profitwell paddle

BIG NEWS: Paddle acquires ProfitWell to "do it for you"

You really need to floss more

Abagail Sullivan Nov 4 2019

Today, we are flossing (our teeth, that is). We also see Mixer revisit its pricing strategy, and a new series by the Predictable Revenue team is encouraging your sales people: be less annoying. 

 

 

Your top subscription news


Multi-product mouth health

Our first story is one I am most pumped to cover, because not only am I an advocate for mouth health, but I am also a two-time-a-day flosser (some may think that's nuts.).

If you’ve ever listened to pretty much any podcast ever, you’ve heard of this next company: Quip (for what it's worth, this is not an #ad). It offers “modern oral care, delivered”—essentially, a subscription toothbrush company.

And Quip has just introduced the addition of floss to its repository. It’s a $20 floss and metallic applicator with refills at $5 every three months. Each string is pre-marked every 18 inches to help guide people to use the correct amount each session. Quip has pulled some data, and the big takeaway is that people want to floss on the go. So they’ve created something sleek that can fit in most any pocket. Thus, spreading the good message of health for your mouth. 

To date, the Quip team has raised more than $60 million in funding from several VCs. Amazing to think something as simple as a toothbrush has seen this much success (but everyone needs one, right). And now they’re diversifying their offerings to keep people coming back, because we know going multi-product is the way of the future.

If you want to grow beyond a “lifestyle” business, you do need to diversify your product offering. The path you take to get there, though, is completely up to you.

In this episode of our series Protect the Hustle with Freshworks’ Girish Mathrubootham goes deep on this, during which he talks about his journey from producing a single helpdesk software offering to the multi-product suite they have today.

Check it out in full here if you’re interested in the multi-product way.

And a final PSA: don’t forget to floss.

Mixer vs. Twitch

Mixer lowers its subscription price to compete with fellow video live streaming platform Twitch. Mixer is a gamer streaming service with which you can subscribe to your favorite gamers, comment on their stream, and interact with other viewers live.

Mixer has officially lowered its price one dollar—from $5.99 to $4.99, which is apparently the same price of a monthlong Tier 1 subscription of competitor, Twitch. This is a clear statement that Mixer is really looking to compete with Twitch and potentially steal some of its talent.

The biggest star currently on Mixer is Ninja, who jumped ship from Twitch (which apparently rocked the gamer streaming world)—and likely had to do, in large part, with monetary incentives.

Your pricing objective sets the course for your pricing strategy, and can mean the difference between success and failure. The price you choose affects more than just how much profit you’ll make or whether customers will choose your product over your competitors’. Profit and market share are both valid pricing objectives, but they aren’t the only options, and certainly not always the best options.

No other lever than pricing has a higher impact on improving profits. We elaborated on this assertion in a previous pricing strategy post, but realize that a 1% improvement in price optimization results in an average boost of 11.1% in profits. That’s no small change (pun intended).

Instead of thinking about pricing as a one-and-done process, it’s smart that Mixer is revisiting it here—to potentially maximize profit, boost growth, or simply to make ends meet. Mixer can (and should) set its prices in order to meet specific objectives.

If you’re looking for more pricing advice, head to profitwell.com to chat with our team, or download our pricing strategy ebook to stop guessing, and start building a pricing strategy that works.

 

Sales, stop being so annoying

Predictable Revenue’s video series Outbound Labs—launched this past September—consists of learnings, tips, and trends from more than 50 outbound sales experiments. 

In the latest, they discuss why it’s better to send fewer follow-ups as a sales rep, while maintaining high response rates—and since sales tactics apply to literally every organization out there, we’re highlighting this one for the masses.

They remind us that you can only be annoying by doing just that: being annoying. Your cadences don’t need to be miles long (they should, in fact, be briefer than what you consider brief).

“If you’re on with your messaging, people are going to get back to you. And the majority of people are going to get back to you in those first couple of emails. And all that you’re doing by continuing to send email after email after email, after somebody hasn’t responded to you, is just piss them off.”

We’re all about personalization when reaching out to potential users. Remember: your users are what fuel you, and there’s a lot more to selling than closing a deal and throwing it over the fence.

This episode applies directly to the subscription space, sure, but is really helpful in any realm. Check it out and let us know your thoughts. Let’s help each other be, you guessed it, less annoying.

As a bonus, here's a podcast episode with Patrick and the Predictable Revenue crew—on why it’s important to understand the nuanced factors that determine pricing... and why salespeople aren’t more involved in pricing discussions.


Protect the Hustle
: a Multi-Product Unicorn


Data shows the future is multi-product for growth and success. Yet, you need to make sure those multiple products are bridged through a unified experience that work together in harmony.

On this episode of Protect the Hustle, we talk multi-product expansion, the value of team alignment, and leveraging a market ridden with competitors. We discover how Girish, founder and CEO of Freshworks, has successfully tackled some of the most competitive spaces in the world.  


And that’s a wrap for your November 4 subscription news. Recruit your teammates into the subscription know: profitwell.com/recur/recurnow to sign up for episodes on the daily.

If you have news to share, hit me up at abby@recurnow.com and we'll collaborate.

By Abagail Sullivan

Subscription market insights you won't find anywhere else.