Subscription Box Answers

Your Summer Doesn't Have to Be a Subscription Box Wasteland

• Liam Brennan

Share episode

Summer Slowdown? Not Anymore

We all know summer can be a slower season for retail and subscription boxes are included in that

But that does not mean you have to accept a dip in sales

In today’s episode I cover three simple things you can do right now to keep subscribers coming in and revenue flowing during the summer months

Take a listen because this could be the difference between a quiet season and a strong one

If you have a question you want answered on the show head over to www.SubscriptionBoxResources.com and join the free Facebook group

Speaker 1:

Welcome to Subscription Box Answers with your host, liam Brennan. You're no rubbish, no crap. Straight to the point podcast with real, actionable tips, real strategies and insights from the industry which will help you start and grow your own successful subscription box business. You ask the questions, you ask the questions, you ask the questions. Liam gives the answers. It's as simple as that.

Speaker 2:

Welcome back to a brand new episode of Subscription Box Answers. On today's episode, we're talking all about the summer and ways you can keep the sales flowing. Now we all know, for retail e-commerce subscription boxes, whatever summer can typically be slower for a lot of different niches, and this is probably nothing unique to your box. If you haven't been in business long or if this is your first summer, maybe you're panicking a bit. For those who have been around longer, you know how it goes. Summer can be a bit slower and then you obviously have Q4 coming right behind summer and that's the busy period. And that's the busy period. The good news is there are things you can do to improve your sales throughout the summer and there's still opportunities during the summer months to do well in your subscription box, and we're going to cover that today. But for those of you who don't know why it's typically slower in the summer, let me explain quickly. This is because people are spending more money on experiences. They're going on holidays they could have kids and they're taking them places. They're going on trips and for ongoing businesses, people typically spend less time online in buying mode throughout the summer, and then obviously it all settles down as we come into September. But yeah, let me cover three things you can do to keep the sales flowing in your subscription box business this summer.

Speaker 2:

Now, last year I had a similar episode. A lot of people reached out to me and said they really enjoyed it, so I've decided to expand on it this year. So number one this is the most important thing thing. Right, you have to give people a reason to buy your box in the summer. If you don't give people a reason to buy your box in the summer, what will happen? People won't buy it. That's simply it.

Speaker 2:

Now I'll tell you a story. A few years back, it was really slow for us one summer, really really slow. It was hard to get people in and we decided we had to come up with a reason why somebody would sign up to our box in the summer. So we launched a new offer. We launched a splash pad, and the way this worked was if somebody signed up for six or twelve months, they would get a free splash pad, and the splash pad could obviously be set up in their back garden. It was a really fun offer. It would keep their dog cool, it would keep their whole family entertained and it was a really, really hot summer, like I'm talking record-breaking for ireland and the uk. So this was a perfect offer and it gave people a reason to subscribe to buster box. And as soon as we launched the offer, our sales absolutely went through the roof. Our customer acquisition cost dropped and we were getting so many people in for a cheap cack a ridiculously cheap cack and that was really eye-opening to me because it was the same box but just a different offer, and the offer was tailored for the summer.

Speaker 2:

You should be thinking along the same lines and I know this can be harder for different niches, but I'll give you some examples. If you're running some kind of food subscription box, well then I will be looking at a barbecue offer. I'll be coming up with some kind of offer and it's presented in a way where people see it and they're like that will absolutely be perfect for me. I'll be doing a lot of barbecues this summer. I'm going to sign up Now.

Speaker 2:

If you had a kid's, a kids box, well, the offer I will be pushing is some kind of activity the parent can do with the kids throughout the summer months. The point of this is you have to give people a reason to buy. If you don't give people a reason to buy. Like I said, they won't buy. If you come up with a really tailored offer for the summer, you will get people in and if you're doing a good job, people will enjoy the box and they'll stay subscribed well into Q4. And the other great thing about the summer is the customer acquisition cost can actually really drop if you get the offer right. Right, because it's not as competitive. It's definitely nowhere near as competitive as q4. Brands tend to pull back their ad spend a bit and that makes the cpm price come down. We've got some really cheap cpms at the minute. They're like the cheapest they've been in a very long time. So, yeah, get the offer right and a lot of opportunity there for you to grow throughout the summer.

Speaker 2:

Okay, moving on, make the most of the assets you've already built up and target. I would segment all your cancelled customers and pull out all the good quality people. Now you may be thinking well, who are the good quality people? Well, I would recommend targeting people who have made a minimum of six payments payments. You don't want to waste your time and money advertising to people who aren't going to stick around for a decent amount of time. We're running a subscription business and for a subscription business to work, people have to be in the subscription for a decent amount of time. So, yeah, I would pull people who have made a minimum of six payments and I would try and win as many of them back as possible.

