Subscriptions are taking over the world, but it can often be a challenge for smaller e-commerce sites to add and service this new sector on top of their existing business, Upscribe is here to fill that niche for Shopify shops and other e-commerce platforms. We talk with Dileepan Siva, founder and CEO, about what he’s building, the e-commerce landscape, and how to reduce churn and increase loyalty through smarter subscription offerings.

About Dileepan Siva:Dileepan grew up across three continents and four countries before the age of ten. His dream job growing up was to be the UN Secretary General. After graduating from UC Berkeley and getting an MBA from Harvard, he went on to be an advisor for the US and UN in war-torn countries.

After his time in government and politics, he moved to consulting and tech operations at Ebay, and Twitter, before becoming a founder for himself. Upscribe was founded in 2019 and recently closed a $4M seed round lead by Uncork Capital.

In this episode we discuss:

01:24 The evolution of the subscription economy

03:09 What has caused the shift to subscriptions?

06:13 The technologies that have helped enable subscriptions

08:25 How companies can start into subscriptions

10:27 Why Shopify and CAC has changed the game in e-commerce

12:15 How non-SaaS businesses can implement subscriptions

13:52 Why subscriptions are not just yesterday’s box companies

15:25 What is the best strategy for pricing your subscriptions

17:24 Why bundling is so important to e-commerce

19:21 The importance of data and personalized marketing with subscription

21:18 How companies should think about retention in relation to growth

24:05 Dileepan’s best advice for a company just starting a subscription service

26:18 Targeting data that Upscribe uses to upsell customers

27:22 Why smart subscriptions is a good idea

29:14 The decision to take on funding from Uncork

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