Beagle - 5:31 pm on Sep 27, 2006 (gmt 0)

There are some automatic renewals that I appreciate as a customer because they give me one less thing to do, but they always have two things in common: I specifically signed up for automatic renewal (it was opt-in, not opt-out), and I get an email a week or so ahead of time reminding me of the renewal and saying that unless I tell them otherwise, my account will be billed on [date] etc., so I have a chance to cancel if I want before my account is billed (which saves charge-backs and, hopefully, angry members).

Regarding the "stripping the site dry" problem, do you contact non-renewing members 6 months or a year later to remind them you're there and that you have a lot of new content? Or would that be seen as spamming? [ETA: andye's suggestion of snail mail reminders might be an idea for this.]

You say you could increase your level of new materials - IMVHO this would be essential to get renewals. Not just more new materials, but also more frequent additions (even if that means slightly decreasing the amount you add each time). They have to be afraid they'll miss something if they don't renew.

[edited by: Beagle at 5:37 pm (utc) on Sep. 27, 2006]