Subscriptions That Stand Out: The Nuances That Separate Great Experiences from Mediocre Ones | Ben Fisher
Today’s Guest: Ben Fisher
Ben started his entrepreneurial journey as a kid in Maine and later worked at a tech startup during the first Dot Com boom. He co-founded CartHook - a checkout optimization platform for DTC ecommerce brands that has processed over $1 billion on behalf of merchants. He now runs Rodeo, a platform that offers personalization features to maximize customer retention and lifetime value for 8-figure DTC brands that utilize subscription-based models.
Here’s a summary of the great stuff that we cover in this show:
Ben discusses the importance of a good customer experience, specifically with subscriptions. He emphasizes that brands should consider the nuances and individual consumption patterns of their customers, and offers a solution called "on-demand" reminders that give consumers more control and eliminate the concern of getting too much or running out of a product.
Convenience is key in consumer subscriptions and figuring out the most convenient method for each individual is important for maximizing customer lifetime value. Brands can offer questionnaires or check-ins to tailor the subscription to individual preferences rather than assuming everyone needs the same subscription model. Reminder emails or texts leading up to the desired replenishment period can also be helpful in simplifying the subscription process for customers.
Ben discusses the different subscription options offered by the company, including a standard subscription, on-demand feature, and one-time purchase option. The on-demand feature allows for convenience and eliminates checkout friction while still allowing for upsells and cross sells. The segmenting of customers and addressing their reasons for canceling or skipping subscriptions also helps to retain customers and offer a better-suited program for their consumption style.
If the customer wants to delay the next purchase, they can select the snooze feature which suggests pre-filled periods of three to five days, one week, and other options to remind users that they may be running out of the product soon and would they like to order some more? However, some users can explicitly choose a date and sometimes even up to three months in advance.
Ben & Matt explore the perks of subscriptions and how to add value beyond just getting subscribers. They discuss the importance of thoughtfully designing membership programs, offering benefits like free shipping, members-only pricing, and individual subscriptions, and the risks of discounting subscriptions too much and attracting the wrong customers. The focus is on providing the best experience for each customer and creating a healthy, sustainable subscription model.
Matt talks about a a subscription he signed up for which he had forgotten about and was charged $1000 without warning. Ben explains that if the company had been proactive with their onboarding process and personalized their messaging, they may have been able to retain him as a customer. A bad experience can leave a negative impression on a customer.
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Ben: But what about the other 80% of your customer base who just does not want a subscription or they have too many, or they've been burnt by a subscription. Mm-hmm. They are, you're, you need a strategy to be able to like, to optimize those customers and their experience.
Matt: Welcome to the e-Commerce podcast with me, your host, Matt Edmundson. The E-Commerce podcast is all about helping you deliver e-commerce. Wow. And to help us do just that today we are gonna be chatting with Ben Fisher from Rodeo. About subscriptions. Uh, subscriptions, that's a hard word to say. Apparently subscriptions that stand out.
The nuances that separate great experiences from mediocre ones. That's an awesome title. Can I just say congratulations to the podcast title team? Uh, cuz that was awesome. Uh, but before Ben and I dive into our discussion, let me share, uh, Some podcast picks of previous episodes that I think you'll enjoy.
Check out everything you need to know to take over with subscription e-commerce with Evan Padgett. Evan is such a cool dude. Uh, do check that one out. And also how to increase your customer retention, the ultimate guide. By Brandon, who is also another legend. So check both of those out. You can check out both my podcast picks, uh, and our entire podcast archive for that, uh, for free on our website, which is ecommercepodcast.net.
Plus, if you there, sign up for the newsletter and we'll send you the links to the podcast picks, along with the notes and the links from today's show. With Ben, they all get delivered straight to your inbox at no cost to you automagically, every time we do an episode, which is pretty amazing. So do crack on and do that now.
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Oh yes. We're excited to announce a brand new free resource for you called E-Commerce Cycles. It's a mini course which walks you through a proven framework for building a successful e-commerce business. I. And the one, uh, that takes you through the specific steps that I use in my own e-commerce companies so you can see exactly how to put these concepts into practice in your own business.
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Now let's talk about Ben. Ben started his entrepreneurial journey as a kid in Maine, and later worked at a tech startup during the first dot com boom. He co-founded CartHook, which is a checkout optimization platform for DTC e-commerce brands that has processed over one billion dollars. That's right. A billion dollars on behalf of merchants.
And if you're not sure, that's a lot of money. He now runs Rodeo, a platform that offers personalization features to maximize customer retention and lifetime value for eight figure DTC brands that utilize subscription based models. So we're excited to have Ben on the show. Ben, welcome man. Great to have you. How are you doing?
Ben: I'm doing great. Thanks for having me. And it's, uh, awesome. It's funny hearing your bio. You're like that. That's a mouthful.
Matt: It's always funny, isn't it? Yeah. No, no, it's great. I, I, I always enjoy reading out people's bio. It's, it's great fun. So, whereabouts in the world are you, Ben?
Ben: I live in New York City, but I'm actually at Shop Talk, uh, the e-commerce conference. So I'm in Vegas right now. Okay. Typically, I'm in New York.
Matt: Okay. Hence the hat is the reason why NY. I didn't realize that. Yeah, yeah. Okay.
Ben: Just like their logo, it's actually blasphemous.
Matt: It is a pretty cool logo. The n y logo, for those of you listening to the show, which I know is 99.9% of people, uh, Ben is wearing a New York cap. Is it a New York? Is this a specific New York Yankee baseball team is That's right. The New York Yankees. Yeah. So, yeah. Yeah. Um, so are you a Yankees fan?
Ben: I, I just like the logo, which is why it's blasphemous, right? I live in New York City. I've lived, I'm not a huge sports person, skateboarder, snowboarder.
Matt: Okay, we should do another podcast on why skateboarding and snowboarding are not sports. Uh, maybe
Ben: fine. They're sports. We're not, uh, not team sports.
