5 Reasons to Give Ecommerce Subscriptions

The ecommerce subscription model offers retailers several operational advantages, including relatively superior marketing results, higher client retention rates, improved margins, simple inventory management, and less costly shipping.

Subscription ecommerce companies take many diverse forms and serve many different niches. What they have in common is that the kind of customer need or problem they tackle. Very often these problems or needs include some kind of merchandise replenishment, merchandise discovery, or a service.

Ecommerce subscriptions may be a standalone company, such as BarkBox or BirchBox, or an option from a merchant willing to market products to you . By way of instance, a shopper could buy four ounces of Four Vices beard balm from Beardbrand as a one-time purchase or select Beardbrand’s”auto-restock” option to get the balm regularly.

This means so transactional retailers may also provide subscriptions and enjoy a few of the benefits, such as the five listed here.

1. Return on Marketing Investment

Ecommerce subscription businesses should provide an excellent return on the advertising investment because a newly acquired customer is very likely to make repeated purchases.

For any online retail company, new client acquisition is common advertising goal. It may also be one of the priciest advertising investments a company makes. But using a subscription service, your return on investment or return on advertising spend is almost certainly better than a company that provides only one-time sales.

Imagine that you sell a widget for $50. You purchase this widget from your provider for $25. Normally, it costs you $10 for a new customer for your widget, so you end up earning about $15 gain on every widget. Put another way, a $10 advertising investment yields $15 in gain.

Now imagine that you also provide a subscription”auto-restock” choice for new clients, too. If a shopper subscribes and leaves two buys before canceling her subscription, your yield increases. You make a total of $40 profit over both transactions, but still only spend $10 to obtain the customer. A $10 advertising investment yields $40 in gain.

2. High Customer Retention

The previous example assumed your widget contributor would cancel (churn) after two orders. But in fact, your ecommerce subscription company might enjoy a better client retention rate.

While very few in the industry are ready to guess at an average customer retention rate for subscription company relative to the retention rate for additional retail business models, many insiders will tell you to expect improved rates for subscriptions.

In a nutshell, with a subscription offer your client will buy over and over.

3. Good Retail Margins

Some ecommerce subscription companies have reported greater retail margins compared to those from one-time sales of individual products. While many factors can lead to these improved margins, they result from selling the goods for more or having lower costs associated with selling the item.

The first opportunity, selling goods at a higher price, may be the case for”box” subscription services that pack a number of products together for a set price. If you purchase a $25 box of fresh shoelaces, you may not individually price each lace. Therefore, the merchant can charge a little more for a few laces.

The second chance, having lower costs related to a subscription sale, is possible, in part, due to predictability. Because you know beforehand what you will sell next month, you can optimize inventory, packaging, and transport.

4. Easy-to-manage Inventory

Your ability to maximize inventory, which lowers your costs, comes from knowing what you’ll sell beforehand.

In case you have 100 subscribers to your sardine-of-the month box, then you know that you’ll need at least 100 cans of the month’s sardines. This means you could place the appropriate order from your sardine provider with assurance, and if the amount is sufficient, you might even get a better discount, placing orders for many months ahead of time.

Compare this to stock management for a standard retail business model. How would you know how many sardines to order next month? You’d think about sales history, taking into account seasonal fluctuations in sardine intake, seasons, etc. However, you wouldn’t have as clear of a picture.

With the subscription version, it’s easier.

5. Low Cost Shipping

The ecommerce subscription model may also lead to lower shipping costs. Your customer expects to get an arrangement on a schedule. Perhaps it’s an arrangement every week, month, or quarter.

All your client cares about is that the order arrives on time. You can send it as it makes sense to your enterprise. These means which it is possible to choose comparatively slow and affordable ways to send your subscription orders.

For a transactional ecommerce company, you really want packages to arrive in a couple of days from the date that the customer requests. With subscription fulfillment, you might have a bundle take two weeks. Your client won’t care, provided that the items arrive when expected.

You may also maximize shipping with special packaging or utilizing fulfillment services with warehouses near your readers.