How to Run a Successful Shopify Black Friday/Cyber Monday Campaign that Captures New, First-time Subscribers 

Black Friday and Cyber Monday (BFCM) are the largest holiday shopping events of the year. During this high-traffic online shopping occasion, Shopify eCommerce brands see an increase in site traffic and sales—that is, with the right acquisition strategy. 

Alongside new first-time purchasers, the most effective way to drive revenue growth on Black Friday and Cyber Monday is by running a successful campaign that captures first-time subscribers. By converting new subscribers during Black Friday and Cyber Monday, your brand sets the foundation for recurring revenue throughout the holiday season and into the new year.

In this article, our retention and subscription experts unpack tested, winning strategies that will help your eCommerce business run a successful Black Friday & Cyber Monday promotion to capture new subscribers and increase your DTC recurring revenue. 

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Strategies to Successfully Capture New Subscribers during Black Friday/Cyber Monday 

Strategy #1: Offer Flexible Bundle Options

Bundles are a great way to increase AOV, especially around Black Friday and Cyber Monday. We’ve seen brands succeed using high-priced bundles that include limited-edition products or complimentary add-ons. These entry bundles create high initial orders, and then brands can roll those customers into subscriptions. 

But beyond the traditional bundle, we recommend build-your-own bundles that offer increased flexibility, personalization, and value for customers looking to try several new products, and who will appreciate the added small discount for buying multiple products. Increased flexibility in your bundling offers also makes customers much more likely to stick around for a subscription. 

Here are a few different bundling strategies we love from Stay merchants – 

(1) Trial or Starter Kits that Roll into a Subscription

Hook customers by offering trial kits that seamlessly roll over into a full subscription, sprinkled with personalized tips and exclusive sneak peeks. Bundle everything your customers need to get started, then leverage workflow automation to switch buyers to a regular subscription shipment after the trial period ends.

Tenzo uses a trial-to-subscription offer to ensure first-time matcha makers are fully equipped to make their matcha before rolling into a simpler restock subscription.

(2) Build-Your-Own Bundles

When items are bundled, customers feel like they’re getting a sweet deal, even if the discount isn’t massive. With build-your-own bundles, shoppers can customize their bundle exactly how they want, whether it’s different sizes, flavors, or delivery cadence. The more they can customize, the happier they’ll be — and much less likely to churn.

When customers have different size, flavor, and frequency options, they need a more customizable bundle for exactly the shipment they want — and to easily adjust when their needs change.

Grinds makes it easy for subscribers to choose specific flavors and quantities of their caffeine pouches so that they can create exactly the variety of flavors they want each month. This flexibility contributed to Grinds’ 22% increase in three-month retention rate and 48% surge in subscription revenue.

Pro Tip: Be sure your bundling strategy fits your audience. Large bundles with a high price tag may not be the right call for every brand. While they can increase AOV in the short term, they can also lead to churn if subscribers start feeling like they can’t justify the recurring cost. A bundle-builder can be a good solution since your consumers can create their own bundle with a price point they’re comfortable with. For more strategies around bundling, click here.

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Strategy #2: Create Winning Welcome Offers & High-Converting Buy Boxes

Optimizing your welcome offers and buy boxes are just a few of the many ways you can entice new customers to subscribe. By exposing customers to your subscription program’s value at a glance, you can encourage them to opt for recurring orders over a one-time purchase.

Graza, aka DTC’s favorite olive oil brand, is serving a buy box that’s as smart as their internet-loved squeezable bottles. With a subtle nudge toward quantity, Graza arranges their quantity options to make bulk buys extra tempting — marrying free shipping with sweet savings.

The drop-down delivery frequency menu puts options right at their fingertips so they can tailor their delivery schedule to their unique needs.

For 8 additional high-converting buy box examples from top Shopify eCommerce brands, click here.

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Strategy #3: Offer an Exclusive, One-time Subscription Discount

The least complicated way to run a successful sitewide sale on Black Friday/Cyber Monday that captures new subscribers is with a boosted subscription offer that increases your usual subscription incentive or discount offer by stacking it with an additional, one-time discount code.

Last year, our friends at Vita Coco leveraged an in-portal banner ad to announce and offer a subscriber-exclusive discount on customers’ upcoming orders during BFCM. Take a look:

For a detailed breakdown of how to create one-time subscription discounts during Black Friday and Cyber Monday, read more here.

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Strategy #4: Offer an Exclusive Subscriber Discount by Updating Your Selling Plan

The second approach your brand can take to offer new subscribers a greater deal is to change your Selling Plan to a higher discount (ie. 30% versus your usual 15%), and once the promotion is over, change it back to 15%. The caveat here is that subscribers who first purchased during your sale will be grandfathered into that 30% deal indefinitely.

This option is great if you want to offer new subscribers an indefinite rate at your current promotional discount. However, if you ever intend to switch these subscribers back to your typical subscription discount (ie. 15% off), you would need to implement a workflow or two that could end up being a nightmare depending on the size of your SKU catalog.

For more information on updating your Selling Plan around Black Friday/Cyber Monday, read more here.

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Looking for More Black Friday/Cyber Monday Strategies?

Looking for additional Black Friday/Cyber Monday resources to ensure your Shopify subscription brand is ready to scale this year? We’ve got you covered – our team analyzed 300 #Shopify subscription programs to bring you winning BFCM strategies guaranteed to give you the revenue boost you’re looking for this year, all in one convenient (and free) 2024 Ultimate BFCM Playbook.

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