Not that you\u2019d ever want to do such a thing \u2013 but you\u2019d be amazed how many companies lose valuable business every day by getting their subscription management processes wrong. It\u2019s that simple, upsetting subscribers with inaccurate billing or unfulfilled subscription contracts will cause them to reach out to competitors or just cancel their service at the first opportunity.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s important to get effective subscription management<\/a> correct – it\u2019s not just a matter of taking regular payments and providing consistent delivery of goods and services. As with success in many forms of business, it\u2019s all about discipline and procedure; subscription management isn\u2019t a \u2018set and forgets\u2019 exercise. So let\u2019s look at the most common problems with subscription management, and the best solutions, in more detail:<\/p>\n For a start, subscriptions can take two very different forms, whether the service received by the customer is \u2018metered\u2019 or of a fixed, recurring nature. The most obvious example of a Pay You Go or metered subscription is a cell phone<\/a> contract, which doesn\u2019t offer unlimited call minutes, but rather an initial amount of inclusive call time, then a pennies per minute billing thereafter. Clearly, if a subscriber has 300 \u2018use them or lose them\u2019 minutes per month on a rolling contract, but in one month uses 400 minutes of airtime, they are going to be billed for 100 extra minutes in that month. The subscription amount thereby varies each time.<\/p>\n This is the same for software in some business applications, for example, a certain number of customer interactions via a ChatBot or a certain number of words processed by an AI like GPT3. So long as the billing is accurate, and crucially that the customer is informed of the amount before they receive the bill, all is well and good. Nobody likes nasty surprises, so it\u2019s sometimes a good idea to prompt users during heavy usage periods with reminders. For example:<\/p>\n Dear [first_name], we noticed that you already used 500 call minutes this month, with two weeks remaining in this billing period. Your bill currently stands today at [$X] and minutes are charged at $0.03 cents each.\u2019<\/p>\nAlso read:<\/span> [10 BEST] AI Influencer Generator Apps Trending Right Now<\/a><\/span>\n You can always use such warnings as an incentive for the customer to upgrade to a higher package, so when the customer receives a warning that their bill is already at $X, that if they were to take out a monthly subscription of $Y, their current usage pattern would be covered, and they would save money into the bargain.<\/p>\n Enabling the customer to take \u2018payment holidays\u2019 or \u2018service fulfillment vacations\u2019 is a great way of allowing wavering subscribers not to cancel, but to put their subs on hold for a month or two. This is common with wine delivery clubs and the like. It\u2019s essential that an easy one or two-click online facility is available for customers to log into their account, and \u2018pause\u2019 their payments and deliveries for, say, a maximum of three months over a year. Any good e-commerce platform like Shopify<\/a> or WooCommerce should have this facility built into its core functionality. Otherwise, if someone has promised themselves a \u2018Dry January\u2019 after Christmas, but can\u2019t put their Dolcetto delivery on downtime, they might just decide to cancel and maybe (but only maybe) resubscribe another day.Fixed Price, or Pay As You Go<\/h2>\n
Billing Reminders Used as Incentives<\/h2>\n
Fixed Prices don\u2019t Always Mean Fixed Time Periods<\/h2>\n
\n
\n