Subscription Ecommerce Customer Experience Challenges and How to Overcome Them

The most effective way to keep your subscribers engaged and prevent them from churning is to anticipate and solve any challenges that might occur during their subscription. If you eliminate friction from their experience, there's a better chance they’ll stick around.

What challenges should you anticipate? Many of the problems your customers will experience are unique to your products. It is vital to study your customers and talk to them about their specific pain points.

That said, there are universal problems in the subscription customer experience. Here are some common challenges subscription ecommerce shops face and how to overcome them. 

1. Order Delays

There’s nothing more frustrating than a shipment that doesn’t arrive on time! It’s especially painful if the subscriber has run out of the previous shipment. 

‍How to Overcome This Challenge:

First, offer reliable shipment tracking so your customers don’t have to ask for an order’s location. If they have to ask, they are already feeling friction.

If there is a delay, notify the customer immediately and apologize. If possible, compensate them in some way for the inconvenience. Try to offer a solution without introducing more friction (e.g., “we’re sending a more expensive product for the same price, the extra is on us”).

There’s nothing more frustrating than a shipment that doesn’t arrive on time! It’s especially painful if the subscriber has run out of the previous shipment.

If you know about a shipping delay before the subscription charges, allow the customer to delay the subscription or swap to a different product that can ship on time. 

This Chewy email is a great example. They warn the customer about a potential delay before it even happens. This way, if the customer gets the product on time, it will feel like Chewy went above and beyond. They also offer a call-to-action to manage the order in case the subscriber wants to make any changes.

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Pro Tip: ARPU users can offer the option to “Ship Now” in their upcoming charge notifications or through our Gorgias integration to help customers choose to renew early if they’re ready for more of your product before their next renewal.

2. Frequently Out-of-Stock Items

If customers subscribe to a product, they expect to get it at the scheduled cadence. They’ll undoubtedly be upset if that product never arrives because it fell out of stock. Depending on the product, they may visit another store to have their needs met more quickly. That’s a terrible experience. 

‍How to Overcome This Challenge: 

If a product goes out-of-stock often, to the point where you can’t fulfill your subscription obligations, consider removing its subscription option until you can sort out your inventory challenges. It’s better not to commit to a customer than to commit and fail to deliver.

Alternatively, you can reserve all of your current stock for subscription customers. Doing so could be a perk of their subscription. Say, “We do everything we can to ensure you get your monthly [product] ahead of non-subscribers.”

If a product is often out of stock, fix that! Work with your inventory team to find ways to keep the product in stock. Subscription products are a priority over products that might sell because this one is selling. 

Additionally, you could allow subscribers to swap the out-of-stock product for a variant that you can ship immediately. Give them a few options, even if they come at a small cost to you, so the customer doesn’t churn. 

If you can’t fulfill a subscription and there aren’t any reasonable alternatives, give subscribers the option to wait until the product is back in stock. Do not charge them during this period. 

‍Pro Tip: Low on stock on a product variant? ARPU users can offer variant swaps for subscribers to choose alternative scents or flavors when a product is low in stock. Combine a variant swap option with a temporary campaign you run to subscribers of that variant and use messaging like “We’re experiencing low stock on watermelon right now if you’re interested in swapping flavors this renewal.”

3. Subscription Cadence/Quantity

Some subscribers grow tired of managing a subscription over time, especially if poorly managing it means they end up receiving too much product, receiving too little product, or receiving the product at an inconvenient cadence.

When queried about their subscription fears, cadence and quantity are the two biggest concerns. Check out the replies to this tweet:

How to Overcome This Challenge: 

Your first step to keeping customers engaged with the subscription is to make great products. If they adore your offerings, they’ll never unsubscribe, even if the subscription experience isn’t perfect. 

Next, give them control over the subscription experience. 

