Subscribe to Offering Self-Image Benefits

A benefit to customers of a subscription is that they don’t need to think about the subscription after the initial purchase. If you belong to the fruit-of-the-month club, the periodic arrival of your box of goodies requires no further action unless the subscription expires.
     But researchers at University of Arizona and Yale University find that with those subscription purchases most likely to profit the suppler, thinking about the subscription is an important benefit. That's because the subscriptions reinforce those consumers’ self-identity. This helps explain why customers renew or allow automatic renewal even when they find themselves using the product or service only rarely. It’s more than the inertia of a habit or a laziness about cancelling.
     In one of the studies, 93% of a group of 600 consumers were able to think of subscriptions or memberships they maintain which they don’t really use. In another study, participants completed an inventory of self-concept clarity and were also asked to indicate the likelihood they’d retain an unused subscription or membership. The example given to the participant was a magazine, a club, a daily app, or a snack delivery service.
     It was found that those people with lower self-concept clarity reported the highest likelihood of continuing renewals. Further inquiries provided additional evidence of the relationship. When the experimenter guided participants toward greater clarity in their personal self-concept, they became less likely to renew an unused subscription. People with limited self-concept clarity were unlikely to begin a subscription for or membership in an offering projecting a strong self-concept, although they might try out a one-shot participation. A one-month subscription to the dress-of-the-month club, for instance. People with an unclear self-concept shop for providers of projects and services which lend clarity and then settle on and stick with ones which feel comfortable.
     Marketers utilizing a subscription-based business model should highlight the advantages of the purchase for clarifying an attractive self-concept. Receiving regular shipments of fruit reinforces a self-image of eating healthy, signing up for the gym strengthens a self-concept of fitness, and subscribing to National Review helps clarify one’s self-concept as a political conservative. That stays true even if you never eat the fruit, attend the gym, or read the magazine.
     Make use of this effect by referring to subscribers as members, emphasizing the self-concept clarity advantages at times the member will be considering whether to renew, and encouraging members to give unused items to friends.

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