Skylight · B2C · digital family calendars and frames
Sell the device everywhere: your own site, Amazon, Costco and Best Buy
Called very successful; retail acts as a quality stamp, but lowers subscription attach
Workedpartnershipsintegrations-marketplaces
What they did
Multi-channel distribution: direct on myskylight.com (controls customer relationship, auto-on subscription), Amazon, and retailers including Costco and Best Buy, plus the same abroad. Retailers generally take only one player per category, which works as a moat. Trade-off: in Amazon and retail the subscription can't be bundled at checkout, so attach is lower and the product must sell the subscription after setup.
What happened
'the strategy to be everywhere, that has been very successful for us'; retail seen as the biggest 'influencer', but it pressures post-purchase subscription conversion.
“We sell through Amazon, and we sell through retailers, and we do the same thing internationally. And so, I think the strategy to be everywhere, that has been very successful for us.”
“Retail is the biggest influencer of all in our world. The fact that we are in Costco and other great retailers, it's a stamp of quality that can't be underestimated.”
Related topics
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More from this episode
- Skylight: Raise the yearly plan from $39 to $79, not the $99 tests favoredMinimal loss of subscribers or retention; ARR curve 'transformative'; no exact numbers
- Skylight: Keep old customers on the old price, and honor it for anyone who asksGave up an estimated couple million dollars for goodwill; no measured effect
- Skylight: Send the device's QR code to an Apple in-app purchase instead of a web checkoutOver 100% more conversions, on a small slice of users
- Skylight: Knock money off the device when people buy it with the subscriptionMuch higher subscription attach on the own website than on Amazon or in stores; no numbers
- Skylight: Test a free trial, with and without asking for a credit cardNo extra subscribers; trial takers were people who'd have subscribed anyway
- Skylight: Make every first purchase cover what you paid to get the customerEvery order in company history paid back on day zero; grew without VC money
- Skylight: Borrow from risk-tolerant lenders at 15-20% to buy holiday inventory, not raise VCStayed bootstrapped and profitable; paid 15-20% a year at times
- Skylight: Keep what people bought the device for free; charge for new add-ons like meal planningPhotos-on-calendar paywall 'just worked' for years; now some customers want it free
- Skylight: Don't mark which features are premium once someone has subscribedRenewal rates high even for light users of paid features; no numbers
- Skylight: Survey customers on whether the product is life-changing, and build to raise that shareAbout 20% say life-changing today; goal is 50%
- Skylight: Push marketing spend on a new calendar product before the product was goodDidn't work; nearly killed the product; took off only after product fixes in fall 2022
- Skylight: Change how you show what's in the subscription bundleRarely moved the share of buyers who subscribe