WooCommerce Subscriptions Upsell: Boost Your Profits with Recurring Revenues

WooCommerce subscription upsell can help boost your revenue through subscription-based sales.

Moreover, subscription-based products allow you to add predictability to your revenue.

You can sell physical and digital products and services to your buyers at a recurring fee. There's no need to chase more and more traffic constantly; instead, you can maximize the value of each customer you acquire.

Implementing a WooCommerce subscription as an upsell in your sales strategy ensures increased order value and customer lifetime value through recurring payments.

In this post, we’ll share with you the best strategy to sell WooCommerce subscription-based products using one-click upsells. And without even forcing your customers.

Let’s start.

Note: We will use Sublium Subscriptions to create and manage subscription-based products. And to offer upsells, we will use FunnelKit Funnel Builder.

5 Reasons Why Subscriptions Are Good For Your Business

Subscription products are products that are billed on a recurring schedule like a weekly, monthly, or yearly cycle. If you haven't implemented subscriptions as upsell or cross-sell and are wondering whether they can help your business or not, here are 5 reasons why they are powerful:

1. Subscriptions are more profitable compared to one-time sales

As per the Marketing Landscape, a report published by Adweek, it is five times more expensive to acquire a new customer than to sell to the same one.

A one-time purchase might just barely cover what you spent to acquire that customer. A subscription, on the other hand, keeps generating revenue from that same customer long after you've broken even, making your acquisition spend far more profitable over time

2. Paid subscribers add predictability to your revenue

If you have subscribers paying you each month or even annually, you can count on them. And the best part is that you don’t have to make extra effort for this money.

You only have to ship the goods on time every time.

This predictability means that you can plan your marketing activities and upcoming expenses more accurately.

3. Your subscribers are your shield against growing competition

Let’s say a customer has subscribed to you for a pack of supplements that they need every month.

It’s obvious that as long as they’re subscribed and happy with your on-time delivery, they will not even consider going to your competition.

But a one-time buyer has no reason to be loyal to you. He’s open to exploring other choices for his next purchase.

There are no strings attached here.

4. Increase customer lifetime value and revenue 

Subscriptions increase customer lifetime value by ensuring regular revenue through recurring payments. 

Moreover, you can upsell and cross-sell to subscribed customers by offering them special deals and discounts that suit their interests and needs.

By implementing upselling and cross-selling strategies for subscription customers and recurring payments, you can boost their lifetime value, increasing revenue for your online store. 

5. Strengthen customer relationships and brand loyalty

A subscriber sticks with your brand, building a habit around your product. Take a coffee subscription, for example—if a customer enjoys your blend and gets it delivered hassle-free every month, they have no reason to look elsewhere. 

But a one-time buyer? They might try your coffee today and someone else’s tomorrow. No commitment, no loyalty.

Subscriptions Are Great, But Here’s Why You May Not Be Offering Them

Subscription is a great source of consistent and predictable revenue.

But here are a few reasons you still don't have them:

1. Don't know what to sell as a subscription

You may think it is hard to turn prospects into subscribers, but it's not.  You can mine for profitable subscription ideas by doing a bit of research. Take a look at Cratejoy - it's a marketplace for subscription-based products.

You'll be surprised to see what all is possible. From flowers to razors to beauty products and more!

For example, if you're a parent, you'd love to subscribe to this box of educational toys and games.

Each month, you'll have something amazing coming home and won't have to crack your brains over the next engaging game.

Dollar Shave Club grew to challenge the monopoly of Gillette by creating a subscription-based grooming brand. They offered low-dollar trials and a no-hassle cancellation policy to strengthen their case for subscriptions.

2. You're single-mindedly focused on one-time sales

Nobody starts by thinking about sustainability and profitability.

The impetus is always on more sales. And that’s not your fault:

Look at the number of blog posts teaching how to offer products to increase sales, but there's not so much discussion over retention.
Thanks to soaring acquisition costs, retention now makes for a smart investment.

3. You feel it’s hard to convince people to sign up as subscribers

While you may believe that it’s hard to convince people to sign up for subscriptions, think from the buyers’ perspective. They’re time-strapped and forgetful.

It’s hard for them to remember to reorder on time. It’s harder to find time on a busy day to go through the entire purchase process.

And if that product is a necessity, it’s hard to stay without it till the new one is ordered.

4. The real estate to convince them about the benefits

This a biggie! Your entire WooCommerce store is focused on one-time purchases. The job of the home page is to direct them to the product catalog.

And the call to action on the product pages is "Add to Cart". You don’t have the real estate to convince them about the benefits of subscribing.

And that’s okay!

The goal of your website is not supposed to be to sell subscriptions. The goal is to get them to make a small commitment by making a one-time purchase.

And once they’ve done that, sell a subscription.

How to Create a WooCommerce Subscription Product You Want to Upsell? 

As mentioned earlier, we will use Sublium Subscriptions to create the subscription product. This is a full-featured subscription plugin built for WooCommerce, covering everything from plan creation to payment flexibility.ommerce.

So, make sure you install and activate it. 

After activating both the free and premium versions of the plugin, we will create the subscription product. We will create a monthly subscription to organic coffee beans. 

Step 1: Add a product for your subscription plans 

For that, navigate to Product ⇒ Add New. Here, provide the product title, description, image, category, and all the necessary information. 

Note: Add the price, as this will be the one-time purchase price. 

Step 2: Set up a payment plans

Go to Sublium Subscriptions ⇒ Plans, then click the “Create Plan” button.

You will be presented with three plan types to choose from:

• Recurring
• Subscribe and Save
• Installments

For physical products, Subscribe and Save is recommended. For virtual product and services, go with recurring.

Step 3: Configure the subscription plans for the upsell offer

By default, Sublium Subscription adds a monthly plan. We will edit this option to create a monthly plan for the product we created. 

