Magento Subscription Service: Get Started with This Guide

It goes without saying a customer who buys from you month on month is worth more (monetary) than a customer who just buys from you once. With a Magento subscription e-commerce strategy, you can ensure customers return to purchase your products at recurrent time frames.

Without going into detail, if you have a customer who repeatedly buys from you month after month, you’ll generate more money than you would if you had to market to acquire new customers each month.

But getting your subscription service isn’t as easy as that. If you’re running and Magento store and have thought about whether the subscription model could be right for you, read on.

In this post, you’ll learn:

1. How to set your subscription service up with Magento
2. What types of products work well with the subscription model
3. How to encourage people to subscribe
4. What marketing strategies you can use to attract people to your subscription service
5. Why it’s important to focus on customer happiness, even if they do have a subscription.

Let’s go!

Setting up your subscription service with Magento

There is a range of Magento extensions you might use to power your e-commerce store including ones for subscriptions!

Whether you’re on Magento 1 or Magento 2, there are two types of extensions. However, it’s best to upgrade to Magento 2 to ensure you’re always eligible for support. If you don’t want to use one the templated extensions you can have a developer build a custom one to suit your news. But make sure you’re aware of the additional costs for this.

The benefit of using an extension means you’ll be able to set up recurring payments, notify payment gateways to capture the right amount of funds within a specific time period to ensure you’re always PCI compliant.

Types of products that work well with subscriptions

Not every product lends itself to a subscription model. Even if you have one product in your product line that is suitable for subscription, it doesn’t mean all will be.

When it comes to working out which products to add a subscription model, look at your products and see which ones people buy often.

See which ones people need to buy in order to keep doing what they’re doing.

For example, suppose you’ve developed a coffee machine that uses specific capsules. It goes without saying that people need to continually buy the capsules in order to use the machine.

Offering the capsules as a subscription means you’re able to support the customer so they never forget to make an order and have to go without coffee.

Customer retention is something that should be at the forefront of your mind so if you have product from the following list, you could consider implementing a subscription payment model:

1. Socks
2. Coffee
3. Tea
4. Pet equipment
5. Shaving equipment
6. Makeup and beauty
7. Books
8. Food
9. Baby care
10. Alcohol

The list goes on. The point here is that if you sell products that people buy often and it could upset them to forget to purchase it, a subscription could work for you.

Encouraging people to subscribe

You’re probably excited by the possibility of having a subscription service, but before you set it all up, you need to think about the ways you’ll encourage people to join.

The first thing to think about is your current customers. These are people who already know your business and your products and will be most likely to subscribe to your service.

If we compare that to a new customer, the same doesn’t hold true. They don’t know about the quality of your products or your business and so might be hesitant to buy from you right away – especially if they need to start subscribing.

There are ways around it, though.

One of the most effective ways to get people to your subscription service is to allow them to buy some of your products as individuals.

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If I wanted to buy a subscription box of goodies for my dog, my thoughts would be:

1. Will the quality of the goods be the right standard for my dog
2. Will my dog like the things in the box
3. What sort of products will I get in the box?

Now this store in question allows you to buy popular items from the subscription box as individuals.

This is effective not only to gain the trust of new customers but to support current customers too.

This is effective not only to gain the trust of new customers but to support current customers too.

Suppose your dog received the pooch and mutt fresh breath dog treats in his first box and loved them!

In the second box, he didn’t receive them. This site allows you to buy that product as an extra.

Not only does it support currently subscribed customers, but it increases their lifetime value, especially as they’re buying from you and not another pet store.

Marketing strategies for Magento subscription e-commerce to keep customers happy

The beauty of subscriptions is that you have regular repeat customers. But this doesn’t mean you should stop marketing to them.a

If you forget your customers they’ll forget you and what happens when they see a recurring payment leave their bank? Well, they’ll simply cancel it and move on to a new exciting product.

Customer loyalty should be at the forefront of your business and it’s key if you want to run a successful Magento subscription e-commerce business.

You could employ loyalty programs or think about ways to give subscription customers special discounts or offers to say thanks for continuing to be your customer.

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With so many products being sold as subscriptions nowadays, it’s time to make sure you’re thinking about ways to make your subscription and e-commerce business stand out from the rest.

Final thoughts

Whether you’re looking to boost customer retention or work on ways to improve customer loyalty, a subscription service could be the perfect avenue for you to explore.

But do keep in mind that in order to get started you’ll need to get both your Magento store and your payment system set up for repeat purchases.

You’ll also need to make sure you’ve thought about different ways you can market your subscription service to both new and current customers.

Finally, you want to ensure that even though customers are paying you money each month, you don’t forget about stellar customer service and keeping your customers (your biggest asset) happy.