Subscribed: Why The Subscription Model Will Be Your Company’s Future – And What To Do About It – Book Review

After reading through different books on training soft skills and professional skills needed for my career development, I realized that almost no one has written books about Marketing anymore.

Marketing is not dead, it must be. However, if I say a book about how to create an advertising banner, or guide from A to Z to make a 30-second promotional video so eye-catching is Marketing, I think that’s not true. Marketers always day-to-day face the challenges of how the journey of consumer experience goes smoothly, from online to offline. Therefore, books that mention these experiences often stir up and do not bring much value to Marketing people, when what they need today is a different way of thinking, rather than different tricks. In the worth, reading books of 2018, only one book has the marketing word in the title, and ironically, it is behind the “killing” word. The book Killing Marketing is also another interesting story about a CEO’s with Content Marketing perspective in his business model.

So what replaces Marketing? Is it a diversion into the customer experience to attract attention and increase revenue for businesses? Tien Tzuo, the author of Subscribed: Why the Subscription Model Will Be The Future – and What to Do About It, explains: “I think everyone would agree that brands are still very important, but today you communicate your brand through experiences, not ads.” In the subscription model mentioned by the author, Marketing is not an added part after you have thought about the main things in your business model – Marketing is the core part of this model.

Tzuo is the founder and CEO of Zuora, a software development company that helps businesses manage their subscribers. At some point, the book is a valuable guideline that companies can take advantage of to develop their services. Subscribed, though did not mention much about the growth of the subscription model. But if readers pay close attention, they will see this model has been surprisingly recent breakthroughs. In the past, subscriber models were only encapsulated in magazines, newspapers and book clubs. However, currently, users also subscribe to makeup (Birchbox), razor (Dollar Shave Club), clothes (Stitch Fix), food (HelloFresh), flight (Surf Air) and countless digital services like graphic design (Adobe), movie entertainment (Netflix) and music (Spotify, Apple Music).

Exhibit: Tien Tzuo and companies will become the future of the service industry

The benefits of this business model are clear. You can get a razor without having to order, customized recipes for your family’s diet and taste. Or simply Son Tung M-TP’s latest song will appear in your playlist instantly and quickly. These benefits are very difficult to resist.

However, the user benefits will be nothing compared to what the company has received: The constantly updated data stream enables the company to personalize its services to customers, creating a closer relationship with them, and therefore generating a rapidly growing revenue stream for businesses. The subscription model also allows enterprises who only focused on selling products in previous generations that can be converted into a more modern model, in which service provision is the advantage.

Of all the books related to Marketing in the recent period, Subscribed is the first book to be serious when discussing this new type of business and how it affects the development of enterprise. Tzuo dedicated a chapter to show what needs to be changed in accounting practices from subscription services to the company’s annual net sales and how to predict this kind of revenue in the coming years. This idea is really groundbreaking and helps the Sales and Marketing team of businesses can understand their expectations about this model, thereby helping them understand that: This whole business model company depends on the future relationship of businesses and subscribers, not based on the number of products sold annually. Since then Tzuo has partly supported the marketing and customer experience story that will be the core of this business model and the survival of the business.

After all, the interesting thing that the book offers is a lesson about this growing business model for its marketing directors and experts. If they accept the fact that Marketing is no longer merely advertising and the values ​​that advertising is bringing less and less, then new forms are what they need to recognize and apply to bring certain effects for businesses. Book information and how to order books can be found here.

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