131: How My Lazy Launch Doubled My Subscribers

Are your subscriptions dwindling? Do you need to do something now to keep your numbers up? Maybe you don't have time in your chaotic schedule to do a full launch. Well, you need to listen to this episode. Grab your earbuds and join me for this episode on how I doubled my dwindling subscription with a lazy launch.

Welcome to the Launch Your Box podcast with weekly tips, tricks, and strategies to start, launch, and grow your subscription box. Now here's your host, Sarah Williams.

Welcome back to the Launch Your Box podcast. Today we're going to talk through how I doubled my subscription with a lazy launch. And I know we've talked a lot about launches lately on the podcast here because I've been going through several launches. I had my Monogram Box launch, I had the Launch Your Box launch, and now I'm going to talk to you about a different launch. This is for one of my other subscriptions. and I had no capacity to launch it in a full launch way. So I did it with a lazy launch. I'm going to break it down for you today, talk you through what I did, what my results were, and how you can rinse and repeat it too. So this particular launch was in regards to my teacher subscription. So I call this my baby subscription because it's the tiniest subscription that I have. I have 3 different subscriptions. For my company, I have the Monogram Box subscription, which is our signature subscription. Then I have our t-shirt club, which has thousands of subscribers as well. And then I have the baby subscription, which is our Tees for Teachers. So it's a t-shirt subscription specific, specifically designed for teachers. And there's lots of reasons why it's still the baby subscription. Number one, I don't promote it very often because I'm always so busy promoting the other two subscriptions, and it's more niched down, it's more specific, and my page isn't geared solely for that niche. So if I was solely geared towards teachers on everything that I did, I think it would be bigger. But because it's a small niche out of my whole audience, that's why it's also a baby subscription. But I love this subscription. It is easy for me to continue to do. It requires one design from me a month, and then we pack and ship. So when I started this launch, I had 104 subscribers. So that's also why I call it my baby subscription because I don't have very many subscribers in it. And it had been dwindling down. I had about 150 subscribers in this particular subscription at the start of this year. And now halfway through the year, I'm down to like 104. And I needed to do something to revive it. I needed to to give it a little love. I needed to give it some attention. I did not want it to fall under 100 subscribers. And so I was thinking, okay, I need to do the launch. I need to launch this. I need to get it back out. I need to bring some visibility to this, but I just did not have the capacity to do a full-blown launch. I mean, I, I kind of quickly told you what was going on, but since the beginning of the year. April, I had a full-blown Monogram Box launch, full launch level in April. In May, I went to Sub Summit and hosted, you know, talks and workshops for my members out at Sub Summit. That was a lot of stuff for me to put together. In June, I had my giant coaching week. We had thousands of people attend coaching week. We've got 625 brand new members inside Launch Your Box during June. My whole June was focused on coaching week. And here's July. And I just did not have any more bandwidth to show up and launch in the way that I needed to. But I didn't want to not do this. And so when I thought about putting it off a little bit, I thought I can't do that because August I have a brand new course coming out. It's called How to Start a T-Shirt Subscription. So that's coming out very, very soon. I know in September we have plans to launch our new Scale Your Box membership. And so when I looked at the calendar, I thought, if I don't do this in July, I realistically can't do it until October. And then when I get to October, it doesn't even make sense. We're going back to school now. So I really need to find a way to do it right now. I've got teachers' attention. It's summertime. They're consuming the content. How can I get in front of the teachers? And make the best out of the launch with the bandwidth that I had? How could I do this and make it as easy on me and less taxing on me as possible? So based on what I shared in the last episode, if you didn't listen to episode 130 yet, I'm— I need you to just jot that down and go listen to it when you get done with this episode. But I'm talking about using paid ads. And so go back and listen to that episode. But based on the information I knew from that last episode, I knew that I could drive a lot of traffic and sales through paid ads. If I could do that effectively, that could eliminate my need to go live, send a bunch of emails, and do all the launch activities that I would normally pour into a launch. So let's see. What does that even look like? If I don't do the launch the way I know how to launch everything that I do, what does that even look like? I needed to create a plan. So I sat down, I thought, if I'm going to do this differently, I need to map it out. I don't want to just go into a launch winging it, not having a plan to implement, because I know when things go all willy-nilly like that, they don't happen We don't feel good about it. And then we've wasted a lot of time and effort. So I knew I needed to sit down and create a plan. And so instead of this intense 5-day launch, I decided I was going to run a 2-week lazy launch. Okay, I'm calling it lazy launch because it required me to show up a lot less than I normally do. This would give my ads time to work and gain momentum. Having a 2-week window would allow me to not have to put so much organic effort into it and let my paid effort really drive what was happening here. So here's what I did. I created an early bird bonus exactly the way I teach you to during our launch plans. Okay, during doing a 5-day launch, I created an early bird bonus just like my regular launches. But I made it good for the entire 2 weeks. Okay. So it was an early bird bonus, but really it was just a launch bonus. I hope I'm not confusing you when I say