5. Next steps for ecommerce merchants

Ecommerce subscription success lies in long-term customer relationships.

Innovative brands are pivoting from acquisition-focused growth to retention-centered sustainability. Working within this evolving landscape depends on flexibility, personalization, and security. With that reality in mind, technology integration increasingly separates subscription leaders from laggards. Advanced merchants are leveraging artificial intelligence for personalized engagement and churn prediction while simplifying operations through integrated subscription management platforms.

Subscriber acquisition rates dropped from 4.1% (2021) to 2.8% (2024), underscoring the critical shift towards retention-focused strategies

— 2025 State of Subscriptions, Recurly

There are four essential areas every ecommerce subscription business can address in 2025, including:

Logistics and inventory challenges: Physical product subscriptions face logistics complexities, inventory management hurdles, and fluctuating fulfillment costs. None of this precludes meeting customer expectations around flexibility and personalization.

First-month experience is critical: For product subscriptions, the first 30 days demand seamless delivery, proactive communication, and evident, immediate value.

Subscription pausing is essential: Pause options retain 51.7% of customers who might otherwise permanently cancel their physical product subscriptions.

Payment fraud creates barriers: Traditional methods show high decline rates (48.2% for debit cards at signup). In comparison, alternative payment methods demonstrate significantly lower fraud rates (just 1.4%).

For ecommerce subscription brands that embrace these trends and implement the tactical approaches we’ve considered, meeting evolving consumer expectations and driving growth becomes a critical differentiator. As marketplace competition increases, that difference will be a deciding factor in revenue, retention, loyalty, and more.

sales@recurly.com

+1.844.732.8759

recurly.com