Ladder · B2C · strength training app
Offer non-converted trial users their first month for $5, then $29.99
About half stay into month two at full price; consistent across cohorts
Workedpricingemail
What they did
Leads who didn't convert after trial (often zero workouts) get a $5 first-month offer that renews at $29.99/month. It is a small share of conversions but gives a user spike in month one and ARR growth in month two from those who stay.
What happened
About 50% of $5-offer takers are retained into month two at $29.99, consistently.
- Stage
- growth
In their words
Sub Club by RevenueCat · How to Use Segmentation to Maximize LTV — Greg Stewart, Ladder“The $5 deal is a good, good example where folks who claim or take advantage of the $5 offer, it's only about half of those that are retained in month two, and it's pretty consistent.”
“So, in the first month, it's a really nice spike at user growth, and in the second month, it's growth in ARR for that cohort”
Related topics
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More from Ladder
All 46 Ladder tactics- Price the annual plan at $14.99 a month ($179), half the monthly priceAnnual take rate rose from 20% to ~30% of new paying members
- Sell monthly only until retention is clear, then show an annual option side by sideAnnual went from ~0% to 20% of new paying members
- Ask new visitors 15 fitness questions, then recommend three matching programsA million people have taken it in 18 months; fixed confused cold-traffic users
- Run a new coach's TikTok for them, using only videos already on their phone250K followers in 45 days, with million-view videos every week
- Send every TikTok ad click to a web quiz and track answers that mark ideal usersTargeting tightened within a week; payback in low single-digit months
- Run a big yearly user survey and use AI to read the answers7,500+ responses in a year; led directly to the nutrition feature
More from this episode
- Ladder: Make a separate ad and coach-led program for each type of lifterFounder says it brings in users more likely to stick; no numbers
- Ladder: Offer a 7-day free trial without asking for a credit cardUsers who finish one or two workouts convert at a very high rate
- Ladder: Aim every feature at getting new members to 3 workouts in week oneHitting it in week one makes month-one retention very likely
- Ladder: Nudge members to cheer on others so new trial users get lots of cheersCheers received correlated with workout completions and long-term retention
- Ladder: Test annual prices, lead the paywall with annual, and add annual-only featuresAnnual members now outnumber monthly; payback periods very tight
- Ladder: Pitch annual only to trial users who worked out; offer others a cheap first monthHelped make annual the majority plan; no split numbers
- Ladder: Run 6-week workout series and pitch discounts to past leads before each startsFounder says deals work best at these moments; no numbers