5 Easy Remedies to Avoid Dropping Subscriptions

In business leadership, we often focus on the 'big picture', marketing campaigns, product development, and brand identity.

And for companies with regular revenue (or subscription), the most dangerous threats are often the smallest ones; the small ones will do you more harm than the largest. You may have the most competitive product, but if the plumbing of your payment system is leaky, that growth will ultimately stall.

For a CEO or Founder, this is crucial as they should be able to explain the processes of how money moves from a customer's pocket to a bank account. You don't have to be a technical expert, but you do need to identify when your payment process causes what we call 'friction' – that invisible wall that prevents a customer from finalizing a purchase.

Here are 5 typical friction points that are quietly taking away your revenue:

Making a Mistake Stopping 'Good' Customers

Imagine an over-polished security guard at a high-end store who blocks a loyal customer just because they are wearing a different coat.

In the virtual world, this is described as a false decline. It occurs when your security settings are so stringent that they turn down a perfectly valid payment.

This is a double blow: You lose a straight sale and also offend a customer who'll probably take his business elsewhere.

Instead, strategic leaders are relying on secure payment processing solutions – such as Adaptiv Payments gateway services – that provide an intelligent security guard.

Such systems can differentiate the fraud from regular customers who are shopping while on vacation or using a new device.

The Cost of the 'Spinning Wheel'

We are living in the age of instant gratification.

Anxiety kicks in if a customer clicks 'Submit Payment' and is forced to wait more than a few seconds for confirmation. And they begin to consider: Did it work out? Am I being charged twice? Is this site broken? This delay is called 'latency'. If your payment system is slow, it will affect your whole brand negatively. On a higher level, industry leaders need to make sure that they are providing a 'fast lane' for transactions.

A seamless, blink-of-an-eye checkout experience fosters trust; a slow one breeds doubt.

Ignoring the Shopping Habits of Localities

When a business grows, when they, say, transfer from a New York headquarters to an entirely new market in Europe, they often operate on the assumption that 'money is money'. 

But how people pay for it varies wildly by location.

We are quite a credit-card-heavy culture within the United States, but if you set out to expand into the Netherlands or Germany without offering their specific local bank-transfer methods, you'll find a huge decline in sign-ups. It's not enough to translate your website into a new language. You need to 'translate' your payment options for the local culture.

By providing suitable payment methods for every city or country that the customer will visit, you make the customer feel at home.

Making Security Too Difficult

All of us need to be safe, but we don't like hopping through hoops.

Eventually, customers will become frustrated with you if you ask them to provide a password, a text message code, and a fingerprint when you're offering a small monthly subscription.

One of the important goals of any intelligent business is 'invisible security'. This means utilizing modern technology to prove that a customer is who they say they are in the background, without interrupting their experience.

If your payment processing feels like an interrogation, customers will find a competitor who makes things less painful for them.

Too Hard on Payment Failures

There are times when a payment fails for the simple human reason that a card has expired, or if a customer is waiting for a paycheck.

Many of those elementary systems react by abruptly shutting off the customer's access and launching a soulless automated 'Payment Failed' email. This is a 'friction point' that kills the relationships between you.

Instead of a debt collector, your system should be a partner.

This entails 'intelligent retries', re-attempting the payment on a Friday instead of a Tuesday (a typical payday), and an extended grace period. Managing a failed payment with empathy and smart logic results in the least churn rate and the highest loyalty to your customers.

Conclusion

When businesses discuss revenue growth strategies/plans, it's important to realize that getting new customers is sometimes less important than retention. You want retention, and the way you do this is by making sure payments can be completed without struggle.

By smoothing out these five friction points, you ensure that your business infrastructure is a bridge to success rather than a barrier. Lots of times, impulse buys occur when there is no access to help chatbots and help lines, so people are more likely to abandon their cart instead of completing a purchase.

Patience is short, and if it doesn't work the first time, you might lose them forever.