Announce the price rise for new customers, with a date, before you raise it
Before raising your price, email trial users and free accounts that the price rises for new customers on a fixed date, and that anyone who subscribes before then keeps today’s price. The date turns a vague "later" into a decision, existing customers stay on their old price, and you learn at once whether the new price holds.
By The Marketinque TeamReviewed November 2026
BackedAt least one source behind this play is a platform’s own documentation, a law, a study or a dataset that we read in full, or a checked claim supports it.
In the wiki: Pricing, paywalls and payments · Email, newsletters and lifecycle
The play
Decide the new price, pick a date about thirty days out, and email everyone on the list who has not paid yet: the price goes up for new customers on that date, and anyone who subscribes before it keeps today’s price. Existing customers get a separate note saying nothing changes for them.
How to run it
- Create the new price as a new price object in your billing tool and keep the old one live until the date; in Stripe an existing price amount cannot be edited, so this is the normal path.
- Email non-paying accounts once: the new price, the date, and that subscribing before it locks the current price. Send one reminder three days before.
- Email paying customers separately that their price does not change.
- On the date, switch the pricing page and checkout to the new price and archive the old one for new purchases only.
Watch out for
- Only announce a rise you will actually make on that date; a deadline that moves once is never believed again.
- Keep every existing subscriber on the price they signed up at unless you tell them otherwise in a separate, earlier email.
- One reminder, not a countdown sequence; urgency you manufacture reads as a sales tactic.
Best for
Plays like this one
- Reply in person to every cancellation reason within a dayMake the billing portal ask why a customer is cancelling, then have the founder reply personally to each answer within a day: a pause or smaller plan for price, an honest date for a missing feature, a question for a lost comparison. Some come back, and the reasons, counted monthly, tell you what to fix next.
- The first-value email: one action, one link, on signup daySend every new signup one email on day zero that names the single action after which your product is worth using, links straight to where they take it, and says how long it takes. A welcome email that lists features spreads attention thin; one that points at the first win gets it done, and the rest of onboarding follows.
- The month-two email: what to do when the quick wins are doneAround week five, email customers the habit or feature that keeps paying off once setup is done, with one concrete example of it working. Usage quietly drops in the second month when the first wins are behind people; an email that hands them the next level of value gives them a reason to keep the tab open.
- "What we shipped, what we learned" — a changelog with a pulseSend a recurring "what we shipped and what we learned" issue: the changes, the reasoning, one honest miss, one lesson. Customers get a reason to log back in, prospects get visible momentum, and the archive becomes public proof the product is alive — the cheapest retention email you’ll ever write.
Sources
- Stripe Docs: manage products and prices (read in full)
Compiled by The Marketinque Team to our editorial standards.