Matt: Yeah, no, fair play. Fair play. That sounds much more interesting though.
I'm not gonna lie. I mean, I do like baseball, but snowboarding is much more interesting. Skateboarding not so much. That's the sure route for me to break a leg break an ankle or my elbow all at the same time in quite a spectacular fashion. I would've thought, oh my gosh. So Ben, listen. Your bio is pretty clear, right?
You, you're fairly successful, um, as an entrepreneur. You've got a good background in tech, you've got a good background in startups, you co-founded CartHook. Um, and so you understand the importance, right, of this whole customer experience thing. So let's get straight into it. Let's, uh, jump in maybe. Have you got any examples of how this word nuance, which I love, uh, plays a role in creating a successful customer experience?
Ben: Yeah, for sure. And I'll say like, uh, for, for context too, my background's actually in design, so Oh. Before like I was a designer and programmer, right? I still am. But um, I'd say a lot of the products and ways I've approached businesses have been from a design perspective and thinking around like user experience.
And, uh, consumer experience. And so, um, and the reason that's relevant is that that ties into a lot around our philosophy at Rodeo and how we've gone about approaching some of the problems that e-commerce brands and, and actually frankly, their customers have. Yeah. Um, around, we'll say like around the experience of buying stuff, of replenishing stuff.
Um, you know, you can throw AI and machine learning at stuff, or you can think about it from more of a design perspective, and obviously it's not either or. Mm-hmm. But I would say that oftentimes, we can overly complicate stuff by trying to program a solution as opposed to think through what's a great experience.
Matt: Um, I think that's such a good, sorry to interrupt, but I, I want to label this a little bit because, um, there is so much talk about AI at the moment, which is great, and I'm playing on it like everybody else. Yeah. And last year everybody was talking about data and big data and mining data and all that sort of stuff, which is also wonderful, the blockchain useful.
But fundamentally, I'm, I'm an old-fashioned guy and I. I, I, I feel like the, the common sense approach to design was drowned out a little bit because of the data talk and the AI talk, and actually mm-hmm. Finding a good design solution to a problem, you know, like an architect and architecture, uh, site architecture and all that sort of stuff. I, I still think is, is a wonderful art actually, and, uh, and almost a dying art. It feels.
Ben: Yeah. No, I think you're. You're absolutely right. Uh, like going back to like, let's say like one of the core problems, uh, for e-commerce brands, and I'll focus on cpg, so like food and beverage, health and wellness. Mm-hmm.
Uh, basically they, they're shelf stable products that are not like a medication where you take the same unit every single day so you can predict, oh, it's just 30 pills, so it's for 30 days. Mm-hmm. Like most products that you buy, um, again, within cpg it's, you know, the amount of coffee you consume or the amount of a food or beverage you consume will vary based off of your life.
It'll vary based off of if you're home, if you're like, if you have friends over, if you're like, there's a bunch of variables, right? And so every single month, your consumption pace will vary, and the amount that it varies will depend. But by and large, it's like, You know, if you go to any, if you go to subscribe to any product online, it's, you know, the typical plans are every 30 days, 60 days, or every month, every two months.
And it's like how much thought's actually put into that A and b, even if it is, we'll call it the, like, optimal amount. How often do people, how often do, do every one of your customers actually consume at that pace? Yeah. Um, and it's a bit of a leading question because the, the answer is the number one reason people cancel subscriptions is they get too much product.
Or they, run out. Yeah. So what's funny about it is, subscriptions are a great model for some customers and for some consumers. But because of that mismatch around like the pace of consumption and like, basically the, replenishment periods, it actively, actively results in people who like your product to cancel and not buy again.
Um, simply because there's a mismatch between those periods. Like, yeah. I'll give you an example. I, uh, I received a family size of, uh, paper towels from uh, Amazon. I used Amazon subscribe and save last month, and I got the paper towels and I realized I still have a bunch of paper towels and not, not only that, I don't have shelf space, so I kid you not, I now have a freezer full of paper towels.
I recorded it for my friends cuz I was like, I was like, this is the exact problem and it's hilarious that it happened to me. But like, if you think of your own life, like how often have you had that happen where it's like, mm-hmm. Crap, I forgot I had this on subscription, or man, I, I didn't need this. Or if we run out.
So, you know, as a brand, um, and once you've acquired a customer who likes your product, like one of the most important things is how can you continue to serve them Yeah. And get them to buy more. And I think that, um, because subscriptions. In aggregate are a really powerful way to, we'll call it maximize lifetime value.
Mm-hmm. It's really easy for brands to be like, we just need to push more and more customers into our subscription program because on like, on average, that's how you make more money. Um, the problem with that though is as I said, is, um, that problem gets worse with scale. Where as you have more and more customers, every one of your customers, you know, is different.
Hmm. And so what we've found, like really smart brands have done and really effectively is pairing the right consumption strategy or sales strategy with, we'll call it the profile of that customer. For some people it is this, I'll get a subscription and have it renewed every month or every, every six weeks, and that's good.
And I don't really care if I get too much because, you know, I'm happy having like a little bit too much. Mm-hmm. Other people, um, like if you, you know, maybe their consumption method is actually like, they'll spend more money by buying in bulk. Right, like they have a garage or they have like ample storage.
They don't live in New York City. And for other people, you know, maybe it's somewhere in between. Like, so the way I solved this for myself before rodeo was I had a calendar reminder for all the things that I would buy on a frequent basis. And so every 30 days I'd get a calendar reminder asking, basically prompt me to like, do do I need more of like this coffee?
And I had a link to the product page. And so we, the very first version of this, we, we recreated that for brands where, for, for the segment of customers who don't wanna have a subscription or are like on the way out, they can do what's effectively like, uh, a smart reminder. We call it on demand, where your card is on file.
So you know the consumer all, they'll, what they'll do is they'll get this prompt every x number of days, like we'll call it every 30 days, saying, are you running low? Do you need more? Mm-hmm. And they can reply yes and like make some tweaks and add additional products to it. Or they can, they can delay it and say, remind me in like a few days, like if they're not ready to buy more.
