Paywall A/B Experiments for Optimizing In-App Revenue for Fitness apps

Improving paywalls can quickly boost the revenue of subscription apps. But how can you create a mobile paywall that convinces people to subscribe? How to choose the right price for subscriptions? What subscription duration should you offer? How to test different paywall design elements, explain the value of the features, and choose trial options?

In this article, we explore the best practices for creating paywalls for fitness apps. We also give you some benchmarks and examples to help you optimize your subscription strategy.

The Paywall in an Engine for Growth & Retention

Paywalls play a vital role not only in app growth but also in retention, particularly for subscription-based apps. The key to effective retention lies in leveraging individual-level subscriber data to enhance the user experience. This means that your external marketing channels, in-app experience, and everything in-between should have consistent information about a user’s subscription journey. 

The Role of A/B Testing

Paywalls in different app categories often exhibit similar features that work well within their specific niche. By analyzing the pricing strategies, trial offers, and subscription durations of your competitors, you’ll notice that the most successful apps often follow certain patterns. While directly copying their paywalls may not be the ideal approach, drawing inspiration and ideas from relevant products can be highly valuable.

If you think the conversion rates of your app users into subscribers is low and not sure about the reasons, it’s worth considering the implementation of paywall A/B testing experimentation. This approach allows you to create an iterative development process by continuously refining your product based on the experiment’s results. The benefits of conducting A/B testing for paywalls include:

1. Increased trial start rate: A well-optimized paywall can encourage more users to start a trial by effectively communicating the value and benefits of your subscription offering.
2. Improved trial-to-paid conversion rate: A/B testing enables you to experiment with different variations of your paywall design, pricing, and trial offers, helping you identify the most effective combination to convert trial users into paying subscribers.
3. Increased customer lifetime value (LTV): Through A/B testing, you can uncover tactics that lead to higher customer LTV, such as optimizing pricing tiers or upselling premium features.

By organizing A/B experiments specifically targeting your paywall, you can gather valuable insights and make data-driven decisions to improve the performance of your in-app subscriptions, ultimately leading to better user engagement, higher conversion rates, and increased revenue.

Optimize In-app Subscription Paywalls for Fitness Apps

Let’s dive into an examination of paywalls within the Fitness app space by exploring the paywall implementations of the top fitness apps.

There are several common features you can easily notice in these top 6 fitness apps paywalls:

• The average price is about 30 euro/year 
• 7-day free trial offer
• At least 2 subscription plans – monthly and annual   

At the same time, we see a growing trend in this category where paywalls are designed as long landing pages and include:

• The value proposition
• Social Proof
• Several Pricing Options 
• At least 2 CTA buttons sections

AllTrails Paywall A/B Experiments 

In the screenshots below, you can observe the evolution of the AllTrails app paywalls. It is likely that, as a result of A/B testing sequences, they expanded their paywall and incorporated a well-known trial subscription description inspired by Blinkist. The paywall includes an explanation of the trial, a value proposition, and plans comparison. The price remained unchanged.

JustFit Paywall A/B Experiments 

The 2023 paywall of the JustFit app has undergone significant changes compared to the previous version. They have shifted their focus in the illustration towards a scientific approach to fitness, highlighting the action taken rather than just the end result as before.

Furthermore, there have been modifications to the pricing and offering strategy. However, the overall structure of the paywall remained consistent.

Bend Paywall A/B Experiments 

Similar to AllTrails, Bend has expanded its paywall to a much longer version. With these changes, they have taken the opportunity to explain their value proposition in more detail, incorporate social proof, introduce custom offers, and modify their pricing.

Sweatcoin Paywall A/B Experiments 

In comparison to the 2022 paywall, Sweatcoin has made several updates to its paywall in 2023. They have introduced a new monthly plan option to the paywall, providing users with more flexibility in their subscription choices. Additionally, they have made changes to the call-to-action (CTA). Furthermore, they have emphasized in greater detail the benefits that users get with the premium plan.

Home Workout Paywall A/B Experiments 

The Home Workout app has significantly expanded its paywall compared to the previous version. This expansion allowed them to provide more detailed explanations of the app’s features, giving users a better understanding of what they can expect. Additionally, they have made adjustments to the pricing, possibly to align with the enhanced value proposition presented in the paywall.

Gym Workout Planner Paywall A/B Experiments 

The paywall of this app is reminiscent of a full landing page, as it encompasses various elements such as social proof, feature descriptions, plan comparisons, and frequently asked questions (FAQs). It provides users with a comprehensive overview of what the app offers and addresses potential queries they may have. Additionally, there have been slight adjustments to the pricing.

Conclusion

We have explored the paywalls of the most popular Fitness apps on the App Store. These apps experiment with paywall length, pricing strategies, call to actions, and subscription offers. Remember, the power of paywall experimentation lies in its ability to drive revenue and enhance the user experience. Embrace the opportunity to continually refine your paywall strategy, drawing inspiration from the provided examples. 

To run paywall A/B testing for subscription apps effectively you do need the right set of tools. Subscription monetization model adds complexity to A/B testing, as you need to have accurate analytics and be able to accurately track trial conversions and subscription renewals to make any conclusions. We at Qonvesion have built the A/B testing tool specifically designed for mobile apps monetizing with subscriptions. Conducting A/B experiments with Qonversion is straightforward and easy to set up.You have flexible targeting and segmentation options and a set of metrics to track. The results of A/B testing are easy to understand as they are powered by the analytics built specifically for the subscription model. Should you have any questions or need guidance on launching A/B experiments for a subscription app, do not hesitate to reach out to us.

Additionally, we have launched the fastest A/B paywall experimentation framework. Discover how to conduct paywall experiments for subscription apps in the most straightforward way.