Complexity Kills: Why Simpler Subscription Boxes Sell Better

Are you making your subscription box harder to sell without even realizing it? In this episode, I'm uncovering the sneaky ways complexity kills conversions and what to do instead. If you've got too many options, too much explaining, or not enough clarity, this one's for you. Grab your earbuds, let's simplify, and let's listen. 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 a little bit about something that I see subscription box owners do all the time, and that's overcomplicating their offers. So this could happen in many different ways, and you might be overcomplicating something that you don't even realize you're overcomplicating, but It could be from too many different product options and too many different pricing tiers, too many different upgrades, confusing website layouts. Like, the complexity doesn't just confuse buyers, but it creates a lot of frictions that kills conversions and retention. So we're going to talk about this today. So I want you to, I want you to think about this, like, if you've ever felt like you're constantly having to explain explain your subscription box to sell it, or if you're struggling to convert buyers because they don't understand the options, this episode is for you. It's something that I see over and over again inside Launch Your Box, and I want us to identify it today, and then I want us to fix it today because I want to make sure that your offer is simple as can be, as simple as possible, because simplicity converts. So let's start with the most common ways that box owner, box owners overcomplicate their subscription. Number 1, too many product types. I see this a lot and I'm usually confused by it. Like, why? How did we get here? When I do box openings inside Launch Your Box, I'm opening the boxes and I understand the overarching idea of their box and then I'll see something in their box and I'm like, Hmm, how does this fit with this? You know, too many product types is something like if I had a book subscription, right? I have a book subscription and maybe I paired that with skincare items. I see it. You're listening. They're like, huh? I'm like, yeah, I see it. Maybe I'm selling decor for decorating or seasonal decor and then I'm adding in t-shirts. Not quite a fit. Maybe there's a candle box and I'm putting some small trinkets in there that I think they will like that will complement their candles. But this is confusing. And why it's confusing is because it doesn't speak to one specific customer or solve one clear problem. It kind of feels like it's all over the place. If I have a book, book box, and I typically sell to women, sure, I can put skincare items. But I'm subscribing to your box for the book box. And that might include maybe a bookmark or maybe a snack to eat while I'm reading. But to add skincare items or self-care items or things like that in with a book box, it doesn't fit. And we think we need to do that because we think we have to curate a box that has all kinds of things in there for them. But at the end of the day, what I'm subscribing to is the book. That book experience that you're creating. Same with seasonal decor. If I sign up for a seasonal decor subscription, it's because I want to decorate, I want to have the decor. And then if you throw a shirt in there, probably some of your subscribers will want that shirt. Excuse me. But a majority of people just want the decor box. Do you see what I'm saying? And then the same thing with the candles. If I'm signing up for a candle subscription, I want the candle, I want the scents, I want the fun things. I don't want a bunch of trinkets that I may or may not use. That's not why I'm signing up for it. So when you mix too many product types, it creates confusion because it doesn't speak to the one customer. You think you're adding value and you're actually adding a disservice to yourself. Now, number 2, this is probably the most popular. I don't know why I didn't put it as number 1. Too many options. We are doing— we are giving too many options. Here's an example. You might— when I get to your checkout screen, I go through and I'm like, yes, I want to subscribe. I get to checkout and now I have 5 different options. I've got 3 subscription tiers. I've got 2 payment plans. I've got customizable choices. Oh, here I can add an add-on. There are way too many options, way too many options. And we feel like we're helping people by giving them options. Oh, you might just want this, or you might want this and this, or you might want this, this, and this. And then, oh, if you sign up for 3 months or 6 months or monthly or yearly, oh, and then I'm going to let you pick what color you prefer. Like, do you see what I'm saying? It's too much. And we feel like we're helping people by giving them options to fit their life. But it's actually killing your business. We're creating decision fatigue when we get them to checkout. And this is why we have abandoned carts, because I know I want your thing by the time I'm going to checkout. Now I have to make decisions on what upgrade I want. I have to make decisions on what pricing model I want. And it's just, it makes me bounce. And this ties into number 3 because we complicate the pricing. And this is probably the one thing that I, when I'm doing website reviews for our members, I'm just like, why do we keep doing this? I keep telling you to stop doing this. We feel like we need to do it. And I don't know why. But we're offering a monthly option. And then we might offer a 3-month option. It's a, it's a discount if you sign up for 3 months, and then you get a bigger discount if you sign up for 6 months, and then you get a bigger discount if you sign up for the year with maybe different perks in there as well. But at the end of the day, these people are still paying you monthly. They can still cancel and take their credit card out of their account at any time. So does it matter? Because now the decision I have to make when I get to checkout, I thought I was just gonna buy the monthly box, and now I have to decide, okay, well, it's cheaper if I get 3 months. It's even more cheaper if I get 6 months. 