This has been a whirlwind week for Subscription Insider, as we return from LA after our latest Subscription Payment Bootcamp. It was great to meet some of you! Meanwhile, we were working on today’s Five on Friday to give you some great resources for growing your business. In this week’s edition, Shopify shares time management apps to help you better balance your life, Vindicia explains three customer acquisition costs to remember, Hubspot offers tips for setting achievable sales goals, we learn four lessons from Time Inc.’s attempt to cut $400 million in costs, and Iterable tells us what to look for when choosing an email service provider.  

• 4 Time Management Apps to Better Balance Your Life
• 3 Key Subscriber Metrics and Acquisition Costs You Need to Understand
• How to Set Sales Goals Your Team Can Actually Achieve
• 4 Lessons on Raising Cash and Cutting Costs from Time Inc.
• 5 Characteristics of a Solid Email Service Provider 

4 Time Management Apps to Better Balance Your Life 

We could all use a little more time each day to get things done, whether it is finishing that report, spending 10 more minutes on an upcoming project, going to the gym, or spending quality time with family. We can’t add more hours to the clock, but we can help by sharing Shopify’s recommendations for time management apps to make the most of the time you have. Here are three we want to try:

Timely: Timely is a time-tracking app that helps you organize your workweek It helps you track time, but also to estimate how much time you need to set aside to complete your tasks. It is available on a variety of platforms, and it syncs across in real time.

Workflow: Available for iOS Workflow is an app that lets you create custom apps to automate tasks in batches with a drag-and-drop interface. You can upload all your smartphones photos to Dropbox, notify colleagues you’re running late, or play a playlist. Workflow works with more than 200 actions and integrates with apps like Facebook, YouTube and Evernote.

Pocket: If you’re like me, you bookmark online articles you want to read, but can never quite get to. Then you clear your browser’s cache, and those articles are lost forever. Ugh! Change all that with Pocket, a bookmarking app that puts all of your ‘read me later’ articles in one place. Available for iOS and Android, Pocket works with more than 1,500 apps to make saving reading material easy and convenient.

Wunderlist: Available for a variety of operating systems, including iOS and Android, Wunderlist helps you create personal and professional ‘to do’ lists, set due dates and reminders, assign tasks, share lists and more. It offers a free version as well as paid Pro and Business (for teams) premium versions, starting at $4.99 a month.

For more time management application recommendations, read ‘9 Time Management Apps to Organize Your Life and Keep You on Track‘ by Kevin Donnelly on Shopify here. 

3 Key Subscriber Metrics and Acquisition Costs You Need to Understand 

Customer acquisition costs (CAC) are a key metric for any subscription company, but acquisition costs are the culmination of many other metrics, notes Kevin Cancilla for Vindicia in a September 13 blog post. To find out how we’re doing and track our efforts and ROI, Cancilla recommends we pay particular attention to these three customer acquisition costs:

1. Search volume: For your company’s SEO efforts to be worthwhile, you need to measure search volume which goes beyond just ranking high on a particular search engine. Rather than just relying on your brand name or industry terms you’ve created, target keywords and phrases related to your subscription product or service.
2. Email subscriber conversions: Growing your email list is a great way to market to potential subscribers, but it is equally important to know where those leads come from. Did they join your mailing list to get a discount or download a white paper or one-sheet? Knowing how a prospect came to you can help you hone your marketing strategies and messaging.
3. Email list unsubscribe rate: If your email list has a high unsubscribe rate, you’re doing something right and you are missing out on opportunities to convert those email readers into potential subscribers. Find out why readers are unsubscribing – are you sending too many messages, are the messages irrelevant, or are they poorly written without a clear call to action?

By keeping an eye on these three key metrics, your subscription company will solid data with which to make improvements and to lower customer acquisition costs. For additional information on this topic, read Cancilla’s original post, ‘3 Acquisition Costs You Don’t Want to Forget‘ on Vindicia.com. 

How to Set Sales Goals Your Team Can Actually Achieve 

Meeting weekly and monthly goals is critical to the success of any sales rep, but there are ways to go beyond meeting quotes to really motivate reps and help them build confidence. Hubspot offers seven ideas for setting sales goals you can actually achieve in ‘7 Steps to Setting Smarter Sales Goals‘ by Meg Prater. Here are three.

1)  Set activity goals to help sales reps back into their monthly goals. Let’s say Bob’s monthly goal is to bring in $5,000 of new business, with an average of $1,000 per new customer. If he closes half of the deals he proposes, then Bob will need to make 10 calls per month (10 calls x 50% x $1,000 each = $5,000).  

2)  Offer incentives to your sales team. Incentives are a great way to motivate sales reps to meet or exceed their sales goals. Which incentives you choose should be determined by your budget, the level of result you are working toward, and what motivates your team. Some sales reps will be motivated by financial rewards, while others would prefer extra time off or recognition.

3) Set ‘waterfall goals.’ When you ramp up your sales teams’ activity, don’t overwhelm them with huge changes in their routine. Prater gives the example of doubling email contacts from 50 to 100 each week. Rather than requiring an immediate shift in activity level, gradually work up to the goal of 100 per week, maybe adding 10 new emails per week until you get to 100.

For more tips on goal setting for individual sales reps and teams, read ‘7 Steps to Setting Smarter Sales Goals’ on Hubspot here.

4 Lessons on Raising Cash and Cutting Costs from Time Inc. 

On the news side of things, we have been writing a lot about Time Inc. lately. Of particular interest is the company’s goal of cutting $400 million in costs and bringing more money in the door. Here are four lessons we can learn from Time Inc. on how to raise cash while cutting costs:

• Divest expendable assets. In a September 8-K filing with the SEC, Time Inc. said it might sell off its UK division, a majority stake in Essence, Sunset, Coastal Living and Golf magazines.
• Develop paid membership programs like PetHero and People Perks. Time Inc. launched PetHero in July and People Perks this month. Both programs are designed to capitalize on customer loyalty with discounts and perks.
• Cut magazine circulation. Time Inc. is reducing the circulation of Time magazine from 3 million to 2 million per issue and People en Español will go from 540,000 to 500,000, reports Media Post.
• Cut magazine frequency. Media Post also reports that Time Inc. is reducing frequency for some of its magazines: People en Español will go from 11 issues to 9; Sports Illustrated will drop from 38 issues to 27; Fortune will drop from 16 issues per year to 12; Money will go from 11 issues to 10; and Entertainment Weekly will go from 38 issues to 34 in 2018. 

5 Characteristics of a Solid Email Service Provider

Constant Contact, AWeber and MailChimp are no longer the only email service providers on the block. Many large and small players have entered the market, so it is important to choose the one that fits your business and your budget. Iterable recommends you look for these five characteristics when choosing your next email service provider. A good ESP will:

1. Have a modern, functional user interface
2. Offer flexibility, particularly when it comes to audience segmentation
3. Be seamless
4. Be scalable to accommodate your growing company
5. Give you real-time email marketing metrics

For more suggestions on choosing an ESP, read or download Iterable’s ‘5 Things to Look for In Your Next Platform‘ guide here.