Is it possible to have Ghost send an email reminding a member ‘your subscription expires in X days, renew now to keep access’ sort of thing?
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Take a look at Outpost. It does this, plus a bunch more stuff.
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Should really be in the core app, I think.
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Yeah, agreed. Support is quite good when you email them but it would be great if they had someone in here on the forums more regularly.
Yes, small staff, so I get it, but it would be good
I’m writing something to do the above via the Ghost API. but my general take is that should be the core app, given it’s a subscription-centric service.
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A friend who is smarter than me is helping put together a node.js script that will go through the member list and add a label to recently expired people so I know to email them
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Yeah, the API is solid, so it’s all doable. I just don’t like maintaining any more scripts than I need to.
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Question for you. If I want to create an email with a little video asking people to renew their subscription, do I create that as a post?
Do I have to create that right at the moment I want to email? Ideally, I’d like to create it, have it (essentially) invisible to everyone and then send it out from time to time based on expiration dates of subscriptions.
I guess the question is: can I create stock posts that get used and re-used as emails without those posts being available to anyone other than the people to whom they have been emailed?
I would not create that as post, even if that’s doable. I would instead create a custom .hbs template stored in /themes/partial that I emailed out based on a script that hit the API every day, checking who needs a reminder. Again, that should be in the core app, but that is essentially the approach I have taken.
You just used a lot of words that make me sad (b/c they remind me how little I know). custom .hbs template? /themes/partial – is this for self-hosted only? (I’m not self-hosted, should I be?)
Ah, sorry. So:
1/ Unless you know you want to be self-hosted, I wouldn’t. It will lintroduce new technical things you need to think about.
2/ Any dev here in the forums can help you create some custom code to do what you’re asking.
3/ The Outpost service does what you describe, but has a monthly service fee.
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If you’re using Stripe, reminders can be set in your Stripe subscription settings.
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I definitely recommend Outpost — Outpost Features — it’s not perfect (and, IMO it’s best to customize all the messaging, which takes time), but it mostly does everything that needs doing here as far as reminders. When things don’t work, the Outpost team is very responsive. It does cost something but I know they said they were looking at perhaps reducing the fee at some point. Others have said there are ways to do this free but I don’t personally have those skills.
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yes, through stripe!!! no need to outsource it.
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You can do it through Stripe, but Outpost does this and much more.
Send a reminder of auto renewal 45 days before as required by some states
Send one 7 days before to comply with other states
Send a special renewal offer to those who cancelled auto renewal close to expiration
Send an email confirming that someone turned off auto renewal long before auto renewal without giving a special offer
Send a set of welcome flow emails with unique offers to increase conversion
Send emails to people whose auto renewal payments failed because the credit card isn’t valid anymore
You make more with this kind of service than without