The document discusses the advantages of adopting a subscription business model for mobile apps, highlighting its rapid growth and significant revenue potential. It provides insights on creating and managing auto-renewing subscriptions, including necessary technical setups and considerations around pricing, offers, and receipts management. Additionally, it covers the importance of understanding user experience and handling churn effectively.

1. App Store Subscriptions
Condensed Edition
Mark Pavlidis
mark@pavlidis.ca
mark@groksoftware.net
@mhp
TACOW Presentation
2019-05-14

2. Agenda
Why: Choose a Subscription Business Model?
Who: Am I To Know?
What: You need to know to get started?
How: Do you avoid some pain points?
Where: Are we having beers?

3. Why Choose Subscriptions?
• Fastest growing business model
on the App Store
• Over a 80% of all apps are free,
up from 67% in 2014
• Generated $10B in revenue in
2017, estimated $75B in 2022
App Store Revenue (%)
0
20
40
60
80
100
2010 2012 2015 2018
Paid Free+IAP Free+Subscrption

4. Why Choose Subscriptions?

5. Why Choose Subscriptions?

6. Why Choose Subscriptions?
PAID SUBSCRIPTION
Periodic impulse in revenue
Slow build to the sum of
the impulses every 3-4
months recurring
Launch
Apple Design Award
App Store Feature

7. Why Choose Subscriptions?
• Recurring Revenue
• Higher price points and fewer customers
• “Build meaningful relationships” with good customers
• Don’t hold back big features for new major versions
• Apple said so
• Everybody is doing it

8. Why Choose Subscriptions?
Are subscriptions right for me?
• Offering ongoing value
• Is the model right for the potential customers
• Do you have ongoing infrastructure costs
Popular Categories:
• Content, Utilities, Dating, Productivity, Creative

9. Who Am I To Know?
• First implemented Non-Renewing Subscriptions in 2011

11. Who Am I To Know?
• First implemented Non-Renewable Subscriptions in 2011
• Auto-renewing plans for Flixel hosting service in 2014
• Included the app unlock in 2015 before it was “legal”
• Worked around a number of limitations that have since been
added to the App Store (i.e., price changes)
• Lucky for you there are still lots of limitations and workarounds

12. What Are The Basics
• Create your Auto-renewing plans in App Store Connect
• Initiate StoreKit at launch and fetch products
• Show localized plans in-app with the conspicuous disclaimer
• ALWAYS END YOUR TRANSACTIONS
• Provide a mechanism to restore subscription and non-
consumable IAPs

13. Create Auto-Renewing IAP

14. Create Auto-Renewing IAP

15. Create Subscription Group

16. Subscription Groups
• Made up of subscriptions of different levels and durations
• Helps ensure multiple subscriptions are not active
• Rank the subscriptions in descending order by most access
• Ranking defines rules for upgrade, crossgrade, downgrade

17. Subscription Groups

18. Initiate StoreKit
func application(_ application: UIApplication,
didFinishLaunchingWithOptions launchOptions:
[UIApplication.LaunchOptionsKey: Any]?) -> Bool {
PurchaseController.shared.setup()
return true
}

19. Initiate StoreKit
class PurchaseController: NSObject {
func setup() {
// Register Observer
SKPaymentQueue.default().add(self)
}
func paymentQueue(_ queue: SKPaymentQueue, updatedTransactions
transactions: [SKPaymentTransaction]) {
//Handle transaction states here.
}
}

20. Fetch Products
func setup() {
// Register Observer
SKPaymentQueue.default().add(self)
// Register for product refresh
refreshObserver =
NotificationCenter.default.addObserver(forName:
UIApplication.didBecomeActiveNotification, object: nil,
queue: .main) { [weak self] note in
self?.fetchProducts()
}
}

21. Fetch Products
func fetchProducts() {
guard productsRequest == nil else { return }
//
productsRequest = SKProductsRequest(productIdentifiers:
productIdentifiers)
productsRequest?.delegate = self
productsRequest?.start()
}
}
extension PurchaseController: SKProductsRequestDelegate {
func productsRequest(_ request: SKProductsRequest, didReceive
response: SKProductsResponse) {
products = response.products
}
}

22. Localized Pricing
open class SKProduct : NSObject {
@available(iOS 3.0, *)
open var localizedDescription: String { get }
@available(iOS 3.0, *)
open var localizedTitle: String { get }
@available(iOS 3.0, *)
open var price: NSDecimalNumber { get }
@available(iOS 3.0, *)
open var priceLocale: Locale { get }

23. Localized Pricing
extension SKProduct {
/// - returns: The cost of the product formatted in the local
currency.
var regularPrice: String? {
let formatter = NumberFormatter()
formatter.numberStyle = .currency
formatter.locale = self.priceLocale
return formatter.string(from: self.price)
}
}

24. Display Localized Products

25. Conspicuous Disclaimer

26. Start Purchase
func purchase(_ product: SKProduct) {
let payment = SKPayment(product: product)
SKPaymentQueue.default().add(payment)
}

27. Purchase Completes
• Once the transaction state changes to .purchased you can
store the subscription transaction to unlock
• What about if a renewal occurs?
• What if the user deletes the app?
• What if you have more than one app or a web service?
• Can use the receipt instead of restoring the transactions