And what that does though is it keeps the person, it gives the consumer more control and it, it basically through design, eliminates that concern of ever getting too much or, or running out, right? Simply by asking the person, how are you doing? Like, are we on track for you to need more? And so, you know, you can have, use AI all day long, but ultimately the, the only accurate way to do something like this is to ask the person, do you need more?
Yeah. In a way that's not annoying and not intrusive.
Matt: That's really clever. I like that in the sense that, um, I, I like you, have Amazon subscriptions. I have a tea. Yeah. Uh, which I subscribe from Amazon four. And I feel like I have to drink two cups of that tea every day just to keep up with the subscription.
And if I fall behind, I'm gonna, and then I'm just like, oh, there's a faf of going on and canceling the subscription and all that sort of stuff. So, I've, and I guess I've never really thought about it. I've never gone to the extreme that you went to Ben in terms of setting appointments in my diary to ask me do I need tea?
I don't know if I do. Yes, I do. That's, here's the link. Um, I, I, I like the fact that your brain works like that, uh, which led you to develop some software, which I think is quite clever. Um,
Ben: well, one thing I'll just add there though, like for me it's like, set it and forget it. I don't want to think about it.
And, and no, no consumer, no customer. You don't wanna be thinking about your tea, like, It's, you ha you're dealing with your life, right? Like, and so I think for everyone is figuring out like, what's the way that it's just convenient. Yeah. And that will be different for different people.
Matt: Yeah. And I, and and that's true.
And I, that's a good word, isn't it? It's convenience. Uh, what's the most convenient method for me as a consumer to get this product on a regular basis? Um, and I, I guess if I can tap into the answer to that question, I'm therefore maximizing the lifetime value of that client. Um, rather than assuming every client needs to be subscription, or every client needs to be a book buyer or every client, blah, blah, blah.
Yep. That's really interesting. So you, you match convenience to the consumer, and I'm assuming, uh, Ben, uh, and correct me, uh, if I've got my assumptions wrong, which I often do, I'm not gonna lie. Um, your, your understanding client convenience by asking them, I guess, some well pointed questions at the point of checkout.
Ben: So, I mean, that, that's actually, that's not what we do, but that is actually something I have seen like good brands do, which is they'll, they'll offer like a quiz of sorts to try to estimate what your replenishment period is like. Do you have a cup of coffee per day? Do you have two? Mm-hmm. Um, what we do is once someone's purchased, um, we check in with them, right?
So typically it's, typically it does match the suggested like, uh, like interval. So let's say, let's say your typical. Subscriptions 30 days. Yeah. So on one hand you could have someone automatically get charged every 30 days, and that's what we would call a, uh, standard normal subscription. Like that's what everyone's accustomed to.
Um, what we do instead is leading up to that 30 days, let's say it's day 27, they'll get an email or a text that says, are you ready for more? Like, do you need more? Do you need to be placed in like, uh, you're ready for more now? And they can either, Accept that and, have the order fulfilled, or they can snooze it and say, remind me in a week, remind me in like a few days.
Right. And so again, the, the goal there being that, um, yeah, the person doesn't have to actively think, do I need more? It's more that I'm asking you. And then they can, they can, if it's too early, they can snooze it. Um, yeah, that's
Matt: so you don't give them the option to cancel. The you are, you are focused on. Yes, I, well, the default is, I'm gonna send this out if I don't hear from you, but if you'd like to, you can snooze this, um, for, uh, and I guess they choose like three days, seven days or, or whatever it's gonna be. Is that right? Right. But you're not really saying,
Ben: so we won't, we don't automatically, uh, fulfill it. Right? Because it's an opt-in. So Right. The, with that mechanism on demand, the customer, if they don't do anything, they won't get the product. Right. Okay. Because again, part of this is providing them control, so mm-hmm. You can think of it as there's a normal subscription where if they did nothing, they still get notification that their subscription's about to renew.
Mm-hmm. And if you do nothing, your subscription renews. That's how I ended up with way too many paper towels. Right. Like that is a normal subscription. Yep. Um, and we do do that. But that, but on demand, which is that in between buying all a cart and buying on a subscription is where you explicitly need to say, yes, I'm ready.
Okay. For you to be charged in, ordered. And a part of that too is a lot more customers like, you know, the percentage of your customer base that will subscribe let's just, is. Relatively small. Let's say it's 20%, and you know, by and large, those are really valuable customers. Mm-hmm. Once you subscribe. But as we've talked about, there's a lot of reason good customers cancel subscriptions.
But what about the other 80% of your customer base who just does not want a subscription or they have too many, or they've been burnt by a subscription. Mm-hmm. They are, you're, you need a strategy to be able to like, to optimize those customers and their experience. Um, and so on. Demand is one way of doing it beyond just.
Sending them more marketing messages. Right? Because if someone's buying from you, you know, the only other way that people buy is either in reaction to like an a marketing email they get from you or like you, if you remember, you need more tea. Yeah. So this is still a sort of pavon, pavlonian, pavlonian, uh, um, it's a great word.
Uh, uh, I would say pavlonian response. I was like, pavlonian interaction. Where it's like, yeah, okay, I'm gonna check in with you. You don't need to worry about thinking about this. And you know, you just think about it when I ask you, and then, you know, you're in full control. So people, more people are going to sign, opt into that.
Yeah. Than, um, than not.
Matt: That's a really interesting idea. So you, if I'm going to your website, then I'm faced with different options and, and, and walk me through this, Ben. Cause I'm sorry to get in the nitty gritty, but I'm, I'm kind of, I just wanna get my head around how it all works. So I've gone to your website.
I've got the standard subscription, uh, option, which says, I want you to send me this coffee every 60 days. Mm-hmm. Or whatever it is. Um, and that's one path I can go down. Another path I can go down is I just wanna buy a bag of coffee. Send me the coffee, leave me alone, and if I want more, I'll come back.
