Every subscriber who leaves has to be replaced before a subscription business can grow, which makes retention the quieter half of reader revenue and often the more profitable one. The first renewal is the real test of whether acquisition brought in the right people.
Retention starts with habit. The publishers that keep subscribers longest engage them well beyond the welcome emails, and renew on the strength of the brand rather than another discount. A surprising share of churn isn't a decision at all. Expired cards and failed payments quietly lose revenue that can often be recovered.
Some brands are losing subscribers and hard-fought revenue that could be saved with some attention and effort.
Tracy Larner Our subs retention strategy: William Reed
When someone does want to leave, how it is handled matters. Understand why before offering anything, and make the exit easy, because subscribers treated well on the way out are far more likely to come back.
Below you'll find some of our best feature articles on subscriber retention and churn, from engagement and renewal pricing to payment failure and cancellation, alongside our latest news and industry commentary.
Does your CEO know what your subscriber retention rate is? The chances are, probably not. But, according to Julian Thorne, author of our Guide to Retention Strategies for Publishers, this number should never be far from his or her (or your) mind.
A subscriber’s first 30 days are important to build habit but so is every day after, says Emma Robinson, head of customer experience.
You cannot improve a process until you have documented it, and you cannot achieve an objective until you have a process and system to support it, says Rosa Sherwood, head of CRM, engagement and loyalty.
It’s a well-known fact that engaged subscribers stay for longer, says Susanne Kinnaird, head of digital reader revenue.
It’s important not to lose subscribers and hard-fought revenue through involuntary churn, says Tracy Larner, subscriptions director.
It’s important to understand the reason for cancellation and to ensure the retention offer directly addresses the subscriber’s stated concern, says Mike Halstead, managing director of HH&S.
What determines pricing power is not only the category of need, says Andy Burden, founder of Substribe, it’s the stakes.
Making it super-hard to cancel a subscription does no one any favours.
The Financial Times is today releasing its Windows 8 App, available to download for free from the Windows Store and accessible on any tablet, desktop or laptop running Windows 8.
Immediate Media Co’s magazine portfolio is now available on the Amazon App Store, timed for the European launch of the Kindle Fire tablet and Kindle Fire HD.
Five Northern and Shell titles launch PC, mobile and tablet newspapers, ready for this week’s Windows 8 and RT launch.
iSUBSCRiBE, the online magazine and newspaper subscription superstore has announced key executive appointments to its management structure.
Families First, a magazine for families of faith and previously only available on subscription, is to launch on the newsstand on 26 October, priced £2.50.
COMAG has announced that it has outsourced the hosting and management of its consumer facing websites, Magazine Café and Wait and Read, to iSUBSCRiBE.co.uk, the online magazine and newspaper subscription superstore.
Subscriptions Marketing, the audience acquisition agency, has appointed Vivien Matthews as Consumer Promotions Director.
The August ABC Multiplatform figures (ABCe), released yesterday, show a record month for Global and UK digital traffic for The Telegraph, boosted by soaring growth during the Olympics.
The Financial Times has announced plans to extend its direct licensing to the academic market.
Despite our truly abysmal summer, Gardeners’ World, which relaunched its magazine in March 2011, has continued to build momentum this year. Publishing director Dominic Murray tells us why the brand is thriving.
What will the consumer publishing company look like in ten years’ time? Will it be digital only? Will there be any place for print? Nial Ferguson dusts off his crystal ball.
The challenge of getting web users to pay for content has kept many a publisher awake at night these past few years. Just what will people pay for online? Ryan O'Meara, watching a TV movie one night, has stumbled across the answer…
Digital media, cloud crunching, analytics and the ability to marry up different data sources are revolutionising how media owners can measure who is reading what content, when, where and how often. Carolyn Morgan looks at the growing importance of da
The Guardian iPad edition has been re-launched as The Guardian and Observer iPad edition, ready for the first iPad issue of The Observer to be unveiled on Sunday 16 September.
Telegraph Media Group (TMG) is to launch a long-term partnership with Avios, the UK travel rewards programme.
