# Boston Globe $3.99 rate after a $0.99 intro: most total revenue

- Outcome: Won
- Page type: Pricing page (SaaS)
- Elements: Pricing display, Plans
- Date shared: 2016-02
- Test run by: [MarketingExperiments](https://liftarchive.com/practitioners/marketingexperiments/)
- Commentary by: LiftArchive (our analysis, not theirs)
- Original source: https://marketingexperiments.com/a-b-testing/cut-through-kpis
- Page: https://liftarchive.com/test/boston-globe-regular-price-after-intro/

A $3.99 regular weekly rate after a $0.99 four-week intro produced the most total revenue for The Boston Globe's digital subscriptions, 163% more than the $4.99 rate. MarketingExperiments (MECLABS) ran the five-way price test and published it. The $0.99 control won on sign-ups and kept the most subscribers, so the winner depends on which metric you care about.

## Result

**most total revenue**

- Total revenue from test traffic: the $3.99 regular rate produced the most, 163% more than the $4.99 rate.
- Subscriptions: the $0.99 control won, and sign-ups fell with each step up in the regular rate. Higher prices cost subscribers.
- Cancellations: the lower the regular rate, the lower the cancellation rate after the intro period ended.
- Revenue per subscriber: the $4.99 rate was highest, but it brought in too few subscribers to win on total revenue.

## Control

A digital subscription with a $0.99 introductory rate for four weeks, then a regular weekly rate that also stayed at $0.99.

## Variant

The same $0.99 intro offer, then higher regular weekly rates across four treatments, up to $4.99. The $3.99 rate was the third treatment.

## Why it likely won (our reading)

- $3.99 seems to balance price and volume: high enough to earn more per subscriber, low enough to keep enough people signing up and staying.
- Because everyone saw the same $0.99 intro, the regular rate mainly shaped whether people subscribed and whether they cancelled later.
- Judging on sign-ups alone would have picked $0.99, which earned the least per subscriber.

## Caveats

Sample size and duration were not shared, and the exact figures appeared only in charts. The winner depends on the KPI: $0.99 won on sign-ups and retention, $4.99 on revenue per subscriber, and $3.99 on total revenue.

## How to run this test

- Hypothesis: If we raise the regular price that follows our intro offer, then total revenue from new visitors will rise up to a point because higher revenue per subscriber outweighs fewer sign-ups and more cancellations.
- Primary metric: Total revenue from test traffic over a fixed period
- Guardrail: Subscription start rate
- Guardrail: Cancellation rate after the intro period
- Guardrail: Revenue per subscriber
- Who should test it: Subscription businesses, including publishers and SaaS, that use an intro discount before the regular price. Tests like this need enough time to see renewals and cancellations, so they are hard for low-traffic products.

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Credit: MarketingExperiments ran this test and owns the result. Summary and commentary by LiftArchive (https://liftarchive.com/test/boston-globe-regular-price-after-intro/).
Usage: Free to use, quote and build on, with credit and a link: name the practitioner or organization that ran the test and link to its LiftArchive page. The results belong to the practitioners who ran and shared them; the summaries and commentary are LiftArchive's.