Welcome to Uscreen's Price Increase Playbook, designed to help you confidently increase your prices with new and existing members and generate more revenue in your business.
In this kit, you'll find helpful tips, best practices, and guidance on how to increase prices for new and/or existing members.
Let’s get started!
Table of Contents:
Foreword: Understanding your revenue levers and how to pull them
Our Recommendations: Uscreen’s recommended methods for increasing prices
5 Signs You’re Underpriced: The tell-tale signs that it’s time for a price increase
Tips from Find What Feels Good: Helpful insights from successful yoga membership CEO, Chris Sharpe
Pricing Benchmarks: How your pricing compares to top Uscreen creators based on niche, audience size, and Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR)
Pricing Best Practices: Tips for changing your prices as a seasoned membership owner or choosing your prices before you launch
How to Change Your Prices in the Admin Area: Instructions for changing your prices directly in the Admin Area
Communication Templates: Repurposable templates and guidance for communicating a pricing change
Foreword
There are three levers a business owner can pull to generate more revenue:
Acquisition: getting new paid members
Retention: keeping existing paid members as long as possible
Monetization: increasing revenue per paying member; charging the right price and updating prices as necessary
As a membership business owner, one of the more challenging aspects of starting and managing a membership can be choosing the “right” price. Even with all of the market research, coaching, and advice, creators may still find themselves struggling to price their membership based on the value they provide and their overall business goals.
Most often, we see creators look to other memberships to inform their pricing but many factors go into pricing:
Platform fees
Marketing costs
The value of the content
The value of your time
Additional business overhead
In this guide, you’ll find everything you need to increase prices for your new and/or existing members with confidence and ease.
Uscreen’s Price Increase Recommendations
If you’ve never changed your pricing before, the best place to start is by raising prices with your new members.
Through raising prices for new members, you’re able to test and find the price point that still allows for new acquisition while contributing to your overall business goals.
Once you’ve settled on a price you feel confident about, you can consider increasing prices for your existing members. When it comes to deciding whether or not to increase prices for new members and/or for existing members, you should re-evaluate your membership value and revenue goals.
There are two methods for increasing revenue through monetization:
Increase Prices for New Members Only: This method allows you to grandfather in your existing members, which can result in better retention. You can make this change relatively quickly within your Admin Area. By raising prices with new members, you can start to evaluate if the new price supports your goals and reflects your membership’s value.
The disadvantage to only increasing prices for new members is that you might not see immediate results. Acquisition takes time, and you need new members to join to see the effects of this increase. In fact, you will likely only see your full return when all of your members at the old pricing churn out.
PRO TIP: Clear communication is key to your members! You want your members to know that you aren’t increasing prices for them while still reiterating the increased value you provide.
Increasing Prices for New and Existing Members: Within this method, you can take one of three directions.
Option #1: Increase prices for both new and existing members at the same time.
This allows you to monetize your existing paid subscribers and new paid subscribers. You will likely see the results instantly. However, you may receive feedback from frustrated subscribers. Price changes are never easy and could result in some churn. That’s not always a bad thing though because it allows you to churn out any unengaged subscribers.
Option #2: Increase prices with new members first, wait a few months, then increase with existing members.
This option is recommended. By raising prices for new members, you’re able to see an impact and evaluate if you’re priced well according to your goals and the market. Once you’ve found a price point that supports your goals and reflects your membership’s value, you can choose to increase prices for existing members.
PRO TIP: Price increases are tough, but you can lessen the impact by approaching your price increase communications with empathy and reason. Explain why you’re increasing prices, remind them of the value you provide, and tell your members about what improvements they’ll see as a result.
Option #3: Increase prices for new members at a new amount and increase prices for existing members at a lesser amount.
For example, let’s say your membership is $9.99 right now. You increase your price for new members to $14.99 and decide to only increase the price for existing members to $12.99.
This option can foster loyalty while allowing you to see short-term and long-term increases in your revenue.
PRO TIP: With this method, we’d recommend keeping the existing member price increase at least $2 less than what new members are paying. This helps create the sense that you’re offering them a better deal while providing the same amount of value.
Additionally, Uscreen’s system supports grandfathered pricing plans, allowing some members to retain their original subscription rates even after new rates are introduced. This feature can help maintain loyalty and reduce churn among existing members.
Other Helpful Recommendations:
- Focus on increasing the price for new members if:
Your acquisition is efficient
You currently have a price advantage (i.e. you’re priced less than your competitors) or pricing is no longer the most important differentiator of your membership
You’re able to grandfather all existing customers without hurting your growth goals/finances
If you have never raised prices (or it’s been a few years since your last increase) and you need to better understand the impact of an increase
- Focus on increasing the price for existing customers if:
Acquisition is not your focus
You’ve struggled to maintain steady acquisition
Your retention has been steady or growing
*This approach is only recommended if you’ve increased new member pricing before and did not increase existing member pricing at that time.*
- Do both if:
You’re underpriced compared to competitors
OR you feel the perceived value of your work is lower than your current price
You’re struggling to grow exponentially or have hit a growth plateau
Your costs have increased
You plan to offer more value or have already added more value
Improving acquisition and retention won’t help you achieve your financial goals
In the following section, we’ll provide step-by-step instructions on how you can do this in their Uscreen Admin Area.
