5 Ways to Boost Renewals for Subscription Websites

Does your subscription website promote customer loyalty?

Many subscription websites have come and gone over the last decade. There are a few subscription websites have figured out exactly what it takes to succeed. What can we learn from their mistakes and successes? Let’s look at one successful subscription website – Ancestry.com.

My father and I have recently joined Ancestry.com in an effort to find our roots and create our own family tree. I must say, they do an excellent job of keeping my interest peeked and my subscription renewed.

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We’ve identified 5 ways Ancestry.com boosts renewals and promotes customer loyalty:

Subscription Website Component #1: Fresh Content – There’s no reason to come back to a website if there’s nothing new. I receive emails when new records have been added to Ancestry.com. They tell me very specific data – ie: 1840 United States Federal Census or Baltimore Passenger List 1820-1948. A list of new content is also updated on my homepage.

Subscription Website Component #2: Contextual Email Alerts – When I see email from Ancestry.com sitting in my inbox – I get excited. Why? It’s usually a notification that someone in my family tree has a match of either new content or a new member with the same relative in their family tree.

Contextual Email Alert from Ancestry.com

Contextual Email Alert from Ancestry.com

Subscription Website Component #3: Personal Investment – Researching and saving data to create a family tree is no small task. Personally, I have invested over 50 hours on Ancestry.com verifying data and cross referencing statistics. To say the least, I wouldn’t end my subscription without a really good reason after investing so much time into this project.

Nicholas Family Tree created on Ancestry.com

Nicholas Family Tree created on Ancestry.com

Subscription Website Component #4: Customized Experience – Once you begin your journey on Ancestry.com, a personalized homepage is created. You can move the boxes of information and alerts around however you choose. Every time you log in, you will see recent member connect activity, recent family tree activity, new content updates, possible data matches, my shoebox and much more.

Subscription Website Component #5: Community Building – Once you’ve created your family tree, you can opt to make it public. We did. The benefit is that when other members are searching for ancestors that appear in your tree, your entire family tree is visible (except living persons) including all of the references. With the click of a button you can “claim” this ancestor and add them to your tree. You also have the opportunity to contact members through an internal email system. I was recently able to re-connect with a family member I hadn’t seen since my childhood.

Publishers must have an effective plan to locate customers and give them reasons to buy and renew subscriptions. It’s just as important to collect names and email addresses of prospective members as it is to build trust and relationships with current members of your subscription website. What are you doing to build customer loyalty?

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