Growing a subscription business takes more than turning on recurring payments. The merchants who scale successfully treat subscriptions as a system with four moving parts: how you acquire subscribers, how you retain them, how you recover failed payments, and how you grow revenue from the subscribers you already have. This article walks through the levers you can pull in each of these four areas, and maps them to the Loop features that help you act on them.
Before reading further, please note that the recommendations shared in this article are general best practices and do not constitute business advice. They are not tailored to your store, products, or markets, and should be evaluated and implemented at your discretion. Outcomes may vary, and Loop Subscriptions is not responsible for any negative business outcome resulting from the use of this information.
All numbers and percentages mentioned in this article are sample data and added only for educational purpose.
For personalised, business-specific guidance, please connect with your dedicated Loop Success Manager, available on the Loop Pro plan.
Where do I start?
Start by thinking about how I can increase my business. Is it the overall acquisition I need to target, or is it just the subscription I need to target? Since your one-time business is a segment covered by yourself, in this article, we are going to talk about the Subscription revenue.
Let's split the strategy into 3 parts:
Acquisition
Retention
Growth
Acquisition best practices
Acquisition is the first lever in subscription growth. The goal is to convert as many shoppers as possible into subscribers by structuring your offer well, surfacing it in the right places, and pulling one-time buyers into the subscription funnel.
Structure discounts in steps
A flat discount on subscriptions works, but a stepped discount tends to drive higher LTV. Start with a smaller discount and increase it over time, so subscribers have a reason to stay past their first few orders.
For example, in your selling plan you can set:
10% off the first 2 orders
15% off from the 3rd order onwards
To understand how to structure discounts on different selling plans in Loop, refer to the Selling plan guide
Convert one-time buyers with checkout links
If your one-time revenue is larger than your subscription revenue, your biggest acquisition opportunity is already in your existing customer list. You can check this in Loop admin > Analytics > Subscribers > Subscription vs non-subscription revenue.
Use checkout links inside reorder emails to nudge one-time buyers toward a subscription.
For example, 30 days after a purchase, you can send an email saying: "You might be running low. Place a one-time order now, or subscribe at 10% off and never worry about reordering again." The checkout link takes the customer directly to checkout with the subscription product and discount already applied.
Refer to the Checkout links guide to understand more
Optimize your widget
The widget is the subscribe-and-save block on your product page, and it is your biggest acquisition surface. A few defaults make a meaningful difference:
Default option selected: set this to Subscription so shoppers start in the subscription path
Purchase option order: display Subscription first
Selling plan description: add a short reassurance line such as "Pause, skip, or cancel anytime"
Design: widget design, colors, and dimensions all affect conversion. Navigate to Loop admin > Acquire > Widget to compare your widget against benchmarks and adjust settings that fit your brand.
Refer to the Widget configuration guide to understand more
Lower the barrier with trial subscriptions
A trial subscription lets new customers try your product before committing to a paid plan. You lower the barrier to entry with a free or reduced-cost first experience, then automatically transition them into a recurring subscription once the trial ends.
This works well for products where value becomes clear only after consistent use, like skincare, supplements, or curated boxes. Trial-to-paid customers also tend to retain longer since they've already experienced the product before their first full billing cycle.
Examples of trial subscriptions:
Skincare: 7-day free trial of a moisturizer before a monthly plan begins
Fitness app: 14-day free access to premium workouts before billing starts
Tea brand: First box free, then monthly charges for curated blends
Supplements: One-week trial pack before converting to a recurring order
Refer to the Trial subscripstions guide to understand more
Convert cart buyers with checkout upgrades
At checkout, customers who have added a one-time product to their cart can be shown the subscription option with the savings clearly highlighted, and upgraded with a single click. This turns a standard checkout moment into a low-friction subscription acquisition touchpoint.
For example, a customer buying a one-time bag of coffee at $24 can be shown a prompt at checkout: "Subscribe and save 15% - $20.40 per month. Cancel anytime." One click upgrades their order to a subscription without restarting the checkout flow.
Refer to the Checkout upgrades guide to understand more
Note: Checkout upgrades are only available for Shopify Plus stores.
Drive first orders with bundles
Bundles let you group products together at a discount and present the combined savings clearly against buying each item individually. This increases AOV on the first order and gives customers a stronger reason to subscribe, since they are getting more value per order than they would buying products separately.
For example, a haircare brand can offer a shampoo, conditioner, and scalp serum as a bundle at $55, while showing that it will cost $72 total if bought separately. Presented as a subscription with an additional 10% off, the perceived value is strong enough to convert customers who might otherwise pick up just one product.
