Making the subscription process a breeze for BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine readers

The subscriptions team needed to automate the set-up of subscriptions when bought in person at events. In the past, customers who wished to subscribe to BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine at the BBC Gardeners’ World Live event had to write their information on a paper form while at the event and received their free gift (secateurs) immediately. The paper forms were then transported via secure courier (to comply with data privacy laws) to Immediate Media’s subscriptions fulfilment bureau, DSB. Customer service agents then called customers to set up their direct debit subscription over the phone.

This non-digital journey posed a few problems:

• There were issues processing paper forms due to poor writing and some customers providing false details
• Some customers walked away with the free gift without paying anything and not completing their subscription set up (roughly £560 lost revenue per event)
• GDPR/privacy concerns – all paper forms were kept in locked and secure boxes and couriered to DSB after the events, but this couldn’t be as secure as making the process digital
• Marketing permissions were not captured for these customers

Immediate Media says goodbye to a labourious subscription process, with the introduction of a new digital journey

Immediate Media created a digital journey enabling customers to pay at the event and finish setting up their subscription themselves straight after. Payment was taken via a card reader at the event and the customer data was loaded into Adestra which triggered an email containing a unique promo code. The promotional codes feature in Adestra was used which assigned a unique promo code upon launch to each customer and displayed it in their email. The customer could then use this code to redeem their subscription on buysubscrptions.com. Customers that did not redeem their code were sent up to 4 reminder emails.

The introduction of a new digital subscription process using Adestra’s promotion code feature meant a smoother journey for new subscribers

Immediate Media did not lose revenue from customers that did not complete their purchase and saved money by removing courier and customer service involvement. In addition, Immediate Media has been able to capture marketing permissions at checkout on buysubscriptions.com

Discover the results and what’s next for Immediate Media by downloading the full case study below.

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