Why use Subscribie as a Paypal alternative for Subscriptions?

At the time of writing, we have an offer listed on AppSumo, and a question gave us opportunity to follow up in-detail to their question.

Below is the full answer to the questions raised due to the character limit on AppSumo.

I use the ">" character to highlight your comments, and then provide an answer following that for each.

Questioner: "have to say if find it quite outrageous that a SAAS thinks its reasonable to charge a % of our revenue for something so simple that's already freely available, a sum that can easily be a large proportion of net profit."

Hi, thanks for creating the opportunity to highlight the time-saving value Subscribie gives people to collect payments automatically. Please see my reply in the interest of highlighting the benefits.‌‌‌‌

Subscribe offers significant time saving to quickly set up a subscription site with plans available for purchase within less than ten minutes. On top of that, we've added a significant amount of time-saving features (https://subscribie.co.uk/#features) which would take less technical users a long time to work out or set up themselves.

We've had customers come from Paypal and Stripe, needing Subscribie because they simply didn't want to spend the time and complexity in setting everything up. Furthermore, the user interface to Subscribie is extremely simple, and our users (such as sports clubs run by volunteers, or freelancers) often appreciate the very simple easy to use interface.

On the topic of "so simple that's already freely available" we strive to do a good job of making complex requirements appear simple for the user. For example, we have worked closely with our sports club customers to ensure their plans automatically cancel at the end of the season, but also export in a format suitable for their bookkeeper, whilst at the same time keeping track of any payment retries. This is sensitive to members who may need a payment break,  sometimes the case with community organisations. To that end, we developed the donation feature again without complicating the system for users. It's this level of detail and understanding that's hard to get elsewhere.‌‌‌‌

What's the justification for this, I cant see this softawre adds anywhere near enough value.

We're about saving people time and automating repetitive boring tasks. Some people prefer to build systems themselves, and/or tie various 'plugins' together. Subscribe is already set up for you, and helps you collect recurring payments quickly, and is flexible for when you need more.

It might be we're not for you, other Sumolings have been happy, even technical ones too. For example, a recent Sumoling purchased our offer for their web design company‌‌ and use Subscribie to collect payments from their customers for web hosting- they felt Subscribie saved them a lot of time and effort from putting together a system themselves.‌‌‌‌

For example, they took advantage of the feature to embed their own CSS to highly customise the payment landing page for their customers. This isn't required at all, since Subscribie is simple to use with no coding required, but they took advantage of the option.

We're also as proactive with our customers as we can be: e.g. we add value by being supportive and truly understanding the needs of our customers be they sports clubs, or freelancers like that web designer.

‌‌Here's a recent anonymised support chat with a customer:

> Us: Perfect, thanks <customer>! I've removed the footer for you- let me know if that's OK for you. The login link for you used to be in the footer, so you'll need to login at: customer.example.com I noticed you might want to use the font ` montserratt` , would you like me to tidy that up for you? We don't usually do that but since I'm here I thought I'd offer. 🙂

> Customer:  "Oh wow thanks a lot! I am actually going for the monospace font family. I am familiar with CSS but don't know exactly what the components are called or I would edit it myself."

‌‌We're smaller than the big alternatives, so we focus on being nimble and truly appreciate every customer.

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"Both Stripe and Paypal already include the functionality for recurring payments anyway."

The functionality for recurring payments is the minimum, I encourage readers to take a look at our speed of setup, and the long list of additional features (https://subscribie.co.uk/#features  ) which are added based on real customer needs.

With Stripe (which Subscribie integrates with) and Paypal,  businesses still need to do a lot of setup, in some cases code something. Even then, they may not have all of the back office features they need specific to their sector (for example, we've thought about cooling off periods because some of our customers require a 14 day money back guarantee- that's a simple checkbox in Subscribie). Another example is private pages (also known as gated content) for Subscribers only.

There are more examples, but as you can see there's a lot more added value than only accepting recurring payments- we also think about automating the manual boring processes which otherwise take up a lot of time.‌‌‌‌> I'd be interested in exploring this if it had an API and no fees but as it is I see very little value here and an unjustifiable and extremely high charge on our hard work.‌‌‌‌Subscribie does have an API for getting plans, adding plans etc. I'm not sure if you mean "no fees" for just the API, or everything? The API currently has no fees associated with it. Or do you mean the entire application for free (that would be infeasible)? May you clarify at what price point you would pay for any of this now that you have more information?‌‌‌‌

We have already seen better options for subscription websites like SUBHUB, a platform purpose built for subscription based websites, they charged no commission on our revenue. What is the value of Subscribie? Why should customers pay a portion of their revenue for it on top of paying for the software?‌‌‌‌Thank you for bringing SUBHUB to our attention, they look like a great team 🇬🇧! They also seem to be focusing on the customer and providing great support so I can only wish them every success too! Try both and use whichever solves the problem/job you're wanting to solve best. Our pricing is a reflection of the experiments we've run over the years.

Some business owners (especially startups) actually prefer zero monthly fees, and are happier with a percentage of revenue, because they're starting out and are happy to pay when they too are making money. Others, (often larger businesses) feel more at ease with a fixed (but often much larger monthly fee) and no % charge. We, like many businesses, listen to our customers and experiment with what works for the market and appreciate everyone has their own preference and situation. At Subscribie, we've found the most success with established businesses or clubs, who know what they want and are simply looking to get the job done and automate their processes, collecting recurring payments for their services, goods or products.

Because the value proposition appears to be so low I have concerns that this is sustainable, do you have sufficient MRR to continue? Are you profitable each month? How long have you been in business?

‌‌We've been running for around 4 years now, and we're sustainable and looking forward to welcoming more customers. Our current pricing model helps sustain our support and continued development always focused on genuine customer needs (largely based on the 'Know Your Customers’ “Jobs to Be Done” ethos).‌‌‌‌To reiterate, at Subscribie, we've found most success with established businesses or clubs, which know what they want and are simply looking to get the job done and automate their processes, collecting recurring payments for their services, goods or products.

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Thanks

Thank you for providing the opportunity to put down in words a response to your well intended question. I appreciate the time invested.‌‌