What are the best subscription retention KPIs to monitor subscription growth in your business?
Churn, retention, ARPU, LTV, cohort analysis.
Those online subscription metrics systems crank out a dizzying array of numbers. But, what should you be tracking to see if your business is moving in the right direction?
Churn rate is where a lot of subscription business leaders go wrong. They look at their rate and compare it with others, but have little idea what it really means.
Churn rate is an average across all of your members. And, since newer members tend to quit at a higher rate than members that have been with you for a long time, a lower churn rate may mean you haven’t been attracting enough new members over the last few months.
Yes, that’s right, a decreasing churn rate could indicate your subscription growth is slowing. Think about it. If you add fewer new subscribers, and they are the group that experience disproportionately high cancellations, your churn is going to be lower!
This episode of Be Unleavable® Subscription Growth reveals the best KPIs to track subscription growth so you’ll never be overwhelmed or frustrated by dashboards full of confusing and conflicting data.
🔎Where I’ve been:
Glacier National Park is amazing. Although there was too much snow to open the highest altitude portions of the Going to the Sun Road, my wife and I embraced the portions of the park that were open.
For the week we biked 139 miles, hiked more 8 ½ hours, and even had time for a 9-mile paddling trip down the rapids of the Flathead River. We spent nights at Lake McDonald Lodge, Many
Glacier Lodge, Glacier Park Lodge, Prince of Wales Hotel, and a couple of nights at Whitefish Bay.
Our favorite hike left from Waterton, Canada three miles up to Lake Bertha. This lake is three miles around and so high in the mountains it was still surrounded by snowbanks, at the beginning of July! This was an amazing experience for two Floridians.
🪚What I’m building:
If subscription revenue is an important part of your business, you owe it to yourself to register for the .
This is the ONLY event I’ve attended each of the last three years it’s been held (virtually in 2020.) It’s the best event for anyone building a subscription business. You’ll have the opportunity to meet principals at the world’s largest subscription brands including publishing, streaming, monthly box, and SaaS.
Plus, I’m preparing two brand new presentations. First, a pre-event 3-hour workshop on and a .”
Plan to attend live, in New York City on November 9 and 10 for great networking opportunities. Let me know when you register so I can invite you to my private dinner.
📖 What I’m reading:
One item in my morning routine over the last 18 months is the Stacked Marketer daily newsletter. There’s a lot of digital marketing resources out there, but the three things I love about Stacked Marketer are the lack of hype, the international perspective, and their paid “Insights” subscription offer.
Most marketing resources use news events to scream at you about buying products, coaching, and seminars they offer. Stacked Marketer provides news updates and analysis without the constant upsell promos.
The international perspective helps me get out of my USA bias. It opens me up to what’s happening and how I can best serve international clients.
I was one of their first subscribers to their monthly Insights publications. Very few free daily newsletters have a paid subscription offering. Watching how these media companies balance free content with paid content is useful for anyone in the subscription business. Plus, these are useful information giving insight into one company’s marketing approach or a coverage of a marketing discipline.
It all begins with opting into a free daily newsletter, do that here.
👀Watch Be Unleavable Subscription Growth here.
About Robert Skrob
