Subscription Services Within Healthie

Offering subscription services within your business is a strategic way to generate extra income for services you already provide, simply by bundling them together into a recurring package or program. Subscription services work well for both insurance-based and self-pay clients alike, so no matter the structure of your business, you can leverage them to add new clients and increase revenue. 

Within Healthie, you can build packages and programs that reoccur during a specified duration of time, as well as bill clients periodically. In this article, we will walk you through how to leverage Healthie features to create a subscription service strategy for your wellness business.

Types of Subscription Services You Can Offer

1. Recurring packages: Recurring packages allow your clients to commit to your health, and secure income from that client for a known period of time. You can create a package with a set number of appointments that a client can use per month, and their appointment credits restart every month.
2. Meal plan subscriptions: Meal plan subscriptions are an in-demand service for wellness clients; by offering them within your wellness business, you are likely to attract clients and generate a significant amount of passive income. Once created, a meal plan subscription service for clients requires little upkeep, as you can make small adjustments to the meal plan each week based on your client’s needs. Or, you can create templates ahead of time to use based on each client’s health and dietary goals.
3. Accountability Booster: Accountability booster services are a great way to generate income for services you’re likely already providing for your clients but not getting paid for your time. Many providers charge a monthly subscription fee to clients for services such as responding to chat messages or emails, commenting on journal entries, sending goal reminders, and other between appointment check-ins, in addition to the price of each appointment. Clients can receive an extra layer of support from you no matter where they are in their journey; but, subscription services can be especially beneficial for clients who have “graduated” from working with you directly, but would like some support as they transition to working on their health solo.  
4. Online programs: Rolling start online programs can help you generate passive income for your practice while supporting your clients’ health. You can easily build an educational program on specific topics, such as how to prepare meals, a new exercise program, the basics of how to manage a certain health condition, etc. Clients can purchase the program and work at their own pace through the modules, surveys, and activities.  Programs can last for multiple months, with associated recurring payments. 

How to Create a Subscription Service

Using Packages

Healthie’s Packages feature makes it easy to sell your subscription services, with billing cycles that occur:

• One time
• Weekly
• Biweekly
• Monthly
• Quarterly
• Yearly

When creating your package, you have the option to select the billing frequency, as well as the number of billing periods. For example, if you want to create a subscription service where clients pay monthly for just six months, you would select “Monthly” and make the number of billing periods “6.” 

Recurring payments are charged to your client based on the date that they purchased their package. For example, if they purchased a weekly recurring package on a Friday, they will be charged the following Friday automatically. Your client will automatically receive a confirmation email/receipt of their purchase after every transaction.

Within your package, you can include both appointments and a description of the other services you provide, like message support and journal reviews. 

Read more on creating and customizing your packages here. 

Using Programs

If you want to use Healthie Programs to create your subscription services, you will need to include the program you’ve created in a package. You can add a program to any existing client packages, or you can create a new package for your program. You can also offer your program along with a bundle of other services that you offer, or as a standalone service.  

When a client purchases that package from you, they will automatically be enrolled in the program. They will then get email notifications every time a new module is shared with them. 

Learn more about building client programs here. 

Pausing/Cancelling Subscription Services

Subscription services within Healthie enable payments to automatically charge to a client’s credit card on file, at a cadence determined by the provider. In lieu of cancelling a subscription service, providers can now “pause” recurring payments, leaving the option to continue in the future. 

To pause a recurring payment, navigate to your Payments tab, locate the recurring payment, click the menu and select “Pause Automatic Payments.” Payments can be manually resumed at any time, by revisiting the Payments tab and locating the payment, and selecting “Restart Automatic Payments.”

To fully cancel a subscription payment, navigate to the Payments tab once again, and select “Stop Payment” from the dropdown menu. 

Best Practices for Creating and Selling Subscription Services

1. Offer the first month free: A great way to get clients excited about signing up for subscription services is to offer the first month free. This offers clients the opportunity to understand what it is like to work with you, set their goals, and start making progress without any financial commitment. Once they understand the value of your services, they will be more inclined to pay and commit for a longer period of time. With Healthie, you can create a package and enable a different price for the first payment. You can select this option to make the first payment free, and then set the amount for subsequent payments for the rest of the package. 
2. Give clients a promo code: If offering a full month of subscription services at no cost is not financially feasible for your business, another option is to give clients a promo code to apply to their services. This again allows clients to work with you with less of a financial commitment, With Healthie, you can create custom promo codes for your packages. You can tailor a promo code to apply to some or all payments of a recurring package, and establish an expiration date in order to encourage time-sensitive sign ups for your services. Read more on promo codes within Healthie here. 
3. Be clear with what the service includes: When clients purchase your basic services, they are likely buying a single or multiple appointments for a set price that they can use over time. If you sell subscription services, you must be extremely clear with clients about what the package includes, the payment amounts and billing dates, and any other policies you want to communicate. For example, it’s important to set boundaries with clients for an accountability package; while you are offering between appointment support, this does not mean you answer chat messages at all hours of the day. With Healthie, you can write a detailed description of what is included in the package when creating it, as well as list out the included services. You can make it very clear to clients what they are paying for, and set boundaries for communications between provider and client.