Morten Stald is a Senior Partner at Subscrybe, the leading Scandinavian consultancy specializing in subscription. In this article, Morten shares why he thinks you need to update your subs management system, what you should do before moving forward and what you need to consider when selecting the replacement solution.
We live in a digital age. Regardless of the type of subscription you offer, you likely have numerous digital interactions with your customers. This places high demands on the system infrastructure that supports your subscription business. At the heart of that infrastructure is a ‘subscription management system‘ which essentially handles the management of your subscribers, pricing, and subscription plans, ensuring that customers are charged the right amount – every time.
But, as a media professional, you already know that. However, do you know what is expected of your media business in the near future?
At Subscrybe, we keep a close eye on what subscribers like and don’t like. And we know for a fact that subscribers are harder to satisfy than transactional customers. After all, you need a good reason for charging them every month – and you need to deliver more and more value each month, in order for them to stay.
This is why we are currently helping Nordic media companies choose the best new subscription management system for their needs. And, if you didn’t already do it, we strongly encourage you to consider it as well. Because a new media reality is here. One, where your digital capabilities must be second-to-none, if you want to retain your readers over time. As print circulation slowly declines, media companies must prepare for delivering the most value in a new digital arena. And that is hard to do, without strategic IT investments.
Consumer expectations have changed, and you must change your IT infrastructure to accommodate them
This isn’t news – consumers are expecting high flexibility in subscription pricing and the option to choose from different plans. On top, they expect subscription companies to know them, remember what they like and dislike – and proactively engage them with tailored content. This expectation was created by the leaders of the subscription industry – Netflix, Spotify, Amazon – and it’s only becoming stronger with the introduction of AI tools, who learn, understand and build relationships with their users.
Don’t get me wrong – legacy media is still supposed to have an editorial agenda and avoid creating echo chambers for their users. But this doesn’t mean that we cannot start accommodating these new subscriber expectations through personalized onboarding flows, strong and relevant loyalty programs – and the feeling of an ever-evolving relationship with the media titles we know and love.
A list of reasons why the time has come for a system change
At Subscrybe, we help subscription companies improve their KPIs through creating meaningful, long-lasting relationships with subscribers. And the most common challenge we meet with our clients is that we hit a wall, when the tech stack isn’t enabling for modern customer journeys. So, in order to put the issue into perspective, I have collected a list of which subscriber trends are on the rise – and what technical setup is required to accommodate them.
Flexible introduction periods and pricing plans
Subscribers are looking for increased flexibility in pricing plans, options to scale up and down during the year, receiving personalized retention offers and loyalty benefits like “one-month-half-off”, or the like.
In fact, according to our 2024 study, flexibility and rewards for loyalty have the highest impact on how long consumers stay subscribed to a service. And increasingly flexible and personalized introduction offers like the ones facilitated by Dynamic Paywall tools, puts new pressure on your billing system. Handling multiple introduction offers, billing periods and personalized pricing plans requires a modern billing system with high flexibility and autonomy. Is your existing setup ready for 100s of different campaign prices? 50 new introduction offers, changing dynamically after testing which ones work the best for a specific target group? If not, it might be time for a change.
True personalization across channels and access points
Subscription companies must offer personalization to users. Subscribers expect to be recognized and take for granted that products and services attune to their likes and dislikes over time. This expectation will only grow in the future. However, personalization is the opposite of standardization, meaning it involves complexity. Offering a personalized experience across channels requires strong data governance and availability.
Modern subscription management systems allow you to collect and analyse subscriber data, so you can use it to offer your subscribers a personalized and tailored experience – across titles, and across channels. Is your existing setup ready to offer a personalized experience across your homepage, your content, your e-mails and your customer service? If not, it might be time for a change.
Finally getting to one source of truth
Data silos between billing, CRM, finance, and customer care are common in legacy systems, making it nearly impossible to get a single, accurate view of your customer or business. Modern subscription platforms often offer centralized dashboards and APIs that unify your data, enabling smarter decisions and better collaboration across teams. As businesses scale and diversify, having one source of truth is a strategic necessity.
Are your teams enabled to proactively collaborate on what makes sense for your subscriber – across billing, marketing, retention and customer service? If not, well, it’s probably time for a change!
Checklist for media professionals before updating your subscription management system
Before you dive into the arms of SaaS providers, it’s important that you sit down to define your business needs and your strategic direction. For doing so, you will benefit from using Subscrybes project model, which we’ve tested with dozens of organisations in Scandinavia:
- Define business needs: Sit down with decision makers and practitioners from every department to understand current operations, needs and wishes to be enabled with the introduction of a new system
- Define strategic choices: Create a set of strategic choices, which will help you decide on the unavoidable dilemmas and discussions that arise when choosing a subscription management system. For example: “The new system must store data exclusively in the EU” or “We wish for a supplier, who offers proactive and in-person support on all matters”. This will help you define a short list from your long list.
- Define a small group of decision-makers: Projects like these often get complicated, because decision makers from all over the organisation is brought into the project group. Instead, define a team of 3-5 individuals who have the authority to make decisions along the way to a decision.
What to consider when choosing your subscription management system
The market for subscription management systems and media-specific solutions is characterized by vast options and considerations. Running a media or publishing operation often comes with more complexity than operating digital subscriptions. Specifics like print distribution, local payment methods and strong self-service options stand out as critical for customer satisfaction and a modern subscription experience.
These are fields that might be prioritized when describing Business Needs and Strategic Choices. However, you will run into some recurring dilemmas, when looking into these systems:
Build or buy
Many management systems have grown to be big cooperations, and they often offer modular services that you can buy on top of your billing product (in order to drive up your vendor lock-in and your price, of course). These extra services are often related to revenue recognition, distribution, data analysis and the like. What you need to consider, is whether to buy these functionalities from your supplier, another supplier or simply, build it yourself. This depends on costs and internal competencies for system development.
> Build or buy: The technology decision that defines modern newsrooms
Best-of-breed or full-service
In relation is the consideration whether to buy a simple billing engine and connect it with a landscape of different systems, in order to get exactly what you need in each area. Generally, this best-of-breed approach is favoured today, as it minimizes your dependence on one supplier and let’s you negotiate deals independently with suppliers. On the contrary, a setup like this is more complicated to manage and usually requires a “head of system management” role in your team. Therefore, consider your internal capacity, when making this choice.
Industry or local experience
Though system providers might state that they are agnostic and can serve your every need, we strongly recommend speaking to other businesses that look like yours, before making a choice. Local or industry-specific considerations are important to clarify and describe, so you make sure that your new system supplier understands and accommodates your needs.
You are allowed to negotiate
As these contracts are often large and defines a long-term relationship, you should consider how to negotiate a reasonable price for your business. Involve your procurement team early on, and if you don’t have one, prioritize getting assistance from consultants or others who might indicate pricing and options based on previous projects.
Projects like these are business-critical and can be overwhelming. However, to offer a modern subscriber experience, you must have the IT infrastructure to support it. Ensuring that your organization is ready for a change that impacts every department is one of the first things you should do, when considering a change in your subscription management system. So, having the right team for piloting this complicated process, is the most important thing.
Subscrybe is the leading Scandinavian consultancy specializing in subscriptions. We help media enterprises, streaming companies, apps and communities grow their subscriber base, create real loyalty and improve their margins through commercial strategy, marketing, sales, UX-design and communication.
Still have questions? Reach out to Subscrybe and we’ll have a talk on whether the time for a change has come.
