A fall chill is in the air, but we’ll warm you up with great insights, tips and tools to help you grow your subscription business. In this week’s edition, Forbes shares tools to help reduce customer churn, MediaPost and PageFair give us the scoop on the loss of revenue from ad blocking, Politico reports that millennials will, indeed, pay for news, Marketing Profs offers great holiday email marketing tips, and LinkedIn posts top subscription jobs from LoveToKnow, Netflix and Dropbox

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Two Tools to Improve SaaS Retention 

Acquiring new customers is costly for any subscription business, including SaaS providers. That’s why it is important to retain the customers you do have. In a recent article, ‘Four Key Tools and Strategies for Reducing SaaS Churn,’ Thomas Griffin, co-founder and CTO of OptinMonster, shares these tips on Forbes:

• Resolve payment issues with Churn Buster. Failed payments create involuntary churn, but Griffin says that can be avoided with a tool like Churn Buster, which helps resolve payment issues caused by lack of funds and expired cards. Churn Buster says companies can save up to 70 percent of failed payments.
• Do a survey of customer satisfaction via YesInsights. Through a simple, single-question survey, you can determine how likely your customers are to recommend you. YesInsights can help you develop a Net Promoter Score to help you find out why you have SaaS churn and how you can better engage your customers.  

Read more about these tools and two more in the original article on Forbes.

U.S. Publishers to Lose $15.8 Billion from Ad Blocking This Year 

According to Media Post, a recent survey revealed that 26 percent of U.S. consumers use some form of ad-blocker. This is an increase from 22 percent in 2016, reported OnAudience.com. This translates to an estimated loss to publishers of $15.8 billion in advertising revenue, a big increase over the approximately $11 billion loss in 2016.

Here are some other staggering statistics from PageFair’s 2017 ad-blocking report, published in February:

• 615 million global devices were blocking ads, as of December 2016, 62 percent of these devices were mobile devices
• Mobile ad block usage grew by 108 million to 380 million active devices globally between December 2015 and December 2016
• Desktop ad block usage grew by 34 million to 236 million devices globally between December 2015 and December 2016
• 74 percent of ad blocking users say they leave websites with ad-block walls
• 77 percent of ad blocking users are willing to view some ad formats

This problem isn’t going away, and it will continue to cost publishers tens of billions of dollars until publishers and advertisers find a more palatable way to reach readers without alienating them.

Surprise! Millennials are Willing to Pay for News

In a recent article by Jason Schwartz on Politico, ‘Young Subscribers Flock to Old Media,’ millennials are turning to ‘old media’ to get their news, and they are willing to pay for it. The New Yorker says it subscribers in the 18 to 34 age range have increased by 106 percent since the November 2016 election. In the 25 to 34 age range, subscriptions have grown 129 percent. Though neither publisher disclosed specific numbers, according to Politico, the Washington Post and The New York Times are both reporting their highest increases in subscription rates are occurring among millennials.

In a 2017 Reuters Institute Digital News Report, Nic Newman said there are two primary reasons for this shift. First, streaming entertainment services like Netflix and Spotify have ‘trained’ millennials to pay for quality content. Second, President Donald Trump has boosted subscriptions across the board, a phenomenon known as the ‘Trump bump.’ You can ignore Trump’s claims that publications like The New York Times and Vanity Fair are ‘failing,’ publications spewing fake news. He just doesn’t want us to read them.

Read more about this trend and the reasons for it on Politico.

5 Email Marketing Tips for the Holiday Season

The holiday season is just around the corner, and if you haven’t started planning your marketing yet, you’re behind schedule. But never fear! We’ve got great email marketing tips here, compliments of Marketing Profs. Here are five of our favorite tips from Kevin George’s October 25 article, ‘Holiday Email Marketing Trends and Tips for 2017 from the Experts.’

1. Look at data from past holiday campaigns to see what worked well and what didn’t. Consider headlines, content, timing and click-throughs, and plan this year’s email campaign using the techniques that have worked well for you in the past.
2. Get their attention. We are all competing for to get customers and prospects to read our content. To draw them in, write an irresistible subject line to ensure that your email newsletter or campaign gets opened. Write something that will differentiate yourself and stand out in a crowded inbox.
3. Add interactive elements. Do you like reading boring emails? Neither do your customers. Add some excitement to your campaign with graphic or interactive elements.
4. Know your customer and personalize your message to appeal to them. This is true year-round, but particularly during the holiday season which is prime time for a lot of subscription companies. Segment your campaign and try different emails for different demographic groups.
5. Thank your customers. Don’t have a special promotion this holiday season? Consider sending a simple thank you to your customers for their business. It’s a nice, goodwill gesture to just appreciate them for doing business with you without the hard sell.

Read more of George’s holiday email marketing tips on Marketing Profs here.

LinkedIn Jobs 

Looking for a new opportunity in the subscription world? There are some great jobs to be had, whether you are relocating to a new city or are looking for a new challenge. Here are five top subscription jobs from LinkedIn:

Growth & Conversion Marketing, Consumer Subscriptions (Remote)
LoveToKnow Corp.
San Francisco Bay Area

Join a fast-growing portfolio of consumer digital media properties that total 30M users per month. If you are looking to directly impact revenue, then we want to speak with you. We’re looking for a rock star full-time Growth & Conversion Marketer to lead subscription acquisition, conversion and retention for our Trails.com, Golflink.com, and Printables properties. Recent monetization improvements have increased company revenue by 100%+ y/y, and we need you to get us to the next level. This full-time role is based remotely and reports to the Chief Revenue Officer & Head of Product Strategy. Read more here.

Senior Software Engineer – Billing Subscription Platform
Netflix
Los Gatos, California

Netflix subscription platform is one of the best in the world. We build the software that scales to invoice 100+ million Netflix customers in multiple currencies around the world. Our services keep track of renewing customers, gift balance, discounts, invoices, revenue and billing history for a customer. Our Microservices are part of various e-commerce workflows to process user actions and charge through various payment methods. As a member of this team, you will be working on software components that are critical for Netflix to invoice its customers fairly and collect revenue for Netflix. The challenges abound as Netflix innovates into providing different kind of invoicing options to customers and scales to acquire its next 100 million customers. Read more here.

Customer Experience Manager – Subscription Businesses
Chegg, Inc.
Portland, Oregon

Chegg is dedicated to putting our students first. Our Student Advocacy Team, based in Portland Oregon, is seeking a Customer Experience Manager to help foster the vision of our digital subscription business lines, maximize service quality while promoting the cultural values and mission of Chegg. Our ideal candidate is data-driven, has an analytical mindset, strives for operational excellence, has experience scaling and managing a support operation, and has a demonstrated ability to partner cross-functionally with product GM’s and business leaders. Read more here.

Senior Product Manager, Ads and Monetization
Brightcove
Greater Boston Area

Brightcove is looking for a Senior Product Manager to join the Video Cloud Product team, specializing in Ads and Monetization. Their focus would be enabling our media customers to effectively monetize their video content and engage audiences across ad-supported, subscription, and direct-to-consumer business models. The position reports directly to the VP, Product Management, Video Cloud. Read more here.

Global Payments Business Manager
Dropbox
Seattle, Washington

As the Global Payments Business Manager, you will be responsible for driving outcomes and results for the Dropbox Self-serve business. This role will drive the strategy and execution across payments – from handling vendor relationships, maintaining industry outreach with payment professionals, to identifying payment expansion opportunities. You will lead business development, business negotiation and relationship management with payment processing & technology service providers. Read more here.

Thanks for reading. Have a great weekend!