that when we're talking about a typical launch, our early bird bonus is good for the first 24 to 48 hours. So for this launch, I wanted to use that same tactic. But instead of it being an early bird bonus, it was just a launch bonus. And that bonus was given to all of my existing members and any new member that joined. So basically anyone that was a member by the time my launch closed, they would get the early bird bonus. And that bonus, I created a really cute canvas tote bag and it said Teacher Survival Kit. And I used that bonus for a lot of reasons. One, it didn't matter what kind of teacher. They could use that tote bag. It was canvas and foldable and lightweight, so we could just put it right in, in our poly mailers with our teacher tee. So it wasn't going to add bulk. It wasn't going to add a bunch of weight. I wasn't going to need a box for it. So I needed to keep it as simple as possible. And so I added the tote bag in and that was my launch bonus. And so that got people's attention. Hey, here's something different going on. Here's a special promotion happening, and I was able to gain a lot of traction based on that launch bonus. Okay, so this was a 2-week launch. Week 1, I started my ads, and I believe I had 8 or 9 different ad graphics and a couple different pieces of copy to go with those ads. I started the ads, and I just made an announcement post. Okay, I didn't even go live in week 1. I just made an announcement post on my page. We got all the ads started. And then what I focused on every day during week 1, one of my posts needed to be a tease for teacher post. So every day I post 3 to 4 times a day. And so I just dedicated one of those slots to be a teacher T post every single day. I didn't change and only focus on the Teacher Tea for 2 full weeks. I don't want to do that. If I'm going to do that, I'll do a 5-day launch. So this was a lazy launch. I needed to spread it out a little bit. So I just made sure one post every single day was about our Teas for Teachers subscription. That was week 1. Make the announcement on your page, start your ads, post about your subscription every single day. Okay, easy. Piece of cake. I'm already doing those things. Week 2. In week 2, I was continuing to post once a day until I got down to the last 4 days of this launch. Okay. In the last 4 days of the launch, I did 1 live, 2 emails, and everything I posted for those 4 days was about the teacher subscription. So that was— that would be typically my launch, my regular launch timeframe, that 4 to 5 days. So I just dedicated the last 4 days to be more intense than the first week and a half. And so I did one live announcing that they could get this tote bag, telling them about the Teas for Teachers subscription and talking a lot about what it means to be a subscriber. So that was my one live. I only did one live in 2 weeks. About the subscription. I sent 2 emails. I sent one on the day that I did the live, just asking them to go watch the replay on the live. And then I sent another one on the last day that they could get in. 2 emails was it. And then those last 4 days, I posted nothing other than the tease for teachers for 4 full days. So every post those 4 days, was about that subscription. Now, sounds easy enough, right? 2 weeks, ads, posts, 1 live, 2 emails. Easy enough, right? So here's what my results were. I started with 104 subscribers and I closed cart with 201 subscribers, nearly doubling my subscription with very minimal effort. I should have gone live again on close cart day, but my kids had lots of stuff going on and I was completely exhausted by the end of the day. And I didn't, and it was okay because I didn't have the capacity in that day. But it doesn't mean that I shouldn't have launched because I almost doubled my subscription with this very simple lazy launch plan. So let's talk about what it took. What did it take for me to double my subscription in 2 weeks? Okay. Because you're thinking, well, I could do that, Sarah. Tell me how you did that. Tell me exactly what you did to double your subscription in 2 weeks. Here's what I did. The launch bonus, that tote bag with the cute teacher saying. Give them a reason to buy now. Okay, so that is the first thing you need to do if you want to do a lazy launch like this. Figure out what launch bonus you can add to that subscription for that month. And remember, you need to give it to all your existing subscribers. They don't want to feel left out. Don't make them regret being a long-term subscriber because they don't get the cool, fun tote bag. And they were so appreciative. So many great comments, so many messages. Thank you for giving it to everyone. That's, that's goodwill that you're giving right there. That's going to show up in your retention rates. Also focused on providing a really cute new design for this t-shirt. I wanted them to be excited about this t-shirt, and I try to do that with all my designs, but I made sure that we had multiple colors on this shirt, that I use a really fun design, and that they would really love it. And so I focused on the launch bonus, a cute design, and ad spend. Now, you might be thinking that I spent a ton of money on ads for this 2 weeks, and I really didn't. When I look at my ads budget on a regular basis, this was actually very minimal. And when I was grabbing these stats the podcast, I was kind of surprised on how much money I didn't spend. When I tell you what I spent, it's going to be a lot for some of you that don't spend very much on ads. But for those of you that have a business that's doing 7 figures a year, this is very minimal ad spend. So it just opened my eyes to a lot of things, and I'm going to talk about that in a minute. But my ad spend for this 2 weeks was $2,000. $2,000. That's it. The revenue I generated from having these 97 brand new subscribers was $2,100. And so I made what I spent. I'll be profitable with this subscription next month because remember, this isn't a one-time sale. I've sold the subscription one time and now they're going to come back and they're going to pay me every single month. And on average, my teacher subscribers stay 11 months at a time. So that means I'm going to get 10 months of full profit from them. I'm going to break even on month 1 with my ad spend, and for the next 10 months, I'm going to be profitable. That's what I want you to think about. I spent $2,000. I had a launch bonus, had a cute new design, and I had $2,000 in ad spend. Literally anybody could do this. So let's talk about some more stats. 