Mm-hmm. And then the third option is, um, is this sort of on demand feature that you talk about, where it's like, listen, uh, tell us a timeframe. Uh, and we'll remind you within that timeframe, and you can let us know if you want. We'll, remember, your card makes it easy to order. Um, and it's as simple as a saying, yes, I do.
And if you do great, and if you don't, don't worry. We don't charge you. Um, it mm-hmm. Is that, have I understood that right, or are you merging those together somehow in a creative way?
Ben: No, I mean, I think, I mean, at the basic level you described it, right? I think so. The way that most brands that we've worked with who've introduced this, they've done it through actually, um, call it like the, the, the exit flows.
So they introduce on demand. When someone's already expressing that, they're like, they wanna pause or cancel their subscription. Right. So what you're doing is it's effectively a way to retain that customer who, for the re, for the, for the very, for the, for the reason that they had spent too much, um, or they received too much rather.
Um, that's when, when some brands will present on demand, um, you can also present in, in marketing, right? Mm-hmm. So a lot of what we even do with rodeo is help you segment your customers because you know what you wanna be looking at is who are your repeat buyers who buy, um, cuz there's a lot of people who will buy like, almost like clockwork.
But they'll buy manually every month or mm-hmm. Or whatever that cadence is. And so those are the type of people too, where it's like you're effectively helping them do what they were already doing, and you're making it more convenient. And what's great is you're, you're eliminating 95% of the checkout friction because their cards held on file as opposed to them having to go to the checkout every time.
Um, and you're still able to do, like, upsells and cross cells. And so, um, the. The way that you, the way that a brand will introduce or push on demand? Like, I wouldn't personally, I think the, you know, the, you don't wanna give someone too many options too quickly, right? Yeah. On demand is really a way that, let's say someone's buying at a one time interval, like they're buying a la carte on demand would be a great.
Upsell, so to speak. Mm-hmm. Where it's basically just a, it's a convenience answer, right? Where it's like, Hey, we'll, we'll, we'll remind you. Or if someone has a subscription, and let's say they, they, they're doing two different behaviors. One behavior might be that they're, they're consistently skipping. So most brands actually don't even know how often people skip.
Um, it's, you ask a brand. Yeah. Well, and a lot. And what's funny though, when I talk to a lot of brands, I ask them, so you say you have a hundred thousand subscribers. How many of those people actually buy every month? as opposed to they skip or they reschedule. And most brands can't tell you that.
I mean, they might know their cohort analysis, like their retention. But what they don't know in both the aggregate level and as well as at the individual level is like, who are the people who are consistently skipping and how can we serve them better? Right. Because if they're consistently skipping, they're le there's something about that experience that is putting them.
I mean, it just looks like they are on their way out. Mm-hmm. And so if you can act proactively, um, I'll say proactively approach those customers who are behaving as though they're likely to cancel, this is a great way to get them into a program that is better suited for like, for their consumption style.
Yeah. Yeah. Um, and then the other thing too is that if someone's canceling their subscription, The, you know, the exit survey is one of the, one of them is like, what's the reason, right? Yeah. And I receive too much product, too much, like, uh, you know, too expensive. Those are all the different reasons you can offer solutions based off of what that reason is.
So if it's too expensive, we do the ability for you to offer that segment of customer like a discount. Yeah. Um, but for the con, but again for the context of on context of on demand, if they picked, um, that they have too much product, that's where you can, instead of canceling, what you can suggest is, Hey, you should switch into on demand.
And these, you know, here are the benefits.
Matt: Yeah, I like that. That's really cool. So you mentioned, cuz one of the, I mean, you sort of preempted my question, uh, but I'm not gonna lie. Um, but it, I, I'm kind of thinking one of the things that, um, That I was pondering was with the, with the on demand system, is there space for the cross cells and the upsells?
Because that's one of the downsides I think with subscription is actually, it's pretty, it's pretty fixed what they're buying and it's on autopilot until they change it. Um, so I'm always getting the same type of tea and I'm never on the site going, oh, quite fancy a change. Or I might want to try that flavor or whatever.
Right. Because the whole thing's on automatic, sure they get my money, but, um, I'm gonna get bored with that flavor at some point. Right. So, um, how, how, how do you make cross cells and upsells then? Because this is now starting, this appeals in a, to those maybe that are thinking, how do I do that with subscription?
The on demand thing, I think gives you this opportunity by the sounds of it. So how does that, how does that work?
Ben: Yeah, so you could think of it as basically it's pre-building your cart, right? So it has a cart on file so that the, whatever you buy, the customer doesn't have to reenter their payment information.
It already, you know, looks at your default shipping address. Um, so effectively when you get this communication around, Hey, are you ready for more? Uh, and you click a link, it brings you to a prebuilt cart. Um, within, within, uh, a portal mm-hmm. Um, that shows the product that you most re basically the product or product that you most recently had been purchasing, but there's also suggested products.
So that's where your upsells and cross sells are. Right. And obvi. And yes, you can swap out, you can, you can modify your cart before you can click the button to confirm. Right. And so that also is where you can change the shipping address if for some reason you need to. I know we're getting into the details there, but, um, Um, we do do a similar thing though with normal subscriptions where, um, if, if a person has a normal, or if a consumers subscribed to, has a normal subscription three days, uh, ahead of the subscription renewing it does say, Hey, we're, you know, your subscription's about to renew, here's some product.
You still have time to add these products to your upcoming order. Yeah, yeah. So you do still have the ability to do like upsells and cross sells. Um, But yeah, I mean, your exact use case is a great one, which is, well, maybe I want something slightly different cuz I'm bored of the same tea. Mm-hmm.
Matt: Yeah, no, it, it, it is interesting that you can do that.
I like that. This, I'm just, I'm furiously writing notes, Ben is what I'm doing, you know, to, um, to, to get my head around how all of this works. I find it fascinating. So. The on demand email then, um, that you're sending out to the customer, you're notifying the customer that, uh, at a predetermined timeframe.