28. Complete Transactions
• Once verified on-device or sent the receipt to your server call
SKPaymentQueue.default().finishTransaction(_:)
• If you don’t StoreKit will keep posting the transaction
• Apple is more likely to refund the transaction if you don’t

29. let receiptURL = Bundle.main.appStoreReceiptURL
• Receipt is in PKCS Cryptographic Container & ASN.1 encoded
• Need to build a static OpenSSL, asn1c, etc to verify it
• Bundle Apple Root CA Certificate
• Not provided by Apple on purpose — no single point of failure
On-Device Receipt Validation

30. Server Side Receipt Validation
• If you can, have your server manage receipt verification
• Send the BASE64 binary encoded receipt data and store it
• Server sends it to Apple server that responds with JSON
payload of the receipt and a latest version of receipt data
• JSON includes additional information about subscription state

31. Server Side Receipt Validation
• If you have multiple apps/platforms you must use this method
• App Transport Security is required
• Different endpoints for Production and Sandbox environments
https://buy.itunes.apple.com/verifyReceipt
https://sandbox.itunes.apple.com/verifyReceipt
• Don’t call from the device
• Status code to indicate if you should use the other environment

32. Additional Receipt Fields
• auto_renew_status indicates if the customer has cancelled
• auto_renew_product_id renewal product could be different
• price_consent_status when you change the price
• is_in_billing_retry_period indicate past due to user
• expiration_intent is voluntary, billing, price increase, etc.
• original_transaction_id your primary key to the subscription

33. JSON Receipt Demo

34. Managing Server-to-Server
• Your server can receive push subscription status updates
• General App Information > Subscription Status URL
• Only one endpoint, so you have to forward sandbox requests
• Different data structure containing partial change data
• Delivery is not guaranteed
• Poll all receipts daily to ensure auto-renewal and cancelations are
synchronized

35. Ways to Increase Conversions
• Promoted In-App Purchases
• Auto-renewing Subscription Offers
• Introductory Offers
• NEW: Promotional Offers
• Handling Past Due user experience

36. Promoted IAPs
• Can promote up to 20 IAPs
• Give customers browsing the App Store a one-tap buy button
• Needs unique images
• Shows up in search results (n.b., ASO marketers)
• Another reason you need to initialize StoreKit at launch

37. Promoted IAPs
func paymentQueue(_ queue: SKPaymentQueue, shouldAddStorePayment
payment: SKPayment, for product: SKProduct) -> Bool
• Always return false now or risk rejection
• Hold on to the SKPayment
• Display Product, PRICE, and Conspicuous Disclaimer
• Have the user sign-in/up if necessary
• Then add the payment to the payment queue

39. Subscription Offers
Introductory Offers
• Free Trial, Pay as you go, Pay up front
• Unique by (Territory, Plan)
• Displayed on Promoted IAP on the App Store
• SKProduct.introductoryPrice

40. Subscription Offers

41. Subscription Offers
Promotional Offers
• Up to 10 offers per plan to existing or churned subscribers
• You decide which are shown
• Not displayed on the App Store — avoid IAP pollution
• Requires a server to determine eligibility & generate signature
• SKProduct.discounts

42. Past Due User Experience
• On-device or before last year you don’t know user is past due
• Apple used to cancel after 24 hours, now it is 60 days
• Up to you how to limit access
• Clearly inform the user that they are past due
• Show a button that opens
https://apps.apple.com/account/billing

43. How Do You Avoid Some Pain
• Cancelled is not what you think it means
• Converting a Paid app to Free+Subscription
• New App Auto-Renewing Subscription Propagation
• Have I mentioned the Conspicuous Disclaimer?

44. What “Cancelled” Means
• Another reason to poll nightly is that a transaction in the receipt
can change
• cancellation_date_ms, cancellation_reason
• Means refunded and you should remove access immediately

45. REALLY ?

46. How To Know If Churned
• On-device: if the latest transaction in the receipt end date is in
the past now
• Server-side : check pending_renewal_info for
expiration_intent

47. Converting Paid to Subscription

48. Converting Paid to Subscription
Sandbox
Prod iOS
Prod macOS

49. REALLY ?

50. New App with Subscriptions
• Turns out that auto-renewing subscriptions aren’t added to the
production environment until the app is live
• Most of the time this propagates to all stores quickly
• But…

51. New App with Subscriptions
Activation of the In-App Purchase identifiers may lag up to 48
hours following the activation of the application

52. REALLY ?

53. Conspicuous Disclaimer

54. Summary
Why: Choose a Subscription Business Model?
Who: Am I To Know?
What: You need to know to get started?
How: Do you avoid some pain points?

55. Available for consulting after
WWDC

56. References
• Auto-renewable Subscriptions
• In-App Purchase and Subscriptions
• Implementing Introductory Offers in Your App
• Implementing Subscription Offers
• IAP Propagation Critical Bug “Tech Note”

57. App Store Subscriptions
Condensed Edition
Mark Pavlidis
mark@pavlidis.ca
mark@groksoftware.net
@mhp
TACOW Presentation
2019-05-14