92% of all the traffic that went to my sales page during these 2 weeks came from Facebook ads. 92% of my traffic. And that's realistic because I wasn't doing much to send traffic there. I did 1 live and sent 2 emails in a period of 14 days. So yes, most of my traffic needed to come from those Facebook ads, and that's why this is a lazy launch, because I physically wasn't driving the traffic to my sales page. I was letting my Facebook ads do the work for me. 78% of all my new subscribers for the Teas for Teachers came directly from a link in the Facebook ads. 78% of them came directly from those Facebook ads. Not an email, not a live, not a post— from an ad. Here was another really interesting stat that we discovered during this launch: 82% of all my new subscribers, this was their very first purchase from me ever. 82% were brand new customers. Wasn't a bunch of repeat customers that have signed up and canceled, signed up and canceled. 82% of them were brand new purchasers to me. Think of how many other things that I can sell them. All these past t-shirts that I have sitting around my warehouse, maybe I can upgrade them to a monogram box. My $79 subscription from my $25 subscription. There are so many possibilities when you bring brand new people into your world, and especially subscribers that have never purchased anything from me before. That was a big eye-opener for me. One other really important statistic that I want you to think about, and I mentioned this on the last episode, but one of the big eye-openers for me during this launch was that on average I only get 200 to 300 views on my teacher sales page a month. Okay, we know because I talk about it all the time, our industry conversion rate average is 1 to 3%. So if I'm sending 300 people to my sales page and my conversion rate is on the high end at 3%, that means on average I'm going to get 9 new subscribers a month. Okay, not bad. 9 new subscribers a month. It might fill what I've lost for the month. It might not even cover what I lose for the month. And if it doesn't cover what I'm losing in cancellations, you're going to see a decline on your subscription month after month after month, just like I have. I went from 150 subscribers in January down to 104 by July. So yes, I was getting new subscribers every month, but it wasn't enough to keep it steady or to increase it. So when I use paid ads, I sent 10 times as many people to my sales page, and I had 10 times the view that I did without any ads. So think about it, if I 10x'd my views, I went from 300 to 3,000. Now if you think about the conversion rate on 3,000 people to that sales page, versus 300 people in that sales page, I just went from 9 conversions to 90 conversions. 90 new members just by 10x-ing the traffic that I send to that sales page. It's all a numbers game. If we have more traffic, if we get more visible, we'll have more conversions. Our conversion rate might not move. Our conversion rate can still be the same. 3% of 300 is 9 new subscribers. 3% of 3,000 is 90 new subscribers. So what do we have to do to get in front of people? Here's my advice for you, because I teach you inside Launch Your Box how to do a full-blown launch, and I still believe wholeheartedly that that's the way to go. But my advice is, when you need to launch, just launch. When you need to do it, just figure out a way to do it. Figure out your capacity and make it work. If you do not have the capacity to do a full-blown 5-day live launch, could you do a lazy launch? It doesn't have to be perfect. Just take action. No matter if you're doing a lazy launch or a full-blown live launch, you have to create a plan. You cannot just wing it. If you go into a launch just winging it day by day, you will not have the results that you want. I guarantee that you won't. Sit down and make a plan in whatever capacity this looks like for you. Now that the launch is over, one thing that I continue to think about is how can I continue to drive that amount of traffic to that sales page on a regular basis? Because I know it's all a numbers game. So how do I continue to drive that much traffic? I would love to have 3,000 visits to that sales page every single month. And if my conversion rate held strong at 3%, that means I would be getting 90 new subscribers every single month. And you know what? In 3 months, 4 months, 6 months, I'm gonna have 400, 500 subscribers. Just by sending people to that sales page. So what do I need to do to work in a consistent ad budget promoting my new t-shirt every month? Creating a budget, creating a plan, and making sure I have good ad graphics. And that's exactly what I did. So now we're in the next month. Now I'm in August after the launch in July. I've got my brand new August t-shirt. That is coming out and people can sign up now to get that shirt. So I started running ads 4 days ago for my August teacher tee, and I already have 7 brand new subscribers in 4 days. That's almost 2 subscribers a day. So on the current budget that I have planned, if I got 2 new subscribers a day, That's another 60 subscribers this month when I only had 104 a month ago. You can really drive traffic and increase your subscription rate by just running some paid ads. Set a budget that you're comfortable with and get visible. It's all a numbers game. You don't have to do everything, just do something. If this lazy launch feels doable to you, I'm gonna challenge you to put a date on the calendar and make it happen. I've outlined everything that I did right here in this podcast episode, and I want you to go back and listen to episode 130. It's going to help you so much. Let's go out there and grab our subscribers. Recurring revenue is what we need to be focused on every single day, driving traffic to those web pages that will convert to recurring purchases. Stop wasting all your time trying to convert to one-time purchases. I only broke even in one month, but the next 10 months I'm going to be profitable 100%. So let's go get launched. Let's make progress. Let's increase our subscriber rate. I'll be back next week with another great episode.