| Weekly News Roundup |
| 1. Schibsted brings car subscription service Honk to Sweden – Dagens industri After a successful rollout in its native Norway during the second half of 2022, Schibsted has launched the car subscription marketplace Honk in Sweden, collecting and presenting car subscriptions from several different companies. “Prices vary depending on car model and binding period. The most flexible subscriptions cost from SEK 5,490 a month, and those that are tied to longer periods start at SEK 3,995. Both terms and prices are set by the suppliers themselves, but common to all subscriptions is that everything from tax to insurance, winter tires and service is included.” Read more 2. Meta to test monthly subscription service priced at $11.99 – Reuters Meta Platforms, owner of Facebook and Instagram, announced on Sunday that it is testing a monthly subscription service, called Meta Verified, which will let users verify their accounts using a government ID and get a blue badge. The service will initially be rolled out in Australia and New Zealand this week, with gradual launches in other countries to follow. “The subscription bundle for Instagram and Facebook, to be launched later this week, also includes extra protection against impersonation and will be priced starting at $11.99 per month on the web or $14.99 a month on Apple’s iOS system and Android.” Read more 3. Volvo Cars reboots car subscription service in California – Subscription Insider Volvo is bringing back their Care by Volvo car subscriptions to the state of California. The company originally launched in California in 2017 but suffered significant backlash from car dealers. The company is light on the details for the new offering, including pricing, terms and conditions. “The company said they are rolling out the car subscription service in California in response to drivers’ growing demand for simplicity and flexibility. With the Care by Volvo subscription service, drivers can choose whether to buy, finance, lease, or subscribe to a Volvo.” Read more 4. News publishers are wary of the new Bing chatbot’s media diet – Wired Microsoft’s new search interface for Bing, which is currently in trial mode, can serve up key information from articles, removing the need to click — and potentially undermine publisher business models, writes Wired. “Bing’s bot, based on technology behind OpenAI’s chatbot sensation ChatGPT, also neatly summarized a Wall Street Journal column on, well, ChatGPT, even though the newspaper’s content is generally behind a paywall.” Read more 5. Smartrr bags $10M for its customer experience approach to e-commerce subscriptions – Techcrunch Smartrr enables direct-to-consumer brands, focused on Shopify sellers for now, to offer customizable subscriptions and memberships and then for their customers to have a portal where they can more easily manage their subscriptions. Now it grabs $10 million in Series A funding. “[…] with Smartrr, brands can create recurring sales on their website, either through wholesale or e-commerce. The company’s “bread and butter” is advanced subscription offerings — think a monthly box, digital subscription or a membership to a clothing store that unlocks a closet of clothing that you can select from […]” Read more 6. The U.S. Congress wants to make it easier to cancel subscriptions – Business Insider Congress has tried twice already to make it easier for Americans to unsubscribe. Representative Mark Takano, a California Democrat, told Insider that he plans to reintroduce The Unsubscribe Act later this year. Consumer Action and National Consumers League have helped push the legislation in the past. “The bill would require companies to be upfront when they roll a free trial into a paid plan without expressly telling you, a practice known as negative option billing. The legislation would also require a company to offer a straightforward cancellation process. That would mean that a company that lets you subscribe via an app can’t then require you to come in person to cancel.” Read more Weekly Analysis Roundup 1. 166 Nordic SaaS companies: This is what we will focus on in 2023 – Breakit Monterro’s second annual benchmark report on Nordic B2B software business growth shows that the economic uncertainties have caused many Nordic SaaS companies to rethink. But most companies are still confident that growth will continue. “There is a greater focus on existing customers. It’s not just an aggressive expansion plan where lots of sales people are to be hired. I think that shines through clearly.” Read more 2. Gannett’s fresh onboarding process indicates new subscribers are more engaged – INMA Onboarding is where the fight to stop churn should start for any modern publisher, writes Phil Schroder, Head of Digital User Engagement at Gannett, detailing the media conglomerate’s revamped strategy for onboarding subscribers. “Not only do we use e-mail in our onboarding journey, but we also utilise social media in a unique way. We do not feed content to every new subscriber, but we specifically watch for any subscribers in their first 90 days who have not engaged in the last seven days.” Read more |