Um, listen, would you like these products? And they click either yes or snooze. Um, Mm-hmm. They click yes, they go to the cart page, which has got the products pre-filled. Um, they've got their shipping address pre-filled. You've got their credit card details on file. There's a few upsells and cross sells. So it's sort of the, the one click cart thing is, or the click through cart thing where you can click that your cart's pre-built.
I mean, it makes shopping super, super easy. Thank you, Jesus. Let me just hit this button and we've gone, right? Yeah. Um. How does then the snooze function work? So let's say I want to, I, I, I look at that and I go, no snooze. So do you remind me in like seven days to, to do you send me the same email in seven days and I get exactly the same options, I guess is what I'm asking?
Ben: Yeah. So we prefill it with some, basically some suggested dates, like snooze it three days, snooze it one day, snooze it a week. Or there's an like a link to go other where you can actually go in and you can select the date that you wanna be reminded. Right? So as with most things, it's like we have like the sort of suggested snooze periods, which by and large, 80% of the time, people will just pick one of those.
Yeah. Um, or you, if you want to go in and explicitly pick what the data is, you can do that too.
Matt: So what's the mo I'm, I'm just generally, uh, in, in my, in my data questions here, so apologies. But what's the, what's the typical to snooze timeframe? How long do people typically snooze for?
Ben: Um, I mean, it, it varies partially based off the product, right?
Mm-hmm. Um, I would say the, the typical that I, that I've seen is around three to five days. Um, which, when you think of, when I think of my own life, like how when I re paper towels was an exception, I probably already had like three months worth of paper towels. Well, um, but remind me in 2026. Yeah. Right, exactly.
Um, but no, it typically around. Probably somewhere around a week. Cause again, if you think about like how a person's consumption will vary, it's probably gonna vary about a week. Mm-hmm. Um, obviously that it depends, but Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Um, yeah.
About that sort of time.
Matt: That's interesting. And how many people, so you send out a thousand emails, how many people would you expect to click the yes button versus the snooze button?
Ben: That's a good question. Um, I don't actually have those numbers off the top of my head. Um, typically what we're looking at is what's the, you know, the, the fulfillment rate. Um, I'd say that, yeah, I'd have to get back to you on that.
Matt: Well, okay, we'll put it in the show notes. Uh, let me know and we'll put, it's a good reason for people to go and get the show notes to find out the answer to that question.
Yeah, because I'm just kind of curious, you know, it's like if I'm sending out a thousand emails, how many people, how many of those thousand people will click the yes, I want the order button and yes, uh, no. Snooze it. And then how many people just forget to respond or reply and then don't get the order. So I suppose that's a good follow up question.
What do you do with the people that don't make, don't choose either option in your, in your on demand system there?
Ben: Right. Well, again, the, the intent there is not to be a pain, right. It's intended to be a convenience. Mm-hmm. And so, you know, part of the appeal of something like on demand is that, um, that it's not gonna automatically charge you and it's not going to be, um, that it gives the consumer more control.
So if they, if they ignore the email, what you can do is you can, you can create your own additional follow ups. So if you want to, like, if they haven't done any, any action mm-hmm. Um, you as the merchant have control of being able to like, all right, well, maybe two days later. Um, sending additional one being, Hey, just wanna make sure that you absolutely don't need, don't need a refill this month.
Mm-hmm. Or, or, yeah. Month. Um, yeah. But the, so it would behave, it behaves just like a, like a drip campaign. Yeah. Yeah. Um, but again, the intent there is not to just inundate someone with, uh, Check-ins, because ultimately that is, you want, it's about convenience. Yeah. Um, but you do wanna make sure that sometimes some people miss emails and so it's not a, it's, it's not just that you should just send them to a once, um, and assume that they don't want it.
Yeah. It's like they might just not, they might be busy. Yeah. No, that's fair play. You can also do it through SMS too. Hmm.
Matt: Do you do Yeah, I, I, I, I get what you're saying because I've found, I mean, having done this a, a fair few years now, Um, that sometimes you have to, our, our magic number seems to be around three, so sometimes people miss the first email.
Sometimes people miss the second email. Mm-hmm. By the time the third email comes along, we're like, this is the last email that we're gonna send you in relation to this. Mm-hmm. It's sort of, um, and so three seems to work quite well. Any more than that. I feel like I'm bugging somebody. Um. Mm-hmm. And you find that actually whatever percent open the first one out of the people that didn't open the first one, there's a percentage of open.
The second one, there's a percentage that open the third one, and then the, the ones that didn't open one through three, I probably shouldn't be emailing them anyway, to be honest with you, cuz something's not working somewhere and it's not helping me out. So, yeah. Um, that's really interesting. So, and you call this on demand, is that your phrase?
Is that the term, is that an industry standard term or is that a, is that a rodeo term?
Ben: Uh, it's a rodeo term.
Matt: It's hard as know. Yeah, well, no, let's quick, let's trademark it. Yeah. So have you got any, um, I dunno if you know, if you know the answer to this question, but I'm kind of curious, are there any companies that you think are doing that particularly well where as being all nosy Parkers can just go on their website and have a look at how they're doing it?
Ben: Yeah, I mean, I think so. You know, one brand that's just been really thoughtful cause I think. We didn't talk about this, but say like, one of the most important things around subscriptions is providing value outside of just a product.
Mm-hmm. Right? So, um, when I think about subscriptions, I think less about, like subscription is a, is a revenue model. Um, Business model. Um, but you know, ultimately the job to be done is a customer wants their product when they want it. Mm-hmm. Not too much, too little. They don't actually care about a subscription.
What they care about is not running out and having enough. Yeah. Yeah. Um, or not getting too much rather. And so what I've seen brands do a really good job of, and, and Jot coffee is one example is layering in like, membership, um, into a subscription. So with Jot, um, What they do is they, there are products they basically do, like, they collaborate with artisanal coffees and they do small batch, uh, small batch coffees mm-hmm.
