In this week’s edition of Five on Friday, Forbes Agency Council outlines strategies to overcome ad blocking, Winnipeg Free Press uses micropayments as a top-of-the-funnel strategy, Harvard Business Review explores how sales teams are impacted when companies transition to subscription models, Associations Now discusses the benefits of monthly subscriptions, and Hubspot shares customer service secrets from beauty brand Glossier.

Overcome Ad Blocking with These 5 Strategies 

Since 2014, ad blocking usage in the U.S. has gone from 15.7 percent of web users to 27.5 in 2017 percent, according to Statista. That figure is expected to grow to 30.1 percent this year.

That means that publishers and advertising agencies need to find new ways to get in front of their target audiences. In a recent article, Forbes Agency Council outlined 14 such strategies. We’re sharing five of them here, along with the name of the originator. Read all 14 strategies on Forbes.

1. Use native advertising that blends seamlessly with content. ~ Ricardo Casas, Fahrenheit Marketing
2. Put yourself in your readers’ shoes. Do you enjoy getting pop-up ads or seeing flashy banners? Create ads that would enhance your experience, not detract from it. ~ Omar Jenblat, BusySeed
3. Keywords are critical. Use relevant keywords that match the product or service you are promoting. ~ Katina Kenyon, Applaudo Studios
4. Go to your audience and serve up ads with the messages they want when they want them. Find out the sites or platforms that your target audience frequents – blogs, Facebook, Instagram – and reach them there with appropriate messaging. ~ Craig Greiwe, Rogers & Cowan
5. Focus on creating the best user experience. Instead of fighting the ad blockers, leverage other marketing tools like influencers, personalized ads and native advertising to share your message. ~ Bernard May, National Positions

Winnipeg Free Press Attracts Readers with Micropayments as a Lead-in to Subscriptions

We’ve been following the Winnipeg Free Press since it added a micropayment strategy to its list of payment options about three years ago. Last week Nieman Lab’s H.G. Watson did an update, ‘In Winnipeg, micropayments aren’t generating big money, but they’re serving as a top-of-the funnel strategy.’

When the micropayment strategy was originally implemented, it was just one part of a bigger picture. The newspaper would still offer paid subscriptions and a metered paywall, but they knew they weren’t hitting all of the different types of readers with those options. By offering micropayments, they could capture some interest – and a little bit of income – by charging $0.27 per article. Three years in and the newspaper hasn’t exceeded the $100,000 per year threshold in income, reports Nieman Lab.

According to publisher Bob Cox, micropayment revenue will never be enough to be a sustainable source of revenue, but it is an important part of the sales funnel. Micropayments are really the lure to attract readers with the idea that the Free Press can eventually convert some of those readers into paying subscribers. In a 30-day window this spring, Cox said they had about 1,500 readers making micropayments. Of those, about 15 percent were estimated to become full-time digital subscribers.

Read more about the Free Press’s sales funnel and usage of micropayments to attract subscribers at Nieman Lab.

How Subscription Business Models Impact Sales Teams 

SaaS companies like Adobe are transitioning away from licensing their products and moving toward subscription models. While this helps sustainability for SaaS companies, it also presents some new challenges, such as how a sales force adjusts when they go from securing the sale and moving on to securing the sale and maintaining the customer relationship. In ‘What Subscription Business Models Mean for Sales Teams,’ Harvard Business Review explores the impact on salespeople and the pros and cons of being in a single versus a dual sales role.

Companies who choose a single sales role have their sales people not only acquire the account but they also service and retain the account. Advantages include customer satisfaction, accountability and efficiency. Disadvantages are that diverse sales and retention activities can fragment the work, making it necessary to do a number of tasks simultaneously and well.

In a dual role system, salespeople can be more effective because managers can match up staff with the roles they are best suited to. Companies can also see efficiencies by utilizing an inside sales force. There are disadvantages as well, including deciding when customers are handed off from the initial sales contact to the support contact, synching up responsibilities and sharing information.

Both systems are workable, but subscription companies need to really examine the pros and cons to decide which system will work best for them. Learn more about the pros and cons of each at Harvard Business Review.

Are Monthly Services Right for Your Membership Organization?

If you belong to a trade association or professional organization, you’ve probably seen the trend moving away from memberships. To reverse – or at least slow – this trend, associations are trying to find new ways to attract and keep their members. In a recent article, Associations Now suggests that that this is a great time to experiment with offering a monthly service to generate recurring revenue. This has become relatively easy with digital services which don’t require a physical product. If you do it right, you might even be able to attract new members to your organization.

‘Associations, because of their long history and experience with membership models, would be in a good place to experiment in this space. This approach would fall into the nondues revenue category, but you would likely use marketing tactics similar to the ones you use to promote membership,’ writes Ernie Smith for Associations Now.

‘Associations take great pains to serve and understand the audiences they’ve been supporting for generations. What if you used those same tactics to serve a brand-new audience, considering that technology makes doing that a lot easier,’ asks Smith.

Read more about this concept in ‘Subscription Strategy: Why a Monthly Service Could Be a Savvy Play‘ on Associations Now. 

3 Customer Secrets from Beauty Brand Glossier 

Beauty brand Glossier is an online, direct-to-consumer beauty brand focused on millennials. Not only do they have much-loved products like Boy Brow and Balm Dotcom, they have almost a cult following, reports Hubspot. In a recent blog post, Hubspot explored one of the reasons for their success – customer service – and shared eight success secrets. We’re sharing three for you to borrow here:

1. Allow your team to show their true personality in interacting with customers and encourage them to be genuine. Don’t know the answer to a question? Say that and then find the answer. Have a product recommendation based on your own experience? Share it.
2. Go to your customers where they are. Don’t limit customer service channels to emails or phone calls. If your customers want to send you DMs on Twitter, reply to them there. Make it easy for customers to find you and make sure you are responsive.
3. Several of Glossier’s success secrets are tightly woven into their identity – take pride in your job and your company and that passion will show through in your customer service.

For more customer service success secrets, visit Hubspot.