon.

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