i called every customer who cancelled. here's what they told me

i had 9 cancellations between month 2 and month 4. for a business with 20ish customers thats alot, and the cancellation form answers were useless ("other", "too expensive", one person just wrote "no"). so i did the scary thing and phoned all 9. 7 picked up. heres what i learned and what i changed.

the reasons (the real ones)

• 2 were seasonal. they close for 3 weeks in august and didnt want to pay for a month they werent working. they fully planned to come back. they just didnt know they could pause.
• 2 hit a double booking bug. a recurring appointment edited from the phone created a duplicate. one of them had two springer spaniels turn up at once. i had no idea, neither of them reported it, they just left.
• 1 went back to paper. shes 68, the app was fine, she just likes her diary. honestly fair. we're still friends.
• 1 was price, but not the way you'd think. she has a part time assistant and my pricing charged £8 per extra staff login, so she was paying £37 for a one and a half person business. she felt nickel and dimed.
• 1 found a competitor with online booking. that one i cant fix this year.

what i changed

• added a "pause for up to 2 months" button right on the cancel screen. 3 people have used it since. all 3 came back.
• fixed the double booking bug (a timezone thing on recurring edits, of course it was) and personally emailed both groomers. one came back.
• killed per seat pricing. every plan includes 3 staff logins now. i lost about £16 a month of revenue and gained alot of goodwill
• changed the cancel form to one free text box: "what should we have done better?". answers are 10x more useful

things i didnt expect

nobody was angry on the phone. most were a bit embarrassed and very nice, and 3 of them gave me ideas i've since built. people dont report bugs, they just leave quietly. so if youre small enough to call your churned customers, call them. it takes an afternoon and you'll learn more than from any dashboard.

also turns out a pause button is basically free retention for any business with seasons. if your customers take holidays, add one