Subscription “Boxes” are Great, but they aren’t the Future of the Subscription Model
Who wouldn’t like to receive an awesome box of trinkets, snacks or clothes every month? Themed subscriptions boxes like Birchbox, which ships you a personalized box of beauty product samples, or MeUndies, which sends a set of designer styled underwear monthly, are monthly bundles of goodness which sell on the promise of providing the excitement of a new experience with the certainty that it’ll make your day. But what about the items we use every day but regularly forget to pick up? Things like the dog food, toilet paper, shampoo and deodorant we already use daily. The problem is that there are currently very few companies that are solving a commonplace problem like this.
What if a customer didn’t have to remember to buy the dog food? Or toothpaste, mouthwash, makeup, moisturizer, shampoo or toilet paper for that matter? There are incredible opportunities currently presenting themselves to provide customers with what they want without them even remembering they need it. Subscription services are the perfect model for solving this painful (and common) experience. If we think about it logically, you buy the same pet food/moisturizer/shampoo, from the same store, at predictable intervals, and yet life gets in the way and we still forget to grab these essentials. A simple service that automates these essentials every x number of weeks would make a fortune solving their customer’s basic needs in a convenient and consistent way, and their customers would love them for it.
So why are these services so few and far between, especially in Canada? An issue that contributes to this barrier is the perceived difficulty of setting up such a service, but due to a set of new outsourcing solutions it’s probably simpler than many business owners think. Let us take a look at the factors which are necessary for an online retailer to create a booming subscription business from scratch.
An online presence
Numerous beauty, pet supply, life essentials and hobby retailers sell their products online already with seriously devoted customer bases. Awesome! This is the first step to creating the subscription service that “stickifies” customers.
A subscription option at checkout
It’s actually quite simple to have this set up, companies that use Shopify already can integrate a plug-in for subscriptions or they can use Cratejoy to create a subscription service that makes sense for their customers.
A fulfillment center that can handle orders consistently and reliably
This is perhaps one of the greatest challenges of setting up a subscription service, building a system that works on time, every-time, with no delays or missed deliveries. Remember, customers are relying on you to deliver their products when they need them, not before, or after.
World conquering (scalable) customer success model
Effective marketing and on boarding are essential but when something inevitably does go wrong or a customer is having trouble understanding what they just signed up for, you need to be able to respond rapidly and pro-actively. Customer retention is the biggest key to any subscription service being successful in the long-term.
An efficient way of dealing with recurring payments
Not all revenue is created equal. A subscription dollar is significantly more valuable than a single order dollar because the prospect of recurring revenue is significantly higher. However there are still challenges in dealing with recurring payments versus one-time payments and having a robust payment processing service will go a long way towards getting paid on-time and without upsetting customers.
Looking at this list may seem a bit daunting especially if a business is currently having difficulty fulfilling orders reliably and some of your customers have been so dissatisfied you had to replace your phone’s earpiece. In addition to Shopify and Cratejoy, another company that hopes to help intrepid entrepreneurs and retail business owners add a subscription service to their business is Scriberbase. Scriberbase is positioned as the only all-encompassing subscription outsourcing solution which takes a business from no subscription service to a fully realized and maintained subscription machine. Essentially, by hiring Scriberbase, businesses with a product ready for a subscription service are hiring a customer service department, software developer, fulfillment center, and delivery service to create and run their subscription service. Scriberbase is like Shopify but with the added bonus of fulfilling orders, a customer service call center specifically for subscribers and delivery for subscriptions.
With services like Cratejoy, Shopify and Scriberbase it’s now easier than ever to create a subscription business, and, with a hole in the market as gaping as regular pet food, beauty, daily essentials and hobby materials delivery, the first to market will claim a significant place in consumers hearts. So entrepreneurs and aspiring entrepreneurs, dive in! Take advantage of the current market and technology opportunities. Heck, let me know when I can have my deodorant, toothpaste and shampoo delivered every two months; I can’t wait to pay a fraction more to make my errands non-existent.