Subscription Box Basics

Signs You Should Start a Subscription Box Business

January 04, 2021 Julie Ball Episode 55
Subscription Box Basics
Signs You Should Start a Subscription Box Business
Show Notes Transcript

#055 - Welcome 2021! New year, new set of goals and starting a subscription box could be one of those goals. You've been sitting on that moneymaker idea and you're excited but at the same time scared and still doubtful whether you should do it or not.

 In this episode, we are talking about five signs you should start a subscription box business. Hopefully this will motivate and inspire you to take action and finally start carving out your subscription box concept.

 Summary:

  • Your brick and mortar shop is either closed or it doesn't get much traffic and you have lots of inventory  (00:02:34)
  • You have a passion hobby or interest and there's other super fans who love it too (00:04:10)
  • You're tired of finding new customers every single month (00:04:52)
  • You are so over the feast and famine of product launches (00:05:26)
  • You have an existing audience or follower base (00:07:05)

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(00:01): So you want to launch a subscription box and don't know where to start? Girl, you are in the right place. I'm Julie Ball, a subscription box coach and your host here at Subscription Box Basics, a podcast for new and aspiring subscription box entrepreneurs that want to avoid overwhelm. So grab a coffee, some pen and paper and let's have some fun!

Hey, hey hey, welcome back to Subscription Box Basics podcast! It is a new year. Welcome 2021! Can I get an amen? Peace out 2020. It was a rough one, right? I am super grateful that my business continued to thrive. We did see some negative growth for the first time ever. But it is to be expected considering all of the financial issues that everyone went through last year and just all of the cutting back on discretionary income and everything else. It was just a lot.

So I am really grateful for 2021. I have set some very big goals. If you haven't done any goal setting yet go back a couple episodes. I did a podcast episode on a simple three step goal setting plan. When it comes to my annual goal setting, I like to first look back on what I did that year. What were some of the wins? What were some of the losses? What were our total revenue, expenses, profit, all that good stuff. And then start looking at the next year, the new year 2021 and figure out what some of my new goals are, what I want to make on a monthly basis, what I want to be able to pay my team and what we want to have leftover things like that. And then we back into the numbers. So I am feeling full of hope and motivation. And I hope that I can provide that to you today.

We are talking about the signs you should start a subscription box business. I know you've been sitting on a moneymaker idea. You probably have this idea that you're like, "Oh, should I do it? Or should I not? I'm scared, but I'm excited." And it's okay to feel all those feelings, but sometimes don't you want just some sort of sign that tells you what to do, that you should move forward with something? Well, here's your sign today. I'm talking about some signs that you should start a subscription box business. I have five of them for you today. And so listen up. If any of these resonate with you, then that's your sign. I'm just going to jump right into it so we can keep this short and sweet. I know it's a new year. I know you have a lot on your plates. Let's do it.

(02:34): So the first sign you should start a subscription box business. Number one, your brick and mortar shop is either closed or doesn't get much traffic during a pandemic. You feel me, but you have lots of inventory. Girl, those candles aren't going to sell themselves. I've seen so many brick and mortar shops add this as a stream of revenue to their business. If you have a brick and mortar shop, you had been so used to having foot traffic in the past, right? Or selling one-time products on your website in addition to your shop. Well, think about this, wouldn't it be so much fun and so much easier to serve your existing customers in a way that is easy. It's automatic and that you continually delight them month after month after month.

So for example, if you have a candle shop and you have lots of inventory, you could pick a candle of the month and send that to your customers automatically. So you set up the subscription side of it, the recurring revenue, you get to renew them once a month and then you get to ship them your candle of the month, once a month. It's simple, especially if you already have your business foundations set up and you have an existing audience. You can just add it to your existing business. So that's sign number one. You have a brick and mortar shop that is either closed right now, due to the pandemic, or it's just not getting the foot traffic. You need to pay those bills. Add a subscription box stream of revenue.

(04:10): The second sign, you should start a subscription box business. Maybe you have a passion, a hobby or an interest and there are other super fans who share that interest who love it too just like you. People want to connect with others with a shared interest.

