Sports-Themed Subscription Offer Pages

How well do sports-themed subscription pages convert visitors into subscribers?

You may not be a “sports fan” per se, but everyone plays games, whether it’s chess, checkers or Thursday nights down at the local Bridge club. We took a look at three sports-themed businesses offering subscriptions to see how well (or not) they are converting visitors into subscribers.

Golf Crate

http://golfcrate.com/

A subscription box for the golfer in your life, Golf Crate follows the tried-and-true box formula: Golf-themed goodies sent in the mail once a month for a subscription fee. The site itself has a modern scrolling design where it is easy to find registration information.

  1. When clicking the “Learn More” button, the site scrolls to the next “What is Golf Crate?” section that explains what exactly the site offers subscribers. In this case it’s a monthly “box in the mail with an assortment of carefully products in the golf market.”
  2. The next section explains how it to register, in “3 Easy Steps.. Even Carl Can Do It” which is a reference to Bill Murray’s character Carl Spackler the immortal golf movie Caddyshack.
  3. The “Join Now” button brings you to the Pick A Plan page, where there are three options:
    • Pay Per Month (The lower product offering)
    • Single Month (A single box, not a subscription)
    • Hole in One Box (The higher product offering)

GolfCrate

What’s interesting here is that GolfCrate offers something that’s not often seen in Subscription Boxes, a “Single Month” option for a one-off box purchase. While at first glance it may look like this flies in the face of the whole idea behind subscription boxes, what Golf Crate has done here is to essentially create a comparison to the subscription offering, which makes it look like somewhat of a deal in comparison. We find the order in which the offerings are presented interesting, sandwiched between the two other subscription offerings on the page, instead of on its own. 

 

Draft Sharks

http://www.draftsharks.com/

Draft Sharks is a site for the fanatical Fantasy Football fan to get the latest advice on which players and teams to keep their eyes on.

  1. The main page on the site has tools and analysis available for free.
  2. There is no navigation bar across the top of the page to easily help guide visitors looking to subscribe.
  3. A better placement of a subscription button is needed, instead of a green button halfway down the page that prompts users to “GET THE INSIDER INFORMATION.” This does nothing to tell the visitor they are indeed going to a registration page.

Draft Sharks

4. On the registration page, there are two subscription options:

    1. The “DS Insider Membership” gives a season’s of free access to the site. However, by registering, you are agreeing to a semi-annual auto-renewal for the preseason package at $24, in addition to the $29 regular fee. You can cancel the renewal at any time, and get a refund of the subscription price. This is stated in a call out box of fine print that appears when you hover your mouse over the tiny question mark next to “Semi Annual Auto-Renew.”
    2. The “Regular Season Package” costs $29 per year and begins on March 7th, so anyone registering before then would be auto-renewed on that date.

Draft Sharks

Overall the site does a good job explaining and comparing the benefits of its two product offerings. But this is assuming that visitors actually will be able to find the registration page in the first place!

 

MLB TV

http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/subscriptions/index.jsp

MLB.tv is Major League Baseball’s on-demand subscription offering for the ultimate baseball fan.

  1. The subscription page can be accessed by clicking the link on the top navigation bar the MLB.com homepage. It would probably improve conversions if the site were to better promote this product with its own button or box.

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  1. The registration page straightforwardly lays out both of its offerings. They are properly priced, as the Premium offering (on-demand access to all 32 teams) is only slightly more than the Single Team offering.
  2. MLB does a good job of describing the benefits of each offering, though it’s not explicit whether or not this is a one-off purchase or if it will renew.
  3. Clicking on the large buttons to purchase brings you to an easy registration process.

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Like Draft Sharks, the path to subscription is difficult to find. While it may be intuitive to most visitors, MLB TV could mean different things to different people. We would recommend making it more explicit with a “Subscribe Now” call out or something similar. Once the visitor can get over this hump, the parameters of the product offering are laid out, and the process is easy.

 

INSIDER Take:

All three of these samples convert visitors in different ways. Golf Crate is the most conventional subscription product and goes about its conversion process the same as other Subscription Box companies. Here we saw something we’ve never seen before: a one-time only box purchase amidst its two subscription offerings. This is an interesting way to present your products. At the very least, separate your eCommerce offerings from your subscriptions. Mixing the two is generally a practice to avoid. For Draft Sharks, the biggest mistake they made is hiding their subscription button halfway down the page. Your visitors should always know clearly where they should be going in order to subscribe. MLB TV wasn’t as difficult to subscribe to as Draft Sharks, but unless you knew exactly that MLB.tv was a subscription service, you wouldn’t visit the page. This points out a simple best practice for Subscription Sites: Always make the path to your subscription page explicit, or else you risk losing customers.

 


Brian Hood is a contributor to Subscription Insider

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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