Natal · B2C · pregnancy and postpartum fitness app
Reply to every DM, comment and email with a real expert within 24 hours
Trial-to-paid ~68% vs 38% typical; not isolated
Workedcustomer-supportfounder-brandcommunity
What they did
Every DM and comment on all social platforms, every email and every in-app post/comment/DM gets a non-canned human reply within 24 hours (8 years running). Replies come from coaches (DPTs, pelvic floor therapists, trainers), not low-level reps; SOPs/workflows keep it scalable. Team trained never to hard-sell; share the link only when asked.
What happened
Nancy attributes above-benchmark funnel numbers to pre-paywall trust: trial->paid ~68% (vs 38% industry), download->trial ~17% (vs 6%), web checkout->download 93%. Not isolated.
- Stage
- ongoing
This shipped together with other changes, so the result can't be credited to this alone.
In their words
Sub Club by RevenueCat · How Removing the Free Trial Grew Monthly Subs 2000% – Nancy Anderson, Natal“But every DM and comment across all social platforms, every email, every in-app post, comment, and DM gets answered within 24 hours and has been for eight years.”
“Our coaches, real-life DPTs, real-life public floor therapists, real-life trainers that have tons of practical experience or are still practicing in person are in talking to them.”
“Those stats are just a signal that trust has been built before the paywall.”
Related topics
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More from this episode
- Nancy Anderson Fit: Sell a program as a monthly 30-day group challenge with before/after photos100 signups in month one, 125 in month two; kept growing
- Nancy Anderson Fit: Run paid social ads before Apple's tracking changeWorked well for a couple of years, then Apple's tracking change hurt it
- Natal: Post funny, relatable personal content, not just product postsStories get ~50K views; organic beats competitors' by 90%
- Natal: End posts with a soft 'learn more' instead of a sales pitch
- Natal: Turn down brand deals and affiliate links to keep audience trustGives up an estimated $0.5-1M/year; benefit not measurable
- Nancy Anderson Fit: Turn the questions people keep asking in DMs into your main programOver 1M users; still the top traffic driver
- Natal: Merge several niche apps into one app users keep across life stagesLess confusion and a lower price; ARR +20% in Q1 2026
- Natal: Narrow to pre- and postnatal fitness and rename the brand away from the founder
- Natal: Have your in-house expert coaches film the brand's videosFounder says it's working well; no numbers
- Natal: Ask 10-15 onboarding questions and show only content for the user's stage
- Natal: Build a new program for every client requestBiggest fail of the year: too many choices, users didn't start
- Natal: Offer a free posture check by a real expert that picks the first workout68-70% who finish it complete their first workout
- Natal: DM every new user personally and invite them to a coach-run community31% of community joiners return on day 2; no baseline
- Natal: Never give away free workouts or freebies
- Natal: Let people pay with their health savings account (HSA) at checkoutTens of thousands of dollars in two weeks, unpromoted
- Natal: Push 'spend your HSA dollars before they expire' at year end
- Natal: Drop the free trial on the monthly planMonthly subs up ~2,000%, annual +21% (founder's rough recall)
- Natal: Raise subscription pricesARR still grew 20% that quarter
- Natal: Pay influencers to post about the brand