5 Signs You’re Underpriced
If you’re wondering whether your membership fees truly reflect the value you provide, you’re not alone. Sometimes, even the best creators don’t realize they’re not charging enough.
Charging too little or too much can limit your growth and make it harder to achieve your goals. So how do you know where you stand?
This guide will help you identify clear signs that your membership might be underpriced.
Tips from Find What Feels Good
Chris Sharpe, CEO of the yoga membership Find What Feels Good, discusses the intricacies of pricing strategy, emphasizing the importance of accessibility and value over competing on price.
Chris’ Top Tips:
Accessibility Over Exclusivity: Keep prices accessible to maintain a broad audience; value inclusivity over a high-priced, elite model.
Grandfathering Prices: [At FWFG] existing members retain their initial subscription rates, even after price increases, rewarding long-term loyalty and reducing churn.
Justifying Price Increases: Price adjustments should be framed as essential for business sustainability, not tied to specific events but rather overall value enhancement.
Communication Strategy: Clear, transparent communication about price changes is vital. These communications should focus on added value rather than the increase itself, to existing and new members.
Customer Value and Experience: The focus [for FWFG] remains on improving the user experience and offering additional value, which justifies the price increase.
Fear of Price Increases: The fear of increasing prices is often unfounded. Proper analysis and understanding of costs, value provided, and market position can guide appropriate pricing strategies.
Advice for Different Scales of Operations: For smaller creators, consider tiered pricing to introduce higher-value offerings without alienating existing customers.
Additional Ideas and Tactics
Tiered Pricing for Small Creators: This is a suggestion for creators who are considering price increases but are concerned about alienating their audience. You could consider introducing tiered pricing to offer additional value at higher price points without raising the base subscription fee. For example, a creator could offer a base monthly plan at $12.99 and introduce a premium plan at $24.99/mo which includes a live event each month.
Parasocial Content: Emphasize the value of increasing interactions within a membership platform, particularly for creators transitioning from platforms like YouTube. This approach is seen as significantly enhancing member value.
Communicating Future Improvements: Highlight upcoming improvements and new features to justify price increases. [At FWFG] we strive to ensure members are aware that the price increase is tied to enhancements that benefit them.
Aspirational Insights
Creators Often Undervalue Themselves: It’s common for creators to undervalue their work, leading to lower pricing than what is sustainable or reflective of the value provided. Creators need to recognize and communicate their value confidently.
Fear of Price Increases is Overstated: If you’re worried that price increases will lead to significant backlash or loss of business, let’s bust that myth! When done correctly (clear communication, value-focused, etc), price adjustments are generally well received, especially if the value proposition is clear.
Mindset Shift: A mindset shift may be needed to shift from fears related to pricing and value communication towards a more confident and value-centric approach.
These ideas and insights not only offer tactical advice on managing price increases but also encourage a philosophical shift in how you view your value and communicate with your audience.
Pricing Benchmarks
The following charts provide a view of pricing benchmarks across the industry, audience size, and Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR) of Uscreen’s top creators.
These benchmarks are meant to help you understand how your pricing compares to other Uscreen customers to identify any opportunities for a pricing change (increase/decrease).
This data is not prescriptive and is most useful when considering your platform and marketing costs, content value, and overall business goals.
By Industry:
By MRR:
By Audience Size (YouTube):
Pricing Best Practices
If you’re considering changing your pricing or are a new membership business owner deciding how to price, use the following practices to inform your strategy.
Give 30-Day Notice: If you’re increasing prices for your existing members, you should plan to give a 30-day notice as a best practice. This allows your members to plan accordingly and reach out with any questions they have.
No More Than One Price Increase Per Year: Avoid increasing your prices more than once per year. Too frequent price increases may cause your members to develop a lack of trust and could result in high churn.
Start with Monthly and Annual: If you’re stuck on what type of subscription plans you should offer, opt for monthly and annual. Monthly allows for members to commit with flexibility while annual memberships lock members in at a discounted rate and increase your membership’s lifetime value and retention.
Discount Annual: When pricing your annual subscription, we recommend offering two months free. For example, if your monthly subscription is $19.99, you could offer your annual subscription at $199.99.
Keep Your Best Members In Mind: As you iterate and improve your membership, keep your best members in mind. Who are the people who show up consistently to live events or comments in your community? Build your membership for them. The best way to find out what they want? Ask them!
