The first moments post-conversion, when the subscriber is still in the transactional mode, are vital for retention.
It’s the moment to:
- Deliver immediate value
- Capture key data points
- Educate subscribers on what they now have access to
- Set expectations
- And, importantly, activate subscribers, pushing key engagement products and features that correlate with high retention
With this in mind, Lise Benamou, Sophie Cassam Chenaï and the team at Le Parisien have built a new on-site onboarding journey with Poool Engage, leading subscribers through 4 steps to optimize for retention from the moment they click “Confirm payment”.
Le Parisien’s 4-step onboarding journey
First things first, before launching into the classic onboarding journey, it’s essential to reassure your new subscriber.
Le Parisien uses this moment to confirm that the transaction has gone through and is associated to X email address.
Step 1 – newsletter sign up
Incase you need reminding, newsletters are an important engagement-driver, allowing for habit-forming around your content and increased return visits.
- At El Confidencial, readers who are registered for a newsletter have a 15% greater chance of renewing their subscription
- For La Vanguardia, churn is reduced by 50% when a subscriber is signed up to the newsletter
- Whilst at Financial Times, research has proven that 18% of engaged subscribers would be disengaged if it wasn’t for the newsletters
In fact, according to a FT Strategies poll, newsletters the most effective product by far with 2 in 3 publishers choosing them as a key habit forming feature.
Promoting some of their most popular newsletters was therefore the most valuable first step for Le Parisien when building this onboarding experience.
What we love in particular: readers can subscribe directly on this page, in a single click, scrolling through the newsletters on the right. Once subscribed, or if they’re already subscribed to a newsletter, the CTA button changes to blue.
Recommendations:
- Highlighting the most important word in the main text (here, newsletters) supports each comprehension
- Communicate to users the number of steps in this onboarding journey. This helps to reduce frustration and shows the time-to-value (i.e. that it won’t be long until they have full access to your subscription product).
- For most publishers, these newsletter ‘cards’ include an image, heading, short description and the periodicity (“Every weekday at 7am”)
Step 2 – download the app
Apps are essential for high engagement (including time spent and frequency of visits) and retention rates, as proven by the PugPig State of Mobile Publishing Market Report 2024.
At The Atlantic, for example, subscribers who use the app have a more engaged “reader state” than those who don’t, meaning they were coming back and using the product more frequently than others. They are also more likely to renew than subscribers who do not use the app.
However, app adoption is often lower than other products (as The Atlantic found) so integrating promotion of the app in onboarding journeys is therefore very valuable.
To activate app download, some publishers present a QR code, like Aftenposten:
However, Le Parisien asks for a subscriber’s phone number to be able to send a link to download the app, a great way to collect another data point whilst delivering value simultaneously (i.e. a value exchange!).
Recommendations:
- Offer a “Skip this step” link (“Passer cette étape”)
- As always, images and highlighting important parts of the text support comprehension
- If a subscriber skips this step, work cross channel to promote in other ways – on-site post-onboarding, via email, WhatsApp, phone… – considering the type of message and when you’re sending it
For instance, L’Équipe shows subscribers a bottom-banner with Poool Engage on mobile if they haven’t yet logged in on the app.
The Telegraph sends a dedicated email 10 days after subscribing:
Whilst The Economist includes a page on this topic in their printed onboarding pack:
Step 3 – data collection
Given that the payment has already been made and subscription confirmed, this is a great moment to collect data without causing too much friction.
Le Parisien asks for name, postal address and phone number, but any data that has already been collected (here, first and last name), including phone number from step 2, is pre-filled.
Recommendations:
- Don’t ask for anything you don’t need! The key to data collection is to balance your needs / what’s valuable to you, and frustration
- Ideally you should explain why you need each data point – ITVX (TV replay platform) in the UK does a great job at this
> Find more onboarding benchmarks and best practices in The Audiencers’ Collections
Congratulations to Lise Benamou, Sophie Cassam and the team for this launch!
If you’re interested in doing something similar, get in touch with the Poool team.
