Subscribe to this magazine or that streaming service, or a myriad of other recurring services. In fact, go ahead and try it absolutely free for a while. You can cancel anytime, otherwise your subscription will continue, as will our stream of income from your credit card. The beauty of what we call the negative option, is, you probably won’t cancel, at least not before we start billing your credit card. Maybe it’s because you are too busy with other things, or because you’re lazy, or forgetful, or because we make you jump through hoops to do so. Regardless of the reason, we know that a large percentage who sign up will not cancel, at least will not do so in time to avoid being charged.
Of course, we promote the subscribing or joining by talking up the part that it’s free, which it is for a short period and/or with severe limitation. We keep record as to the percentage of people who cancel before we can legitimately charge them, and how many ultimately cancel and after what period of time. Don’t worry; more than enough people continue for weeks, months, and years to make the free promotions well worth our while. Lots of our subscribers probably don’t even want our service anymore, or only vaguely know they re still paying for it, but they don’t take the necessary steps to cancel. We know how to make the human tendency for inertia work for us.