Refer to the Bundles guide to understand more
Let customers build their own bundle
Loop's build your own bundle feature lets customers select their own combination of products and subscribe to that custom bundle on a recurring basis. This is a strong acquisition tool because it shifts the question from "should I subscribe" to "what should I put in my bundle," which is a lower-resistance decision.
Custom bundles work especially well for brands with large or varied catalogs where different customers have different needs. A coffee brand can let a subscriber pick 4 roasts per month from a catalog of 20. A pet nutrition brand can let owners build a monthly box of treats, supplements, and food based on their pet's size and preferences. Because the bundle is personalized, subscribers feel more ownership over it and are less likely to cancel.
Refer to the Build your own bundle guide to understand more
Retention best practices
Retention is where subscription businesses are won or lost. A subscriber you keep costs nothing to reacquire. The goal is to reduce churn at every stage of the subscriber lifecycle: before they disengage, at the moment they try to cancel, and after they have already left.
Proactive retention: subscribers who might churn later
These are subscribers who are still active but losing engagement. The goal is to give them reasons to stay before they ever consider cancelling. You can set up milestones, offer mystery rewards, or run streak-based incentives that reward consecutive billing cycles.
To set this up well:
Set up streaks. Streaks reward subscribers who complete consecutive billing cycles without skipping or pausing, automatically unlocking a gift or discount at a set milestone. With the help of Loop, you can easily setup streaks by navigating to Retain > Streaks > Create streak. To learn in detail, refer to the Streak guide
Set up flows. Flows let you automate retention actions based on subscriber behavior. You can use a pre-built order journey or rewards journey, or create your own flow from scratch. With the help of Loop, you can easily setup flows by navigating to Retain > Flows > Create flow. To learn in detail, refer to Flows guide
Give subscribers the ability to swap products. Product swaps let subscribers replace a product in their upcoming order with an alternative, keeping the subscription feeling fresh and reducing cancellations in case the subscriber is not happy with the current product. With the help of Loop, you can easily setup product swaps by navigating to Retain > Product swaps. To learn in detail, refer to Product swaps guide
Reactive retention: subscribers about to cancel
This is where cancellation flows do the heavy lifting. A cancellation flow is a configurable journey that triggers when a subscriber tries to cancel, giving you a chance to collect feedback and offer a targeted save.
To set this up well:
Set up your benefits page: This reminds the subscriber what they would lose by cancelling. You can use AI inside Loop to draft this page based on your brand and product. To learn in detail, refer to Benefits page guide
Turn cancellation reasons on, and enable treatment actions for each reason. For example, if a subscriber says "It's too expensive," trigger a 15% discount offer. If they say "I have too much product," offer a free order delay instead. To learn in detail, refer to Cancellation reasons guide
Offer discounts during cancellation. This is often a better place to spend your discount budget than acquisition, because the customer has already shown intent and proven they like your product. To learn in detail, refer to Cancellation offers guide
You can also pair a cancellation offer with a skip or delay action in the same save experience. For example: "10% off your next order, plus skip this one." This removes two objections at once and tends to outperform a discount-only offer on save rate.
For cancellation reasons where a conversation could change the outcome, Loop lets you route subscribers to live support through Gorgias or Siena directly from the cancellation flow. Navigate to Loop admin > Retain > Cancellation flows, then add a live chat step for high-intent cancellation reasons.
Incentivize customers to return
Once a customer has cancelled, the goal shifts to bringing them back. Use Loop campaigns to reach out to lapsed subscribers with targeted re-engagement offers. These campaigns are a normal part of subscription marketing, and they tend to outperform cold acquisition on cost per recovered subscriber because the customer has already bought from you before.
For example, 30 days after a cancellation, send a winback campaign offering 20% off their first reactivated order. Segment by cancellation reason so the offer addresses the actual reason they left. A subscriber who cancelled because of price responds better to a discount. A subscriber who cancelled because of product surplus responds better to a reduced frequency offer.
Monitor retention and churn metrics
Retention improvements you cannot measure are impossible to repeat. Loop's analytics dashboard gives you a full view of cancellation trends, save rates, and at-risk subscribers so you can make decisions based on data rather than instinct.
Navigate to Loop admin > Analytics > Cancellations to access three key views:
Overview: overall cancellation volume, churn rate trends, and cancellation reasons broken down by frequency
Saves: how many cancellations your flows intercepted, which offers performed best, and your overall save rate
Risk analysis: subscribers flagged as at-risk based on engagement signals, giving you a list to act on before they reach the cancellation page
Review these metrics at least once a month. If your save rate is declining, check which cancellation reasons are increasing and whether your treatment actions are still relevant.