Where you can only buy 'em over the course of, let's say like a month. Mm-hmm. And then they'll, they'll, they'll switch it up with a different partnership. But the only way to buy that type of coffee is by being a subscriber. Right. Right. So, effectively, They are, um, yeah, they're, they are creating explicit perks for having a subscription in the first place.
And so, Jot is like a great example, I'd say, who's done subscriptions really well. Um, and we worked with them a lot around like, just their strategy around, um, how do you try to address the concerns or mismatch between, um, Say like a cu what a customer, like, what's a great experience for a customer. Mm-hmm.
And then if someone's kind of deviating off or getting too much product, what are different ways that you can go about, um, trying to solve their problem? Hmm. But I think in general, the brands who I've seen, I'd say like the thoughtfulness of how they've approached their subscription program is really from a, from a membership perspective.
Um, And so that's, yeah. Jot is one great example. Um, I'm trying to think of a few more off the top of my head. Um, MUD/W is another one. Okay. Um, where Mud water is very much like a lifestyle. I dunno if you're familiar, like a copy alternative. Mm-hmm. Um, I'm, I'm, I'm friends with the founder, so I, I, obviously I'm biased, but, um, they were like, but I paid really close attention to how they, um, approached.
Uh, we'll call it like their community as a brand. Mm-hmm. And you know, I think one thing that they did, they've done really well is they created a brand with a capital B. Right. They're not just, you know, there's a lot of coffee substitutes now, but there's only one mud water. Yeah. And what Mud Water's done a great job of is like creating content and like recipes around how to create like, you know, like a mud water.
I think they have like lattes and stuff like that. Oh wow. So again, like what they've done is like something cool where it's like, It doesn't have to be a crazy, um, additional value, but it's something that connects back to how do you enhance the experience of consuming that product. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Um,
Matt: well, I'll check out, uh, is it Jot coffee?
J o t
Ben: Yeah. jot.co. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Jot coffee.
Matt: Uh, mud Water. We'll have a look at those. Now, I'm curious, Ben, you, you mentioned, uh, this the perk of subscriptions. Was the exact phrase you used. I don't know if you intentionally used that phrase, but otherwise, otherwise a very good phrase. So what are the perks of, you should definitely use that more often.
Yeah. What are the perks of subscription? So let's say I offer, um, I, let's go back to my tea example. You know, I do tea subscriptions and you subscribe and every month I send you tea bags. And, um, depending on, I might do the on demand, I might do the, the subscription models. How do I. How do I think outside the box end?
So there's perks of subscriptions, and I love the word use, thoughtfulness. What are some of the other things that I should think about as opposed to just getting subscribers? What else can I do? So I like what Jock Coffee have in with, uh, with, with the sort of the artisanal coffees, with the, you know, the, the sort of, mm-hmm.
The small amounts. But that's not me. I don't, I don't have access to that. I'm just a regular tea guy with regular teas that's going out and I don't get, so what are, what are some of the ways that maybe I should think about that and approach that that's gonna add value, that's gonna create the, in effect, what my perks of subscription are.
Ben: Yeah. So I mean you can go super basic, like I think Costco and even Amazon are sort of examples of, of membership. Mm-hmm. And so you can even look at what have they done? So Amazon two day free shipping, right? Shipping is actually is one of the biggest reasons. Prices around shipping are one of the biggest reasons.
People shopping carts. Yeah. Um, right. Um, members only discounts is another one, which is again, like. The Costco model where, um, you typically you're buying in bulk, but you can have like members only pricing. Um, you know, those are the two obvious ones. And then obviously Amazon itself has paired Amazon Prime or video Yeah.
With the Amazon Prime program. And what's ac what's, what's interesting about that too is that Amazon actually has two separate subscriptions, right? They have Amazon Prime, which is. You get all this stuff and two day free shipping, et cetera. But then you also can have subscriptions to individual products.
So they've mm-hmm. They have, they have separated the two, or they both have a subscription program. Mm-hmm. Or membership program rather. And then individual subscriptions. Um, Amazon itself doesn't offer any benefits to their subscription program, um, beyond just sending you the product.
Matt: Yeah, and I think you get a small dis, I get like a 5% discount
Ben: or something, 5% or something like that.
Mm-hmm. Yeah. And I will say that's one of the dangers that I, I've seen brands do is discounting subscriptions too much to make them mm-hmm. Too attractive. So, going back to like, you know, by and large brands are super, um, bullish on pushing people into a subscription program. The problem is that you can make your subscription.
Look so attractive that you're attracting a lot of people who have no intention of renewing. Yeah. Right. Because if you're offering 30% off for a subscription, someone's just gonna subscribe and then cancel. Yeah. Right? And so that's part of why, you know, typically what I've seen work is, you know, maybe subscription, uh, discount around like 15%, but once you started getting into the 25, 30%, you're really just making that, uh, very attractive.
Um, and it, or rather attracting the wrong people like you in your subscription program, for it to be healthy, you wanna be attracting the people for whom a subscription is like a good model. Yeah. It's a good match. Yeah. Because otherwise you're going to churn. Like you can't trick someone to stay in a subscription.
And I think especially some of the earlier brands, um, you know, part of the hope is, well, maybe someone will forget they have a subscription and that might work sometimes. But as you scale your business and as you're trying to presumably build like. Like a great brand name and a great relationship relationship with your, your customers.
You can't, like, you can't, even that is not, that is a losing battle. Yeah. Right. Instead of just be focusing on how can I provi deliver the absolute best experience for each one of my, my customers, my brands, as opposed to, I just hope that people will forget they have a subscription. Um, but I, I hear that every once in a while.
Like brands who are like, they don't want to email their subscribers cause they don't wanna remind them that they have a subscription. And so I keep going back to the you're better off proactively. You might, you will probably, you will lose more people by reminding they have a subscription, but you're keeping the people and you're able to upsell the people who actually like and embrace the subscription.