12 months is a big commitment. I don't know if I want it for a year, but that's a great price. Now I don't want to pay full price for it. Because I've seen all these other discounted options, which in reality I could cancel at any time. So it doesn't make sense to me. Also, what doesn't make sense to me is that at 3 months, what happens? Am I enrolled for another 3 months or do I have to sign up again? We're complicating the pricing. And it kills the momentum of your buyers because customers don't know what to choose and then they delay the purchase. I knew going to checkout that I wanted to buy and made the I made the decision that I wanted to buy your box now, and I was prepared to pay monthly for it. But now there's discounts and discounts and discounts. Do I pick 3 months and get a little bit of a discount? I'm unsure if I'm gonna love the box. Do I pick 6 months and get more of a discount, and then I'm locked in for 6 full months? I don't know if I want to do the 12-month. Do you see what I'm saying here? We do this because we think we're providing value. But we're actually hurting our sales. We're actually creating more decision fatigue. Number 4, we like to give messaging that's vague or a little cutesy. We use phrases like, "It's delightfully curated," or, "You're gonna love what's inside," without actually saying what's inside or who the box is for. I see this a lot when I go to your websites, when we do website reviews. I can actually look at some sales pages and not have any clue what's in your box. And if I don't have a clue of what I'm going to get, you're not getting my sale. We have to be very clear on who it's for and what is in it. That has to be the baseline of our messaging. When we get cutesy with words and logos and names of boxes, we're doing a disservice. We think it's fun, but people don't actually know. That's why my box is called the Monogram Box. There's a monogram in that box. How can you define your box in a way that's clear for your customers? Who is it for and what is in it? All right. Now, here's how to know if you are overcomplicating some things in your business. Are you constantly explaining the box? Like, are you constantly having to explain what's in the box? Are people constantly confused by your offer? You're always in the DMs. You're always answering emails. And here's the reality that 90% of the people that go to checkout are never going to ask you to explain. They're just going to leave. Are you always feeling like you have to explain or justify what it is? If you're doing that, you need to redefine it. It should be instantly obvious from social media or your website what the box is without having to explain it. So if you're having to explain it, it's not going to convert. I don't know if you've ever watched Shark Tank when they talk with, you know, one of their contestants about Well, you're going to have to explain it. You're going to have to have educational information in the stores. And it's not reality. People won't read. There's not space for it. They don't know. So if you— if something has to go with your product to explain what it is, it's not going to convert and you're killing your conversions that way. Confused people don't buy. If someone has to think really hard or click too many times or read over things over and over, they're going to bounce. We have a 7-second attention span right now in this day and age. I like to, I like to use this example sometimes. You know, it's the what's for dinner mentality. Mentality. What's for dinner? We have to figure that out every single day. People are overwhelmed with choices in life. A simple thing as what's for dinner becomes Complicated. Nobody wants to make the decision. Nobody wants to say yes to the other person's decision. It's— we got to eat every day, but nobody wants to make the decision. Your box should be a relief from making decisions, not another decision that they have to figure out. Which style of box do I want? Which payment plan do I want? You know, we shouldn't have to figure that out. Confused people don't buy, they bounce. You're gonna lose people on your website. Too many checkout options, unclear messaging. So let's talk about the power of simplifying your subscription box offer. Clear boxes convert. One offer, one customer, one problem solved. It's for her because it helps with this. And here's what's inside. Do you see just how clear that is? One offer, one customer, one problem solved. The simple offers are easier to sell and they're easier to scale. One plan, one price, fewer tech headaches, fewer cancellations due to misunderstanding. You can always