Price in Increments of 5 and 10: Psychologically, people round up in their minds. For example, if your membership is priced at $13, your members are probably rounding up to $15, so you’re leaving money on the table by not pricing your membership at $14.99 or $15.
Use One-Off Content to Anchor: Your membership is built for generating recurring revenue, but that doesn’t mean you can’t or shouldn’t have one-off offerings. If you choose to incorporate one-off content or offerings, we recommend using them as a price anchor. This ultimately means pricing them so your membership feels like an irresistible offer! Learn more about price anchoring here and check out the following example:
You’re hosting a live event and you’re not sure what to price it. Your monthly subscription is $25/month and includes unlimited access to live events and the full catalog. Your annual subscription is $99/year and includes everything in the monthly as well as exclusive access to your community. Knowing that you want to motivate people to join your membership, you can price your live event at $15. It’s low enough to be enticing but high enough for people to consider paying the $25 for full access.
How to Change Your Prices in the Admin Area
Increasing prices for new members:
To increase prices for new members, follow these steps in your Admin Area:
In your Uscreen Admin Area, head to “Subscriptions.”
Once in “Subscriptions,” choose the subscription plan you want to update.
Click the three dots on the right side of that subscription plan and choose “Edit.”
Next, you’ll notice a “Change Price” button next to the subscription price. Click “Change Price.”
To adjust the subscription price for new members only, adjust the price in the price box then make sure “New members only” is selected.
To apply this change, click “Apply” in the top right corner.
For new subscribers, any pricing updates take immediate effect, meaning they will begin paying the updated subscription price from the point of sign-up.
The new pricing will automatically apply to all new members purchasing this plan. You can repeat these steps for any other plans you want to update.
Existing members will NOT be affected by this update. They will continue to be billed the price they originally signed up with.
Increasing prices for existing members:
To increase prices for new and existing members, follow these steps in your Admin Area:
In your Uscreen Admin Area, head to “Subscriptions.”
Once in “Subscriptions,” choose the subscription plan you want to update.
Click the three dots on the right side of that subscription plan and choose “Edit.”
Next, you’ll notice a “Change Price” button next to the subscription price. Click “Change Price.”
To adjust the subscription price for new and existing members, adjust the price in the price box then make sure “Active and new members” is selected.
6. Next, you’ll want to adjust the subject line and email body copy (see existing member Communication Template below). This is the email that will be sent to existing members making them aware of the price increase.
7. Once your email subject line and body copy have been updated, click “Apply” in the top right corner.
Increasing app plan pricing:
To update app plan pricing regardless of whether this will apply to new or existing members, please reach out to the OTT team to make them aware of this desired change.
Communication Templates
These templates are designed to give you a starting point as you draft your price increase communications. It is recommended that you use your best judgment when choosing what to include in your price increase emails.
NOTE: We recommend understanding your state’s price increase and price gouging laws before making any pricing change.
If increasing prices for new members only, use this:
Recommended Subject Line: [INSERT BUSINESS NAME] Update
Hi [INSERT CUSTOMER NAME],
You may have noticed some pricing changes on our website. We are reaching out to you today to share that these pricing changes only affect new members. You will continue to receive access at the rate you signed up with.
This change comes as [INSERT REASON FOR PRICING CHANGE (if applicable)].
Example: This change comes as we’ve made significant changes to the member experience.
TIP: Lead with value when sharing your reason for the price change. Think about the improvements you’ve made that benefit your members! |
Some of the changes that you’re able to enjoy at no additional cost include [INSERT EXAMPLES OF IMPROVEMENTS].
We are grateful that you have chosen [INSERT BUSINESS NAME] and promise to continue creating the best experience possible for you. If you have any questions, please reply to this email.
We look forward to making your experience great for years to come,
[INSERT YOUR NAME]
If increasing prices for existing members, use this:
Recommended Subject Line: Upcoming Changes to [INSERT BUSINESS NAME] plan
Dear [INSERT CUSTOMER NAME],
Thank you for being a member of [INSERT BUSINESS NAME]. We are reaching out today to share that your plan will be [INSERT NEW PRICE] beginning on [INSERT DATE].
This change comes as [INSERT REASON FOR PRICING CHANGE (if applicable)].
Example: This change comes as we’ve continued to make improvements to the [INSERT BUSINESS NAME] membership which includes regular live streams, an exclusive community, and a variety of brand new videos.
TIP: Lead with value when sharing your reason for the price change. Think about the improvements you’ve made that benefit your members! |
We are grateful that you have chosen [INSERT BUSINESS NAME] and promise to continue creating the best experience possible for you. If you have any questions about this change, please reach out.
We look forward to making your experience great for years to come,
[INSERT YOUR NAME]
If you’d like to manage your plan, please click here. [LINK TO WHERE THEY CAN MANAGE THEIR ACCOUNT]