To start, hit the “edit” icon. 

Next, configure the following option:

• Frequency: How often the order is delivered and billed
• Interval: Billing cycle duration (e.g., 1 month, 15 days)
• Plan Name: Name of the subscription plan (e.g., “Monthly Subscription”)
• Discount Type: Choose a fixed amount or percentage discount
• Discount Value: Set the discount amount (e.g., 20%)
• Free Trial: Number of days before billing starts
• Sign-up Fee: Optional one-time fee (fixed or percentage)
• Expiry: Define when the subscription ends
• Pricing Breakdown: Shows plan details on the product page
• Additional Description: Extra info to explain the plan to customers

Make sure to enable the plan as well. 

You can add as many payment plans as you want, following the same process.

Step 4: Assign subscription plans to products 

Now move to the “Products” tab, search for the product, and add it.  Here, you can set any discount if you want.

Note: If you don’t want to offer a one-time purchase option, uncheck the option “Allow One Time Purchase”.

And make sure to hit “Save” to update. 

That’s it. Your upsell subscription product is ready. 

How to Sell WooCommerce Subscriptions to Boost Revenue?

If you use a sales funnel, then you can successfully sell a subscription product and also increase average order value by utilizing WooCommerce subscriptions upsell. 

And for the sales funnel, we will use FunnelKit Funnel Builder. 

With this popular WooCommerce plugin, you can create and customize different sales pages such as landing pages, opt-in pages, checkout pages, thank you pages, and so much more.

In addition, FunnelKit Funnel Builder also offers order bumps and one-click upsell. This makes the process of building funnels in WooCommerce a breeze -users can chalk out a path in a way that increases the AOV.

Before moving to the main process, you need to install and activate both FunnelKit Funnel Builder Free and the Pro versions.

Step 1: Create a sales funnel 

From the WordPress dashboard, navigate to FunnelKit ⇒ Funnels from the WordPress admin panel, and click the ‘Create New Funnel' button.

Now choose your favorite page builder. From the list of sales funnels, hover on the one you like and click on Preview. Here we are going with Livewire.

Now, choose whether you want a  single-page checkout or a multi-page checkout. 

After that, click on “Import This Funnel,” provide a name, and click on "Done" to import this sales funnel.

This will import a WooCommerce subscription funnel with three steps: Checkout, one-click upsell, and thank you page.

Step 2: Customize the checkout template 

Now it’s time to customize the checkout template. For that, first, click on the checkout step.

To design the template with Elementor, click on "Edit Template". Here you can update content on your checkout page.

To update any section, click on that section, and on the left panel, you can update the content as we have shown below:

Make sure to click on "Update" to save the changes.

Step 3 Add a product to the checkout page 

To add the main offer, move to the Products tab. Click on “Add Product,” search for the product, and add it. Finally, click on “Add Product” to add the main offer to your sales funnel.

We are here adding “Coffee Maker” as the base product, and later we will offer the product “ monthly subscription to coffee beans,” which was created as a WooCommerce subscription upsell. 

Offering discounts can be highly lucrative to the customers and convince them to purchase the product. With FunnelKit, you can offer discounts if you want. 

Don’t forget to click on “Save” to update.

With FunnelKit, you can offer an order bump with your main offer as well.

For more details, read our blog “How to Offer Order Bump on Checkout.”

Step 4: Customize the upsell template 

To customize the upsell template and add an upsell offer, come back to the sales funnel page and click on the "Offer" step.

Now to customize the content of the one-click upsell template, click on “Edit Template.”

Now you can customize the content, just as you did with the checkout page.

FunnelKit offers 10 upsell widgets that you can simply drag and drop to customize your upsell page. The widgets include an Accept button, Reject button, Accept Link, Reject Link, Offer Price, Product Image, and so on.

For more details, check the blog on Upsell funnel for WooCommerce.

Step 5: Add a WooCommerce subscription upsell

To add the offer, navigate to the 'Products' tab. Next, click on the 'Add Product' button. Just like you added products to the checkout page, add the product as an upsell.

We are going to add the WooCommerce subscription product we created earlier. Here, you can offer free shipping, update quantity, and add a discount if needed.

We are checking the "Skip" offer option, so if the product exists in the parent order, the upsell offer won't be shown to the customers.

Make sure to click on 'Save' to update the settings.

Here is a preview of the template:

Note: You can customize this page the same way you customize the checkout and upsell templates.

And that’s it.  Your sales funnel with WooCommerce subscription upsell is ready to earn you your desired revenue.

Frequently Asked Questions About Subscription Upsell in WooCommerce

Ready to Utilize WooCommerce Subscriptions Upsell?

Leveraging WooCommerce Subscriptions upsell funnels can be a game changer for businesses seeking to increase average order value.

Upselling delivers personalized offers for a better user experience, and WooCommerce subscriptions secure long term benefits through recurring payments.

With Sublium Subscriptions, you're not limited to one type of product or one type of plan. You can set up subscriptions for physical goods like coffee beans or skincare, as well as digital products and services like courses or memberships.

And instead of sticking to a single billing structure, you can offer multiple payment plans on the same product, whether that's Recurring, Subscribe and Save, or Installments, so customers can pick whichever option fits their budget and buying habits.

The combination of WooCommerce subscription upsell and sales funnels by FunnelKit is an effective way to move toward sustainable, recurring revenue growth.

FunnelKit Funnel Builder offers pre-built templates, which make the job of creating a sales funnel for WooCommerce subscription products super easy.

Moreover, this one-click upsell plugin ensures a smooth checkout experience by incorporating Google Address Autocomplete, Google and Apple Pay, and an enhanced phone field.

So, are you ready to utilize the power of WooCommerce subscription upsell and boost sales?

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