Upsell tactics

Prompted by members asking for a family plan. The web quiz asks 'Do you have a gym buddy? Would you like to add them onto your plan?' Both users get 15% off. Those who decline see only a small gym buddy toggle on the pricing page, keeping the paywall simple. Buddies can see each other's workouts and meals and send nudges in the app.

Ran a paywall campaign for existing free users triggered on app open, with frequency capped at one paywall per week however often they open the app. Alternative trigger suggested: after a key engagement event (e.g. sharing). Checked support and did a thorough App Store review analysis for complaints. Works alongside a generous free tier.

Printables (coloring sheets, small board games, each tied to a reading skill) are included in the subscription but unlocked lesson by lesson. After a user buys or starts a trial on the web, offer $9.99 to get all PDFs at once, delivered as a link to a Google Drive folder.

'Tentpole strategy': instead of marketing the core product (TaskMagic) with free info content, sell functionality via small, cheap standalone products. Step 1: build for the core customer's next problem (TaskMagic's buyers were business owners, agencies and freelancers who need sales). Step 2: keep it very simple and specific, e.g. Mail-Lead, a basic cold email outbound tool, because specific products ('cold outreach email for some sector') rank faster on SEO than a general one. Sell it to existing customers and let its own SEO attract new ones. It is its own product, not a white-label.

Immediately after a consumer buys an Architectural Digest subscription (when it's unknown whether they're aspirational or in the trade), show one pop-up offering the business membership. Same pattern used to upsell another title, a premium product, sell the slot to a partner, or ask for an action, since the customer is most engaged at purchase.

Built as an all-in-one from the start: POS software first (easier to iterate, deploy, hire for, cheaper), then custom on-machine hardware (own enclosure, EMV modules, screen), not a generic Android tablet. Hardware is sold as a one-time, good-margin product with standalone value to the operator, and every device carries SaaS and payments, turning a one-time hit into long-tail recurring revenue. Focus on net dollar retention (more products per operator) over location count.

Cover the 'white space' around the PMS: analytics, online booking, intake forms, VoIP phones, payment terminals, websites, and now AI (call recording/transcription, intent and sentiment, AI receptionist). Customers build a package; voice, AI and payments layer on top of a basic operations core; most buy the larger packages.

Users pay a monthly subscription for credits (cheapest $25/month) used to build apps. Two credit types: builder credits for general building and cloud credits for back ends. Users can buy one-off top-ups when they run out.

After launch they saw users running the profile analysis flow more often than expected, so they added a second paywall selling additional analyses to power users on top of the subscription.

Microtransactions designed around the core outcome (more matches): Boost shows your profile to more people (like LinkedIn's boost); Super Like sends a differentiated like. Guest's rule: good a la carte products scale roughly linearly in value (10 is 10x better than 1). Other microtransactions were tried; some stuck, some did not.

A meditation app that was struggling to grow started offering classes, intensives, week-long programs, in-person experiences and Zoom calls to users willing to spend more. Hosts note it doesn't scale like software, so fits smaller apps better than Tinder-scale ones.

Meditation app in a crowded category added online intensives, one-on-one coaching, monthly four-hour meditation events and week-long retreats, sold to its thousands of subscribers and tens of thousands of engaged email subscribers.