Lennart Schneider is Founder of Subscribe Now, helping decision-makers in the subscription economy attract subscribers and keep them happy.

Over the past two years, I have written a book about subscription management based on more than 80 interviews with experts from some of the largest subscription businesses in the German-speaking world.

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Hi, I'm Lennart Schneider, Founder of Subscribe Now, helping decision-makers in the subscription economy attract subscribers and keep them happy.

When I talk to newsletter creators, it usually doesn't take long before one of two questions comes up:

1) What actually constitutes a good open rate?

2) My newsletter has an open rate of 40%. That's great, isn't it?

The honest answer is: There is no such thing as a "good" open rate, and the open rate really says nothing about the quality of your newsletter. 

In this article, I want to clear up this misconception and explain when you should still pay attention to it.

P.S. I've written a book! The playbook for successful subscription models: With growth strategies and best practices from 50 leading companies. You can pre-order here (or on Amazon).

Why open rate says nothing about the quality of your newsletter

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Lennart Schneider, founder of Subscribe Now podcast & newsletter, and expert on digital subscription models, interviews Stefan Bader, CEO and Co-founder of Cello, to discuss how to build a referral program that ensures sustained growth.
-> Why visibility is the decisive factor
-> How to choose the right rewards
-> Why fairness wins
-> and how you can reduce the cost risk in customer acquisition

For years, companies have been struggling with the same challenge. Specifically, rising customer acquisition costs are making it increasingly difficult to win new subscribers at affordable prices.

There are many reasons for this – paid marketing is becoming increasingly expensive, SEO has less reach since the spread of LLMs, and social media algorithms play a significant role on who sees which content, and when.

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This article was written by Lennart Schneider, founder of Subscribe Now podcast & newsletter, and expert on digital subscription models.

Everything is getting more and more expensive, including subscriptions. Those who don’t adjust their prices regularly will lose revenue in the long run due to inflation. But of course, with a price increase comes churn risk. So how do you balance the two: increase revenues and retention despite price increase?

To help answer this question, I spoke to pricing expert Florian Bauer in my Subscribe Now podcast where he explained to us when you should increase prices, how to communicate this gently and why you should always offer alternatives.

Here are his 7 biggest mistakes to avoid.

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Hi, I’m Lennart Schneider, Founder of Subscribe Now, helping decision-makers in the subscription economy attract subscribers and keep them happy.

In this article, we look at Duolingo – a leading e-learning app that has mastered the art of habit-forming, something that’s essential for subscription success.

> Duolingo's streak counts consecutive days with at least one exercise and resets if you miss. Nine million people hold streaks of a year or more, and the feature has run through 600 tests in two years

> They optimise for CURR, the share of today's active users who were also active in the past week, rather than daily actives. Focusing on it since 2018 grew daily actives 4.5 times in four years

> The wins are often tiny. Changing a commitment button from "next" to "I'll commit" measurably lifted retention, and reminders fire 23.5 hours after the last lesson

> Streak Repair used to cost money. It is now free but requires extra exercises, choosing long-term loyalty over the easy revenue

> Lennart Schneider's warning matters more than the tactics. Streaks work because every Duolingo user shares one goal. News audiences don't, and a comic animation rewarding an article on the Middle East confuses rather than delights

Duolingo, a rapidly growing language-learning app with a market capitalization of almost $15 billion, owes a large part of its success to its streak feature. A streak is a count of consecutive days a user has completed at least one exercise. If a user misses a day, their streak resets to zero. This simple feature has made Duolingo one of the apps with the best retention, with an impressive 9 million people maintaining a streak of at least one year. 

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Lennart Schneider is Founder of Subscribe Now, helping decision-makers in the subscription economy attract subscribers and keep them happy. In this article he shares insights on how to acquire members for high-priced subscriptions from his podcast episode with Chief Growth Officer at Handelsblatt media.

> Handelsblatt sells communities, not content. Its AI Circle costs 2,500 euros a year, the Pulse women's network 2,000 to 3,000, and TECH 20,000 for three members

> The 2016 business club assumed subscribers would become members. They didn't. Events draw people who never subscribe, subscribers rarely attend, and the two groups have very different willingness to pay

> The annual AI Summit is the anchor. A ticket alone costs up to 1,550 euros, so the event justifies most of the membership fee, and members join around it

> Circles are barely mentioned on the Summit registration page. Handelsblatt deliberately holds the pitch until after the ticket is bought, rather than asking people to weigh two decisions at once

> Handelsblatt's free AI newsletter exists to market the paid Circle, inverting the usual logic. Kleibrink expects briefing publishers and community publishers to converge on each other's models within a few years

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Lennart Schneider is Founder of Subscribe Now, helping decision-makers in the subscription economy attract subscribers and keep them happy. This article summarises his conversation with Marketing Director at Freeletics about how they keep users motivated through the funnel.

> Freeletics asks why, then asks it again. A user wants a six-pack, because they are ashamed at the pool, because they fear looking undisciplined. The third answer is what marketing should address

> Just as useful is asking why not. Finding that people lacked space or had neighbours who complained produced small-space and quiet workouts, and both constraints are now asked about during onboarding

> The streak resets unless you train 17 minutes a day. Some users email support when a time zone breaks it, which tells you more about the mechanic than any engagement chart

> The onboarding questionnaire does two jobs at once: it decides which benefits to show to convert free users, and it starts personalisation. The first plan meets 85% of a user's needs

> Freeletics began as three students emailing PDF training plans. The real signal was not sign-ups but what happened when they stopped: readers offered their payment details to get it back

17 minutes a day: Most subscription companies can only dream of such engagement. In my “Subscribe Now” podcast episode, I spoke to Ellie Hughes, Marketing Director at Freeletics, where she told me how they keep users motivated throughout the entire subscription journey.

And I guarantee that you can learn something from this, even if you sell news or software instead of fitness.

I summarized my 7 biggest learnings for you in today’s deep dive.

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Today it’s all about data. I probably don’t need to explain to you how important it is for subscription success, but data is often still a specialist topic that many people are afraid of.

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I’ve subscribed to over 2,000 newsletters over the last few years. Most of them had terrible landing pages, but a few were excellent.

What sets them apart? They focus on 9 core messages. I have summarized them for you in the deep dive.

Have fun while reading.

PS: The tips don’t just apply to newsletters, but can be applied to almost all landing pages.

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100 days. During this time, you have to convince new users that your subscription is worthwhile for them.

One of the latest guests on my Subscribe Now podcast has been thinking for years about how to best use this time to build trust and routines.

Alban Mazrekaj is the Lead Product Manager at NZZ, responsible for the ‘Discover’ mission, i.e. the part of the subscription journey from the first contact with the brand, through registration and onboarding, which should then lead to subscription.

In the podcast, he reveals which actions have the greatest effect on propensity to subscribe and the role that personalization algorithms play in this.

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