Nowadays, companies are offering a wide variety of services via subscription. It’s a new business model that is particularly appealing to younger generations who are used to subscribing for everything including entertainment, clothing, self-care products, and even cars.
But offering products and services via subscription isn’t enough. To keep a loyal base of subscribers, your organization must have a formal brand loyalty plan that will keep customers from straying to the services of competitors. In a highly competitive space with a business model based on recurring revenue, it’s important for subscription brands to create experiences that keep customers coming back.
Following are some tips for building a brand loyalty program with your subscription service.
Provide self-service.
Customers don’t like having to call your contact center or sales associates. They’d prefer to manage their subscriptions themselves, so ensure that this service is available to them. They’d like to change their information or payment methods and check on their latest order without help from an agent, if possible.
Ensure you have an email program.
Building loyalty for subscription services requires regular email marketing, preferably right off the subscription platform. Ensure that the platform you choose has a drip marketing feature that allows you to stratify your subscriber base to ensure that you’re making the right offers at the right time (and not, for example, sending emails urging a renewal to a first-time customer who just signed up).
Provide the right price point.
Many customers might be hesitant if they need to commit too much upfront to your subscription service. Ensure that they can start small and expand. Subscription pricing strategies can be tiered according to functionality, include discounts for larger purchases or be metered according to usage levels. You can also build in a rewards program that tempts customers into larger purchases. Experts recommend offering one higher priced tier over your ideal price tier in order to give the impression customers are getting a good deal.
Get your billing right.
Because of its nature, the subscription model has far more complex billing than “Buy one widget, pay for one widget.” Ensure you’re choosing a subscription management platform that allows you to bill in a variety of ways (annually, monthly, etc.) that might be attractive to your subscriber base. Flexibility will keep customers coming back.
Choose a platform designed for subscription management.
Subscription DNA’s subscription management software features group enrollment tools and group communications, email marketing automation, cloud billing automation and payments, intuitive membership management, CRM and premium content and paywall management.
With the ability to connect users into a subscriber group, companies can build the type of community that keeps subscription customers engaged, interested and – most importantly – loyal.