And ultimately you have a healthier, you're providing a healthier experience and a better experience. Yeah. And if someone. Forget they have a subscription and then. Gets charged and gets the product, they're having a bad experience. And the first thing they'll do, kind of like when I got that, when I got the paper towels, the first thing I did is I canceled the subscription.
Yeah, yeah,
Matt: yeah. I'm out. Well, I did, I, I mean, the weekend, over the weekend I got a charge on my American Express card from, I think it was like a thousand dollars, which I wasn't expecting. And so you're gonna notice, you know, when someone charges your card a thousand bucks and it was section four, which is like a membership site.
Oh.
Ben: Uh, yeah. I'm a member.
Matt: Yeah. Yeah. And to be fair, I, I signed up on an offer, um, and I enjoyed it for a few months and then subsequently completely forgot about it. Um, yeah, and, you know, they probably could have been more helpful with their onboarding process, but this is, you know, it swings and roundabouts really, and I forgot about it until I saw this charge for like a thousand bucks on my Amex card.
So, Today I just emailed them, said, listen, I'm really sorry I don't use it. Can you please refund this and cancel my membership? So I, I genuinely, I've not checked my junk, my spam, Ben, I have to lie, uh, be honest. But I, I don't, I don't remember getting an email from them saying, your membership is about to, you know, expire.
Do you want to renew? Because had they have had, they have preempted it. And said, listen. Mm-hmm. In a, in two weeks time, your membership's coming up, um, you're gonna recharge you a thousand bucks, which is very different to what they charged me a year ago. Right. Um, uh, any questions, let us, you know, let us know.
I've, I've got in touch from go, oh, cancel it. Which is in effect, the same thing that I've, I've done now cause I don't use it. What that would've done. Mm-hmm. What that could have done was trigger somebody in customer service to go, why'd you want to cancel? Um, yes. How can we help you? Maybe we can steer you down this path so you're still connected with us in some way.
Maybe it's less money than we thought we were gonna get, but had they have been proactive, like you said, Um, and thought that whole process through, they probably would still have me as a customer versus me now. I'm just, I'm out. You've charged me a grand, you didn't tell me you were gonna do it. I don't use the system.
I'm just, I'm out, out, out. I've checked out. Um, and I, so I totally get what you're saying because this weekend I, I experienced it from them, which surprised me actually, because I really like Section four and what they do, but I, I just wasn't expecting that. Right. Yeah.
Ben: And I think that, like, that moment that you just described is what, like, even if.
The brand, you know? Yes. You can request a refund and I'm sure they'll give it to you, but you still kind of, even at some sort of level, like psychologically, you, you have a bit of a, probably a bad taste in your mouth of, well, shit, I don't know if I wanna, if I'll even like subscribe again. Something like that.
Cuz what if I, well what if it happens again, then I don't catch it. Yeah. Right. And so I think that what, what you said, like that would've been the perfect way for them to approach it. And then they could've either like, you know, downs sold you into like, we'll call it like a light version. They don't, I don't think they have a light version, but like, or like month to month or something to keep you as a customer.
Yeah. Or even like, what they also could have done is, um, initiatives regardless, but like, Basically know that you weren't using the videos or weren't actually participating in the courses. And they should have been like, here are ways now, like in the upcoming year, you can make more of your subscription.
Yeah. Or your membership to section. Right. So even just personalizing that message based off of, they have all that data. Mm-hmm. They know that you probably have not logged in in nine months, but they're not using that for anything. Yeah. And so using that to just personalize it to the person would also go really far.
Matt: Yeah, it would, it would. I mean, there's a whole lot of lessons you can learn from something like that, I feel. Yeah. But no, that's awesome. Yeah, Ben, listen, I feel like I, I say this quite a lot to, to, I guess, but I feel like I'm just getting started and I'm aware of the time. Um, it's, uh, it's amazing how quickly it sort of, so there's like, Sadaf who produces a show.
She's, she's awesome. You'd have spoken Sadaf and she writes down all these questions for you, for me. And she's like, well, ask him this. Ask him this would be a great question. And I, I, I get to the first one and then that's it. So, so Sadaf, I'm really sorry. Uh, your, your work is super valuable. It really is.
But, uh, there's great conversations, so. But listen, as you know, this show is sponsored by the e-commerce cohort, which helps, uh, businesses deliver e-commerce wowl to their customers through coaching, through training. A bit like section four, really. Uh, hopefully we can learn something from their membership program.
Uh, but imagine you are speaking to a room full of cohort members are eager to learn. Uh, from your expertise and you go on, you've done your keynote speech on subscriptions and on demand models, and there you get the standing ovation. Wow. Yeah. Go Ben. Uh, that's awesome. Uh, and you, so you stand up, you're there, you have the opportunity to thank those who have influenced your own e-commerce journey.
And I'm curious to know who do you thank and why?
Ben: That's a great question. Um, you know, I think, so before my previous company Cart Hook, I hadn't worked in e-commerce before. Mm-hmm. Uh, I've always come from like the bi, the software, the soft, the SaaS side. Um, and so it was really through that experience of building cart hook. My business partner Jordan, he himself was an e-commerce merchant and it sold his e-commerce business and, um, By working with all of those merchants, and I guess we guys got really involved in their businesses, their dreams.
Like I learned so much through osmosis that it really like it, it's, it's cliche at this point, but Hmm. Um, I really became close to, uh, and invested in their success. Mm-hmm. And so like everything I've learned has been, um, by. Just talking with merchants and trying to help them. Mm-hmm. Right. And so between Cart Hook and Rodeo, I was a fractional CTO for subscription e-commerce brands.
Um, and so, you know, I've, everything I know is, is, uh, is, is through those experiences of working inside and with brand owners and I think, you know, so that obviously has had, I'm grateful for all of them. And there's not necessarily one individual one, I think, um, Actually James Booth, who's the head of growth at Jot, I've learned so much from him.