Speaker 2:

There's probably some really great quality customers in there. Well, there's definitely some great quality customers in there, and their circumstances may have changed since they cancelled your subscription. They may have been struggling money-wise, they may have had too many products building up in their house, they may have been in an awkward position in between moves. Whatever the reason, there's a good possibility that their situation has now changed and they're ready to come back to your subscription and they just need a notch. So when you pull that list of customers, the first thing I will do will be to create a custom audience on facebook. Okay, create a custom audience of those people, and then I would set up some retargeting ads with some very specific messaging, and the messaging will be we miss you. We've made big changes. These are the changes. Blah, blah, blah. We want you to come back and here's a amazing offer to make it happen Now. The great thing about retargeting these people is you have already verified that they're good quality customers, so it's worth your time and investment trying to bring them back, because you know more than likely they're going to stick around for a decent amount of time.

Speaker 2:

Now another way you can target them is direct mail, and direct mail can work really well. It's another way of basically reaching people, and you can be surprised when it comes to direct mail, because you may be emailing people and trying to get them back and nothing happens. And then you hit the same people with direct mail and they actually respond to that and they end up selling it back up to your subscription. So different customers respond to different things. Now the only thing I'd say about direct mail is you need to be careful with it, because it can work out really expensive, especially if you oversee a flopped campaign. So you want to start small with it and test in small amounts, and again it all comes back to the offer. If you don't have an offer that converts really well, I will definitely not do any kind of direct mail campaign and if you're only a new brand, I would probably avoid direct mail for the time being. Other ways you can target reactivations is obviously email, but you want to switch up your messaging and make it very specific, like we discussed with your ads, and then, obviously, sms can work really really well as well when it comes to reactivations, but it all hinges on the messaging and targeting the right people.

Speaker 2:

Number three make more money from your existing customers. So your existing customers are engaged and they're already receiving your subscription, so you should be definitely looking to make more money from these people throughout the summer months Now. I've discussed this on this podcast before. The reply yes process I personally think is probably the easiest way to make more money from your existing customers. I even have a program on that called the subscription box cash machine. I actually happened to open that in a while, but people absolutely love that. They got such great results from it and it's such an easy way to make more money from your existing subscribers.

Speaker 2:

If you don't know what the reply yes process is, let me explain very quickly. You just send out an email to your existing subscribers and you offer them a product. It could be an extra subscription, a one-time product, whatever. An extra subscription, a one-time product, whatever. You make it a time sensitive email where they have to reply, say, in 24 hours, and you basically say to them if you want this added to your next box, just reply yes to this email. The barriers of entry when it comes to this are really really low and customers absolutely love it because they can save on shipping.

Speaker 2:

Now I guess a lot of questions about how do you actually do this? Well, you can do it manually. Okay, you can have a va process to charge it manually. Or, if you're on subley, they actually have this automation built into the system. They could see it was working really well for us in BusterBox and they actually turned it into an automation so you can set it up where, if people reply yes, subli will automatically charge them and add the product to their next order. It's really, really cool.

Speaker 2:

But but yeah, I will be focusing on this throughout the summer months, because if you're struggling to get people in because it's a bit slower, what's the alternative? Make more money from your existing subscribers. There's probably so many people in your subscriber base who want to buy more things from you, but they don't because you don't give them the opportunity to do so. Another thing I will be focusing on is switching your monthly subscriptions to prepaid. So if you have a lot of people enrolling one month, or you have a lot of people on six and 12 months but they're billed monthly. I will be aiming to move a percentage of those people to 12-month prepaid subscriptions.

Speaker 2:

I would do this through the reply yes process. I would put some leaflets in your box. I would do it through normal emails, possibly retargeting ads, all the stuff we covered, and this can help you a lot throughout the summer months, when things are typically slower. You only need a very small amount of people to switch to 12 months up front for it to make a massive difference to your cash flow. Now you obviously have to be careful with that money. You don't want to move people to 12 months up front and then you absolutely blow the money and you're left fulfilling boxes and you create a house of cards. You definitely don't want that to happen, but if you're tactical with this, it can make a big difference to your cash flow throughout the summer, when things can be a bit slower. We do this all the time in BusterBox and a good proportion of people do switch to 12-month prepaid on the back end. We don't sell it on the front end because it's hard to get people to sign up for 12 months prepaid from cold traffic in our market anyway, but it's easier to do it on the back end and we do this quite frequently and, yeah, it's a great way of helping improve your cash flow. So it's a good idea to do it throughout the summer. That's it.

Speaker 2:

I hope you got some ideas from this podcast. There's a lot of opportunity in the summer and it doesn't need to be a write-off, and, on the other hand, some people like to take a bit of a rest throughout the summer and prepare themselves for the big push for Q4. And if that's you, that's absolutely fine. You should do whatever works for you. There's no rules To run a business or a subscription box. You just have to do what works for you. And if that involves taking a bit of a break To charge up your energy for a final push, by all means do that Now.

Speaker 2:

We'll be back next week at the exact same time and, as always, if you have a question you want answered on the show, head over to subscriptionboxresourcescom, join the free Facebook group and post your question there. And can I ask you one quick thing If you've been listening to this podcast for a while and you've got value from it and you've learned something and it's helped you in some way in your business. Would you mind giving me a review, either on Spotify or Apple or wherever you listen to podcasts? It just helps me get this show out to more people. Thanks very much and I look forward to chatting to you again next week. Bye-bye.