EDD Toolbox – Upgrade Encouragement

Licensing a digital product is nearly as important as its very creation. It represents the primary safety measure in terms of ownership and authorization, while also providing a legal bond between the client and the vendor. Basically, the very usability of the purchased digital product depends on validity of its licence. This validity can be determined by the vendor as a period of time; for example, a licence may last for a year, and needs to be renewed after its expiration. A licence can also represent a bundle, which can be dependent on a period of time as well. As a creator and seller of digital products, you are acquainted with the importance of a licence for your software, for it ensures a legal purchase and thus contributes to your business development.

The most practical type of licensing software is based on an upgrade plan. Your digital product can be anything that is licensed, whether it’s images, courses, plugins, templates, addons, e-books… Whatever piece of software your business entails, it is always a great strategy to offer a multitude of purchase options to your customers. You may attract them with a basic version of your product because of its practicality and agreeable price, but the goal is to encourage them to eventually get the best possible version.

Upgrade VS Licence

Upgrading a digital product is equally important for both the client and vendor. A client should have the best possible experience that a vendor can offer, and the vendor should make the most of their product for the sake of revenue and progress. It’s a win-win concept…although it doesn’t always work that way.

Customers can be drawn to the base version of your product as the most promoted one, with the easiest access and practical features, and they will enjoy its functionality and provided support. They may have chosen this „lesser“ version for several reasons: they have ignored the upgrade option, or they were indecisive about it because they weren’t familiar with your product enough to commit for a longer period of time, or perhaps they weren’t in a financial position to buy a better version at the time of purchase. But the longer they use your product and are happy with it, the more they will trust you and eventually will look for an upgrade.

When your clients decide to upgrade to a better version, they will be faced with a difficult choice: to pay the full price of the upgrade on top of their existing licence, or to wait for their current licence to expire. Seems unfair? Yes, it is, and not only to your clients, but to you as the vendor as well. A great majority of consumers will choose the latter option for its purchase fairness, which means less revenue in the long run for you and more inconvenience for them.

This is where you have the opportunity to reach out to your clients and provide the means for the aforementioned win-win.

Upgrade Encouragement

EDD Toolbox Team have developed a smart plugin specifically targeted towards encouraging your clients to make a better and more profitable choice: EDD Toolbox – Upgrade Encouragement. It is one of many fantastic plugins for the digital sales platform Easy Digital Downloads, which offers everything you might need for the development of your digital business. I would say „Look no further“, but you might actually do so just for the sake of comparison. EDD is praised across the web for its functionality, a variety of options for selling any kind of digital product, as well as flexibility and easy use.

Given the nature of Upgrade Encouragement, it is required to have the Software Licensing plugin from EDD family. Software Licensing provides exactly what it says, in the most practical and the most secure manner for your software, and it is considered as a vital part of EDD setup. Therefore, Upgrade Encouragement plugin is dependent on it as much as on the digital sales platform itself.

The main feature of EDD Toolbox – Upgrade Encouragement plugin is pricing flexibility. When we mentioned it’s smart, we weren’t kidding: the plugin will calculate the price of initially bought product in the moment the client is considering the upgrade, according to the time when its licence expires, and then subtract the unused period of the licence from the price of the upgrade. The resulting cost will always be accurate. That way, your client doesn’t have to wait for their current licence to expire and they can upgrade immediately – without unnecessarily overpaying the upgrade. This concept will encourage them to upgrade without the concern of wasting money, and your own revenue will grow because upgrades will be more frequent.

Your clients will be able to see this convenience when presented with an upgrade, because the plugin will immediately calculate the duration of their licence, subtract the remaining period of its duration from the price of the upgrade, and present a fair, correct cost. Their delight is certain, and it’s fairly possible that your store will be praised across the web, and thus attract more customers.

Aside from this fantastic and rather unique calculating system, EDD Toolbox – Upgrade Encouragement has many options for you to choose from, depending on your product and your desired approach to customer base. Whatever option you pick, the goal is always the same: help your clients by presenting them with a better opportunity. You can currently choose to present your extraordinary upgrade options via a Popup, an Email and Widget.

Popup

Upgrade Encouragement Popup is the first option, and the most popular choice among digital retailers. When your client returns to your website, most commonly for support, they will be greeted by this reminder. Being your clients already, it will certainly be something to consider.

When you open EDD Toolbox menu in your Dashboard and select the Upgrades page, it will immediately open the Popup setup. Here you can add your product and adjust how it will be presented to your clients.

You can give your popup a Name so you can distinguish it according to the product it represents. It will also have a Title that will be visible to clients, as well as a light, encouraging Message of your making for the best effect.

You are free to choose when the popup will be shown, whether merely one day after the purchase of the initial product, or perhaps a week – it is up to you entirely. Your client will be greeted by the popup at the desired time when they return to your website. You also have the option to choose how many times the popup will trigger on each page load, if you deem it necessary.

Depending on the number of upgrades you offer, you may show them all in the popup, or leave just one. This can be a preference if there is a certain upgrade you’re targeting and you wish to immediately show it to the client.

There is also an option for users to dismiss the popup forever, and you can turn it on by checking the designated box in your settings.

You are free to edit your saved popup settings at any time, or even delete them entirely on the Popup page of Upgrades Encouragement plugin.

Email

If you are not fond of popups, or perhaps you wish to add more encouragement to your clients, you are free to do so by generating a convenient email – a practical reminder, if you will. This option may be more subtle as something a client would expect from you, alongside newsletter.

You can create the Email Message at your leisure, with an appropriate Email Subject of your choosing. You are even free to Add Media as a quaint attachment that will support the message. All the available tags for email creation are listed on the Create New Email page beneath the email body, so you may be as detailed as necessary.

Scheduling this email is an important feature, and you may choose how many days will pass from the moment of purchase before your client receives the encouraging email. And finally, you are able to choose the Product in question.

This email will be listed with all the others on the Email page of the plugin, and you can change its content and all its details whenever you wish.

Widget

Another practical option to show convenient upgrades of your product is creating a neat widget that will be visible on your website – after your client had made their initial purchase. This means that it won’t show to new customers who are still browsing your store, because they will be introduced to your product in its full capacity, with all the upgrade options, from the get-go.

In the Appearance menu of your Dashboard you will find the Widgets page, and among the Available Widgets you will see the EDD Upgrade Encouragement widget. You can choose the positioning of your widget in the dropdown menu and then add it to your website. Depending on where you’ve positioned it, options will open up for you on the right side of the screen, where you can customize all the details of your upgrades: Title, Text, Download label, your Product, the Limit of shown upgrades, as well as upgrade details which you might wish to be hidden/shown, such as renewal price.

You can always return to your Widgets page and customize presented upgrade options, or even delete the widget entirely.

Future plans

Since Upgrade Encouragement is bound to be important for your business, EDD Toolbox Team are working on a few more options for this fantastic approach on upgrade presentation: Shortcode and Gutenberg block.

Shortcode will present upgrade options in articles, blog posts, widgets and template files, whereas Gutenberg block will be focused on article presentation.

Displaying the convenience of your upgrade offer is vital for building trust with your clients, as well as a great word-of-mouth effect that will certainly follow. You know your digital product is great, and it deserves equally great purchase options which will prove both profitable and motivating for your customer base.