Payment recovery
Failed payments are one of the most recoverable forms of churn, and Loop gives you two mechanisms to handle them automatically. A reasonable target is recovering around 20% of failed payments in a given month.
Recovery via retries
When a payment fails, Loop automatically retries the charge based on a schedule you configure. You set the number of attempts and the days between each retry, and Loop handles the rest. A useful range is 7 to 10 retries within a single billing cycle.
You can also configure what happens when all retries are exhausted: skip the payment and keep the subscription active, pause it, or cancel it. For hard declines, configure a separate action since retrying a hard decline rarely succeeds.
For example, a subscriber's card gets temporarily declined due to insufficient funds. Loop retries the charge 8 times over the next 20 days and succeeds on the 5th attempt, with the subscriber never knowing there was an issue. Navigate to Loop admin > Retain > Payment recovery > Retry settings to configure your setup.
Refer to the Recovery via retries guide to understand more
Recovery via backup payment method
A backup payment method is a secondary card saved to a subscriber's profile. When the primary card fails, Loop immediately retries on the backup card before falling back to the normal retry schedule on the primary. You can enable auto-configuration so Loop automatically assigns a backup card for any subscriber who already has more than one saved payment method, requiring zero action from the subscriber.
For example, a subscriber's primary Visa expires in November. Loop automatically charges their saved backup Mastercard on the next billing date, the subscription continues uninterrupted, and no failed payment email is ever sent.
Navigate to Loop admin > Retain > Payment recovery > Retry settings > Backup payment method to enable this.
Refer to the Recovery via backup payment method to understand more
Growth best practices
Once acquisition and retention are working, the next goal is to expand revenue per subscriber without increasing ad spend. Loop gives you tools to increase AOV, move subscribers to higher-value plans, and surface additional products at the right moment in the subscriber journey.
Upgrade subscribers to higher-value plans
An upgrade moves a subscriber from their current plan to one with a higher order value or better margins, such as a larger product size, a higher-frequency plan, or a premium tier. The best time to offer an upgrade is after a subscriber has completed a few billing cycles and shown they are happy with the product. Loop lets you trigger upgrade offers through Flows based on subscriber behavior.
For example, after a subscriber completes their 4th order of a 250g protein powder, a Flow automatically sends them an offer to upgrade to the 1kg size at a 12% discount. The subscriber saves more per gram, you increase AOV and reduce shipping frequency, and the offer feels like a reward rather than a sales push.
Navigate to Loop admin > Grow > Flows, then create a Flow with an order count trigger and a plan change action.
Refer to the Upgrades guide to understand more
Upsell additional products at the right moment
An upsell surfaces a complementary product to a subscriber at a moment when their purchase intent is already high, such as immediately after checkout or just before their next order processes. Unlike cold acquisition, upsells work because the customer already trusts your brand and has an active payment method on file.
Loop lets you configure post-purchase upsell offers that appear after a subscriber completes checkout.
For example, a subscriber who just placed a coffee subscription order is shown an offer for a bag of a new single-origin roast at 20% off, with a single-click accept. No new checkout is required, and the product is added to their next order automatically.
Navigate to Loop admin > Grow > Upsells to configure your upsell offers, set eligibility rules, and track acceptance rates by product and offer type.
Refer to the Upsell guide to understand more
Other ways to lift recurring revenue
Beyond the four core levers, there are a few additional features worth setting up. Each one removes a specific point of friction or unlocks a specific revenue moment.
Gift subscriptions
Gift subscriptions let existing customers introduce your brand to someone new by purchasing a subscription on their behalf. The gift recipient experiences your product for the gifted period, and at the end they are prompted to convert into a paying subscriber. Learn more
Quick actions
Quick actions are one-tap controls inside the customer portal. They cover most of the moments where a subscriber would otherwise contact support or cancel. The full list includes:
Recover failed payments: let subscribers update an expiring or failed payment method before the subscription is at risk.
Upsell or cross-sell: offer exclusive products and discounts directly from the portal.
Skip order: let subscribers skip an order instead of cancelling.
Order now: let subscribers pull forward their next order.
Swap: let subscribers swap products in their subscription.
Winback campaign: bring cancelled subscribers back with targeted offers.
Resume subscription: let paused subscribers restart with one tap.
Delay order: let subscribers push back their next order instead of cancelling.
Upgrade subscription: let subscribers move to a higher-value plan.
More quick actions are in active development.
Is that all?
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