Subsail June updates
June was a busy month for Subsail. I spent more time this month than ever before on sales, platform updates and new features.
Here’s what’s new!
Overlay checkout
Sell recurring subscriptions on your website. Subsail’s overlay checkout allows your subscription checkout to load over your website, instead of sending customers to a different URL. Coupled with colour and logo customisation in your checkout, and you have a seamless subscription purchasing experience. And it only requires a single line of Javascript added to your website theme.
Import tool
Importing subscriber data into Subsail from another system or a custom spreadsheet is a challenge. Publishers store their data in myriad different ways, so building an import tool that can handle that is a bit 😅. Subsail’s initial import tool was also limited and would, if there were any data errors, display an error message without a detailed explanation.
In mid June, I launched an import tool that makes the process a whole lot easier (see image above). When you upload a CSV file, you can both assign Subsail’s required columns to the columns in your data and edit the data before you import it into Subsail.
Refunds for Subsail-sold subs
Payments for subscriptions sold through Subsail can now be refunded easily through your accunt. You can refund from any of a subscription’s multiple payments (recurring subscriptions will have more than one), and you can refund from zero up to the total charge amount, if you want to send a partial refund.
Smaller updates
On-boarding improvements
The sign up flow for getting started in Subsail got a huge revamp, allowing new users to get set up in a simple and structured manner. No more guessing about Subsail’s features or how best to get started.
Better MailChimp sync
Subsail’s newsletter sync system, which sends subscriber data to MailChimp was vastly improved, both in how the two platforms connect, but also the data that is passed between the two. You can now see data like “issues bought” and “has active subscription” on your MailChimp newsletter subscribers, which allows you to send highly-targeted campaigns to your magazine subscribers.
Subscribers can cancel subscriptions from accounts
A “Cancel” button now appears on all Subsail-sold recurring subscriptions in subscriber accounts, which allows subscribers to stop their recurring payments hassle free.
Improved dashboard
There are now helpful extra statistics on your account dashboard, giving a nice snapshot of your subscriber numbers and upcoming recurring charges when you log in.
Email in spreadsheet for easy migrating
I opened up a new channel for migrating and importing data to help with simplify the process; email. Just send your current subscriber spreadsheet to imports@subsail.com and I will format your data and add it to your account.
Checkout countries limited to those available in postage rates
Now in Subsail checkouts, only countries you’ve added as postage countries on your subscriptions will show up. This means customers can only buy from countries you want to sell to.
Multiple accounts
If you manage more than one magazines’ subscriptions, you can quickly add and manage multiple Subsail accounts from a single login. A new “Add an account” link was added to the user menu.
Sell in New Zealand dollar
You can now sell in NZD, taking Subsail’s supported currencies to ten. (USD, EUR, GBP, AUD, CAD, DKK, NOK, SEK and JPY)
Better card field validation
The card fields on Subsail checkouts are now much better at accepting and validating card details as you input them, and even show a helpful card symbol to match the card you are entering.
That’s a brief run down of Subsail’s June updates. I’m already almost done with one of July’s big additions, gift subscriptions. More information soon!
— Dan