Add options later once the base offer is proven and scalable, scalable. So let's talk about this in my own business. When I started the Monogram Box, I had one offer. It was $40 a month. I didn't even have a yearly offer. And that wasn't because I was super smart at the time. It was because I didn't even know if I'd be around in a year. Like, that's how unsure I was about myself. So I only did monthly. They had one option, monogram box, $40 a month, period. I grew right out of the gate, month after month, growing, growing, growing, growing. It was so clear. It was so easy to talk about. It was so easy for someone to make that decision when they got to my sales page. There was one box, one offer, one price. I didn't create decision fatigue in the buying process, and I did that for 18 months. I scaled that to over 1,000 subscribers in 18 months with one offer, one price, before I ever added a second subscription and a second option. So don't come out of the gate with a whole bunch of options. You've got to prove the base model first. Make it simple, make it scalable, and then we can add to it. When you have simple messaging like that, it's one box, one offer, everybody gets the same thing. People instantly get what your box is. They instantly understand the pricing structure, and they're more likely to subscribe and stay subscribed. Are you overcomplicating your subscription box? You don't have to answer to me. Answer to yourself. If you were to sit down and look at your offers from a, a fresh perspective, from an outsider perspective, does it feel complicated? Do you have too many options? So I want you to start with this. I want you to audit your offer. If you're taking notes while you're listening today, I want you to grab your notebook. I want you to audit your offer. Go to your sales page. Can I clearly see what is in the box? Do I have a mishmash of products? Am I mixing too many product lines? What are my subscribers coming here for, the book or the skincare? And are they turned off by one or the other? Which product is the hero product, and how can I make my offer all about that hero product? Is the pricing clear? Is the value clear? If someone asked you right now about your subscription box, if I asked you right now about your subscription box, could you tell me in one sentence what it was and who it was for? In one sentence. And if you can't, it's too complicated. Look at your call to action while you're auditing. Do you have too many options? Do you have multiple tiers? Do you have different prices? Do you have customizations that could be trimmed down? Are you making the buyer decide too much? Audit that, and then I want you to simplify your messaging. Does your sales page talk about what the box is, who it's for, and why they need it? What it is, who it's for, why they need it. And are there images on that page to reflect what it is, who it's for, and why they need it? Could you put your sales page in front of a stranger and answer those 3 questions in 10 seconds? That's our attention spans. We have to identify that very quickly or we're losing them. And then I want you to focus on one box, even if you have multiple options right now. Maybe, maybe, especially if you're under like 300 subscribers and you really haven't scaled fully. I want you to focus on one box. Don't split your energy across multiple boxes yet, but go all in with one box. Focus on that. Talk about that. Clear up that messaging. Stop trying to talk about all the things at once. That's where you're doing a disservice to yourself. That's where you're losing people because it's too complicated and nobody has the brain space to figure it out anymore. I don't even have the brain space to figure out what we're having for dinner tonight. Please, somebody else make that decision for me. So the last thing that I want to do is go to a website to find the box that I just want to have in my life to come upon multiple decisions upon checkout. That's the last thing I want in my life. I want you to think about that, and I want you to audit those things with your own subscription box. Complexity creates confusion and confusion kills your sales. Are you overcomplicating your subscription box, the offer and the price? And it's okay if that's what you've done. But now we have to pull back and it's okay to make changes. When we start a subscription box, it's not automatically that box for the rest of our lives. You're allowed to change. You're allowed to pivot. You're allowed to create simplicity, clarity, confidence, and ultimately conversions. So if you're struggling to get sales, I want you to audit your box and think about how you can make it simple. Is it your products? Is it your pricing? Is it your options? Is it your messaging? Where can you simplify your subscription box next? Is it in the offer? Is it in the checkout? Is it in the messaging? I want you to use this episode as your action plan for the week. I would love if you would take a screenshot of this episode and tag me in your stories. That you're working on this, this week. How can you make your subscription box more simple and go ask your subscribers? Let them be part of this journey for you. We're all a work in progress. Our businesses are a constant work in progress. We need to identify the issues so that we can grow and scale with simplicity. I'll see you guys back here for another episode on Friday.