Gas prices aren’t the only expenses rising these days. From hosting, to subscription fees, to advertising, website owners are spending more to keep their businesses afloat today than ever. And as much as we don’t like to think about it as consumers, as businesspeople we know that those extra costs usually end up getting passed along to our customers.

But as a new MarketingSherpa case study points out, that doesn’t have to impact your business. In fact, one website was able to increase the cost of their subscription service by 60% and achieve a 19% increase in subscribers.

So how’d they do it? By approaching the situation using the following 5 strategies, PreachingToday.com got the best of both worlds:

1. Add new premium features
2. Improve internal search/browsing functions
3. Repackage content & cross promotion
4. Incorporate Web 2.0 features
5. Lift annual subscriptions with add-ons

In a nutshell, they increased the service they were offering to match the new subscription price without increasing their overhead. The new premium features, improved search and navigation, and Web 2.0 features were all part of a general site overhaul. But they also added additional value to the premium membership.

Cross promotion can also help just about any web-based business and doesn’t have to cost a lot (or any money). And the add-ons which PreachingToday.com include in the premium membership are worth more than the cost of the yearly subscription rate. A lot of times you can find companies willing to donate add-ons (like discounts, gift cards, etc.) for the marketing potential that it offers them.

MarketingSherpa has the specific details on how the project was rolled out.

And the results speak for themselves. Even after raising subscription rates by 60%, PreachingToday.com increased subscriber rates by almost 19%. In addition, 70% of their pageviews now come from the newly added content. The deal worked out well for one the companies that PreachingToday.com offered incentives from - 35% of the orders now come from PreachingToday.com.

How can you incorporate some of what PreachingToday.com did into your existing subscription-based business?  Maybe you’re not raising costs.  That doesn’t mean you can incorporate some of these ideas into your existing service.  Who knows… maybe you’ll see a 19% increase in subscriber rate, too!

And higher prices or not… that’s always a good thing.