Um, and just the way he thinks about the, the consumer experience, I think that informed a lot around even how we thought about on demand. And, um, you know, just like the feedback that we've gotten, um, from, from people like him. Um, I'm trying to think like.
And the, the event I'm at right now, shop Talk, like I learned so much just by listening to other people's conversations, whether it's yeah, other brands or, or, um, or vendors. It's like when they, when when you talk to someone who's an expert in their space, like they'll, they'll go beyond like the superficial things that, um, are sort of, we'll call it like common, common knowledge and you start getting really surprised, like, holy crap, like.
You know, like I have one friend who does, like, who has a company that, that does like, uh, post-purchase surveys and the amount of data they get around and, and like what they've been able to do around predictive analysis around like being able to at attribute where a PR shopper came from and what's that mean and how does it tie back to where you should do marketing?
It goes way beyond anything I ever would've imagined. Mm-hmm. Um, So, but I'm gonna continue to think on that. I appreciate the question. I I, no one's ever asked that before.
Matt: I think it's a really interesting question, isn't it? Because, uh, yeah, you find out a lot about people. I think when you ask him questions like that. That's really, that's really cool. That's awesome. So, uh, James Booth from Jot, uh, uh, a a million,
Ben: yeah. Yeah. He's no longer at Jot, but yeah. Yeah, yeah,
Matt: yeah. And a million subscribers to CartHook or however many was, uh, saying subscribers, merchants. Um, listen, uh, Ben, how do people reach you? How do they connect with you if they want to find out more about you, about, um, what you guys are doing at Rodeo?
If they want some help with their subscription, your software works with Shopify sites, right? You've got a a Shopify system. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So yeah. How do people reach you? How do they connect?
Ben: So first one is our, you can go to our website, Hey.Rodeo, h e y, not hey, like a horse, um, period rodeo. Um, I'm also, I'm active on LinkedIn and I'm on Twitter.
My username is skinny and bald. Because I'm kind of skinny, kinda bald. Certainly more balder today, balder these days.
Matt: Um, that's so brilliant. I'm just Matt Edmundson on Twitter. I couldn't think of anything that creative obviously.
Ben: Um, yeah, and then we, we have our podcast around subscriptions subscription radio.
Um, yeah, tell us a little bit about that. Yeah. So, um, when we started Rodeo, we also, my partner and I just were really interested in talking about the things we've been learning in subscriptions and specifically interviewing merchants. So similar to what you just did with me, uh, I enjoy doing the reverse, which is talking to merchants.
who've had, um, a lot of success and understanding like what's working for them now. Mm-hmm. Like, what are some of the things that they've learned that. Um, the, the goal is to find things that are not just common knowledge. Like what are not the things that everyone's tweeting about. It's the mm-hmm. What are the strategies and, and tactics that people aren't talking about, um, and, but specifically have and have not worked mm-hmm.
For your business. And how did you break through that, that growth plateau, um, or capitalize on a strategy that worked. So that's what I do. I interview operators and marketers, uh, on the brand side predominantly.
Matt: Fantastic. And it's subscription radio, right? Is that, that's the name of the podcast.
Ben: Yep. Yep. Subscriptionradio.com.
Matt: Fantastic. So if you are doing subscriptions, then check out subscriptionradio.com for more information about Ben's podcast. We will of course link to him, uh, his LinkedIn profile and his skinny and bald Twitter, uh, profile, uh, in the show notes as well as the website, hey.radio, which I was saying Ben, before we hit the record button, is, Still one of the coolest URLs we've had on the show.
Um, uh, hey.rodeo. Uh, you can check out, uh, rodeo what's going on, especially if you're in the subscription space. Uh, and on Shopify. I assume you have to be both Ben for, for Rodeo to work, um, for you. But, um, yeah, if you're on Shopify in the subscription based space, check out, uh, hey.rodeo. And get in touch with Ben.
I'm sure he would love to hear from you. Ben, listen, thank you so much for joining us, man. Been an absolute pleasure. A pleasure, pleasure. Uh, and a pleasure as well. I, I dunno. Uh, but thanks for joining us, man on the e-commerce podcast. It's been awesome to meet you and, um, thanks for sharing a ton load of value with us.
Ben: Oh, likewise. I really appreciate it. Thank you so much.
Matt: No problem. Well, there you have it. What a great conversation. Huge thanks again to Ben for joining me today. Also, a big shout out to today's show sponsor the e-commerce cohort. Remember to check out their free training online at ecommercecycles.com.
Also, be sure to follow the e-commerce podcast wherever you get your podcast from because we've got yet more great conversations lined up, and I don't want you to miss any of them. Now, before I wrap up today's episode, let me take a moment to invite you, dear listener, or maybe someone you know, to be part of the podcast.
If you're an e-commerce entrepreneur, uh, or an expert in anything to do with e-commerce and would like to share your insights with our audience, we would love to hear from you. Or like I say, maybe you know someone who would make a great guest. Just head over to our website, ecommercepodcast.net, follow the links and get in touch.
We're always looking for, uh, fresh perspectives and new ideas, so don't be shy. Whether you're just starting out or have years of experience under your belt, we'd love to hear from you. So yeah, do get in touch ecommercepodcast.net and in case no one has told you yet today, you are awesome. Yes, you are created awesome. It's just a burden you have to bear. Ben has to bear it. I have to bear it. You've gotta bear it too.
Now, the E-Commerce podcast is produced by Aurion Media. You can find our entire archive of episodes on your favorite podcast app. The team, the awesome, amazing, fantastic team that makes this show possible is Sadaf Beynon, Estella Robin and Tanya Hutsuliak. Our theme song was written by Josh Edmundson, and as I mentioned, if you would like to read the transcript or show notes, head over to the website ecommercepodcast.net, and like I say, sign up for the newsletter while you are there.
Now that's it from me. That's it from Ben. Thank you so much for joining us. Have a fantastic week wherever you are. I'll see you next time. Bye for now.