It can be as simple as being a fan of something. Maybe you love to play kazoo. And someone else loves to play Kazoo. Start a kazoo crate. It's super easy concept. If there are super fans or people who are passionate about a specific topic or shared interest, that's the perfect opportunity to start a subscription box based around that interest.

(04:52): All right, number three, you are tired of finding new customers every single month. Wouldn't you rather, your customers automatically buy from you month after month after month? That my friend is called recurring revenue. You are going to love renewal day when all those renewals hit and that cashflow starts moving again in your bank account. If you are tired of chasing a customer one single sale at a time, that's your sign. You need to start a subscription box business.

(05:26): Moving on to the fourth sign you should start a subscription box business. You are so over the feast and famine of product launches and need revenue that's a little bit more predictable. So the subscription box business makes it easy to project revenue. So what you do is you look at your churn. Churn, if you hadn't heard from previous episodes, churn is the percent of customers who do not renew every single month, who either cancel or maybe their credit card expired, whatever. Let's just use 10% churn inn our example here. Say you have a hundred customers that are subscribed to your subscription box. And if you have a 10% churn, you can expect to lose 10 of those subscribers every single month. So when renewal data comes around, you can expect 90 customers to prepay for their next month's box. That makes it so easy to project revenue.

Now, of course you add on another layer when you talk about growth and acquisition, but at least you can project using that churn. And the opposite of churn is called retention. So if you have 10% churn, that would equate to 90% retention, you're going to retain 90% or 90 of those 100 customers. So if you're over the feast and famine of product launches and starting over from scratch every single time, you want to share a new product into the world and you need a little more predictability in your revenue streams. Then that's your sign. You need to start a subscription box.

(07:05): And finally, the last sign you should start a subscription box. You have an existing audience or a follower base like on social media. And they look to you for recommendations. You can turn that influence into a stream of revenue by offering a subscription box. Something simple would be, these are a few of my favorite things. And you hand pick your favorite things for each box. Now, of course you want to niche down and niche down and niche down again. You want to make sure that you're very clear on who you're serving, what pain point you're solving for them and how you're going to do that with your box. But if you have followers that look to you for recommendations, turn that into a subscription box business, where you share your favorite things similar to those subscription box business that I run, Sparkle Hustle Grow.

I love office supplies. And so does my audience. And so every single month I get to shop for my favorite things when it comes to office supplies and I get to share those in my subscription box every single month. So you can do that same thing. You can turn your influence into a stream of revenue by offering a subscription box to your existing audience.

So to recap signs, you should start a subscription box business. One, your brick and mortar shop is either closed or it doesn't get much traffic and you have lots of inventory. Start a subscription box. Number two, you have a passion hobby or interest and there's other super fans who love it too. Start a subscription box. Number three, you're tired of finding new customers every single month and you would rather have recurring revenue with your customers automatically renewing with a subscription box business. Number four, you are so over the feast and famine of product launches and you need revenue that's a little bit more predictable. Guess what's predictable? Subscription boxes. And finally, number five, you have an existing audience or follower base, and they look to you for a recommendation, send them your favorite things in a subscription box business.

Hopefully this resonated with you. Hopefully this motivates you and inspires you to finally stop sitting on that moneymaker idea, to start carving out your concept.

A great place to start would be with my book called Subscription Box Basics. You can find it on Amazon. You can either get the ebook or you can get the beautifully, a full color printed workbook. I'm more of a pen and paper kind of gal. So that would be my recommendation is get your hands on that book. And if you go through the book and you do a chapter every other day, you'll get through your first stage in 30 days. By the time you are done with the workbook, you will have carved out your subscription box concept, and you'll have clarity on whether or not you're going to move forward.

Now, today I gave you signs, why you should start a subscription box, but there is a little bit more to it. You know, you have to dive deeper and figure out some of these basic things in your idea stage like who you're going to serve, what pain point you're going to solve and how you're going to do that. So head on over to Amazon now, grab your copy of subscription box basics, and get to work on that new subscription box business here in 2021.

I am cheering you on, thank you as always for joining me on this podcast and I'll see you on the next episode.

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