Ep 143: How To Build A Subscription Business ft. Matthew Holman

Ep 143: How To Build A Subscription Business ft. Matthew Holman

Welcome back Hustlers! In this week’s episode, we are featuring Matthew Holman! Matthew is the Head of Growth at Qpilot. Qpilot offers merchants a truly dynamic and flexible software to manage their repeat orders.
If you struggle to manage 'subscriptions' for your best customers, you should know that there is a solution that can automate everything you need to make their subscription experience amazing.
In this episode we discuss:
  • Subscription fundamentals (different types of programs, customer experience, discounts, when are subscriptions a good fit)
  • Places to collect data to learn about the program (Google Analytics, conversion tracking, post purchase, cancellation)
  • Unit economics (what discounts make sense)
  • How to think about churn (people that churn right away versus those that churn over time)
  • Fundamentals for scale (data collection, iterating, flexibility)
Time Stamps:
(0:00) - Intro with Alex & Owen preamble
(9:14) - Business tip of the week - Top 5 Chrome Extensions for your business
(16:00) - Hustle Nation tip of the week (Setting goals & creating systems)
(22:00) - Show starts
(22:23) - Our worst subscription purchases
(32:00) - Common mistakes in a subscription business
(34:40) - Day 1 of launching your business and what you should do
(38:38) - Owen’s story of getting lured into a sneaky subscription while in university
(42:26) - Businesses that run excellent subscription businesses
(44:45) - How one business did a watch subscription and offered a Rolex to get subscribers
(47:00) - BarkBox losing subscribers and niching down
(49:00) - How to manage the threat of big box retailers starting a subscription business
(51:16) - McDonald’s use of great coffee beans & their attack on Starbucks business model
(56:00) - Marketing your subscription business
(1:00:41) - How to avoid churn as soon as a customer subscribes to you
(1:03:00) - How businesses can trap you into a subscription
(1:05:50) - How Qpilot helps businesses run their subscription business (1:07:00) - How to manage logistics with shipping
(1:10:21) - How Qpilot acquires new customers
(1:11:30) - Debunking the “average” subscription metric & focusing on looking at common drop-off points
(1:14:20) - Managing the accounting process of building a subscription business with uplifts, discounts, and returns.
(1:16:00) - Offering the right discounts to the customer
(1:18:25) - How to recover revenue when customers having credit card failures
(1:20:30) - The future of subscriptions
(1:22:00) - Game changing apps for your business & Shopify’s ecosystem
(1:26:25) - Quotes & phrases that has had an impact on Matthew’s life
(1:28:00) - Wrap up & closing remarks
To learn more about subscriptions, follow Matthew and checkout his newsletter!
Previous article Ep 144: How He Transformed The Landscape of Black Canadian Fashion ft. George Sully
Next article Ep 142: Learning & Pivoting - How To Build Value In An Unexpected Industry ft. David King