• Allow product swaps so they can change what comes next in case they still have products from the last shipment left over. They can also switch seamlessly to a new product if the old one doesn’t suit them anymore. 
• Let them skip an upcoming shipment. They may already have enough product for the time being, and allowing skips can help prevent churn.
• Let them delay/pause the subscription for a short time. Again, this gives them another option instead of unsubscribing. 

This type of subscription flexibility makes management easy. It also allows you to introduce new products, variations (flavors, materials, etc.), and limited edition products. These bonuses can even make the subscription experience more exciting. 

Some subscribers grow tired of managing a subscription over time, especially if poorly managing it means they end up receiving too much product, receiving too little product, or receiving the product at an inconvenient cadence.

Finally, give your subscribers control over the size/quantity of their subscriptions. A bag of coffee might last a month for some people but just a few days for others. Be specific with your quantity and give them options. 

‍Pro Tip: ARPU lets Recharge merchants give their subscribers complete control over the subscription experience. Subscribers can delay or skip their order, add products and subscriptions, swap products, opt to have it shipped early, and even send gifts to their friends. Try ARPU for free.

4. Balancing the Relationship

Building engaging relationships becomes difficult over a long period. It’s easy to run out of things to say and ways to help your subscribers. In some cases, communication with subscribers becomes a string of offers and upsells, but those reinforce the relationship.

‍How to Overcome This Challenge:

Find ways to add value instead of selling. For instance, you can send non-promotional emails or texts to help them be successful with your products. Treat them like VIPs by asking their opinions, giving them a sneak peek or new products, and delighting them in unique ways they don’t expect. 

‍Kettle & Fire’s recipe emails are great examples of adding value for customers.

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Additionally, you can create value by recommending extremely relevant upsells. Make sure to use personalization in your emails, so the user understands you care about their experience.

‍Pro Tip: With ARPU, Recharge merchants can create custom campaigns based on renewal count, subscription product, or Shopify tags. Try ARPU for free.

5. Evolving Customer Needs

A customer’s needs change over time. Parents who subscribe to diapers will eventually stop needing them once the baby is potty trained. Subscribers of sensitive toothpaste may stop once they resolve the underlying issue.

In other cases, subscribers will “level up” and need a new product. For instance, subscribers of puppy food will eventually switch to adult dog food. Subscribers of skin repair products will switch to skin maintenance products.

‍How to Overcome This Challenge: 

The best way to serve your customers’ changing needs is carefully planning and forecasting. You should anticipate those changes and supply content with offers at the right time. 

Consider each subscription product carefully and ask yourself why a customer subscribes and how you can respond when that reason changes.

The best way to serve your customers’ changing needs is carefully planning and forecasting. You must anticipate those changes and supply content with offers at the right time.

For example, if you sell a diapers subscription, you might find a way to survey each subscriber about their child’s age and when they intend to potty train. When that time comes, start offering relevant products, like night-time pull-ups, children’s undergarments, or potty training books. 

6. Involuntary Churn

When a customer’s payment is declined, it’s an involuntary churn. It’s usually when a card expires, runs out of funds, is reported stolen, or is otherwise declined by the cardholder or merchant’s banks. This kind of churn accounts for up to 40% of all churn.

Involuntary churn is particularly frustrating for retailers because you had the sale. Your marketing and sales funnel worked, but you lost the sale through no fault of your own. 

‍How to Overcome This Challenge: 

Your goal is to make customers aware of the potential card issue and convince them to update their payment information before the next charge. A tool like Churn Buster will help you verify payment information before the charge and prompt the cardholder to make any appropriate changes, like this email from Stitch Fix.

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If you suspect the decline is due to fraudulent charges, work with your payment processor to find ways to identify fraud before you take payment. 

Target Your Customers’ Unique Challenges

We laid out the most common customer experience challenges for subscription customers, but you probably have some that are unique to your specific customer base. Hunt these challenges ruthlessly and find ways to overcome them, so your subscribers never feel the friction. 

If you’re obsessed with creating an exceptional subscriber experience for your customers, we’d love to help. Check out how these Recharge merchants use ARPU to reduce churn and increase LTV.