Blog Icon
Upollo Blog
← Back to Blog

Are your customers account sharing?

Using Upollo to see how many users are account sharing for free.

Rachael Morgan
Rachael Morgan
Staff Software Engineer
December 21, 2022
Are your customers account sharing?

Imagine this: you have a great product that your customers subscribe to and use A LOT. You've vaguely heard of account sharing (you know someone that shares their Netflix account...), but you're not sure if it's happening to you. You like the idea of converting more users, but it's hard to justify doing anything about it when you don't really know if account sharing is even happening on your site, let alone much of it.

Believe it or not, but this is exactly why you should use Upollo: we show you exactly how many people are sharing accounts, and we do this completely free of charge. We believe in transparency: we want you to understand the scope of the problem, and once you do, we want to give you the tools to address it.

So how can you find out if any of your customers are sharing their account with others? Simply follow the steps below.

Step 1: Connect and send events

To understand if customers are sharing accounts, we need to know when they are using your website. This is done via calling Upollo's client-side track API with the type of event the user is doing. For example, you will likely want to call track when users successfully login:

import { EventType, UpolloClient } from "@upollo/web";

// Sign up to Upollo to get your API key.

const upollo = new UpolloClient("your-public-API-key");

// When the user successfully logs in.

upollo.track(
  { userEmail: "person@example.com" },
  EventType.EVENT_TYPE_LOGIN_SUCCESS
);

We suggest you send as many events as you can, as this will improve the analysis we are able to do for you. We find most sites should send events about:

  • Login: EVENT_TYPE_LOGIN and EVENT_TYPE_LOGIN_SUCCESS
  • Registration: EVENT_TYPE_REGISTER and EVENT_TYPE_REGISTER_SUCCESS
  • Page visits: EVENT_TYPE_PAGE_VISIT
  • Purchases: EVENT_TYPE_ATTEMPT_PURCHASE, EVENT_TYPE_ATTEMPT_REDEEM_OFFER, EVENT_TYPE_COMPLETE_PURCHASE, EVENT_TYPE_END_SUBSCRIPTION, EVENT_TYPE_REDEEMED_OFFER and EVENT_TYPE_START_SUBSCRIPTION

For details on how and when to send events, see the Event Type Documentation.

Once you're sending events, just sit back and wait for the data to flow in!

Step 2: Understand your customers in the Dashboard​

You can access your Upollo Dashboard by signing in. Once there, you can quickly get a sense of how many users are accounting sharing from the graph:

A graph of flagged users. Note: This screenshot is outdated as our app has been updated.
A graph of flagged users. Note: This screenshot is outdated as our app has been updated.

If you would like to learn more about why Upollo flagged a particular account, you can click the arrow in the 'Flagged Users' table:

Screenshot of a user who is account sharing.
Screenshot of a user who is account sharing. Note: This screenshot is outdated as our app has been updated.

You will then see a more detailed report of the devices and locations that we believe the account has been accessed via.

Knowledge is power: now that you know accounts are being shared, you can do something about it.

Step 3: Start converting​

At Upollo, we believe in converting these users into happy, paying customers. Doing so involves coming up with an intentional strategy that's integrated with things like your pricing structure, product UI, product design, and your marketing strategy. This is very individualistic, and so we've written some best practices to help you work out the best strategy for your business. To help make your strategy a success, we've built APIs for both client and server that provide the analysis information shown in the Dashboard (plus more!) in real time. By partnering with us, you can identify account sharing as it happens, and implement your conversion strategies seamlessly into the product. Sign up for a 30 day trial of our Growth plan to learn more.

Read the Report: Upollo SOC 2 Type 1
PDF • 2.4mb

Join the Wave

Ready to revolutionize how you recognize opportunities? Sign up for the waitlist below and be among the first to experience its transformative power when it launches.

Thanks! We'll let you know when you're off the waitlist.
Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.
About the Author
Rachael Morgan
Rachael Morgan
Staff Software Engineer

You Might Like:

All Posts
B2B Businesses are Applying Netflix and Disney’s Tactics and it is Paying Off
How B2B companies are harnessing the account sharing challenge to fuel revenue and user base growth
What is Password Sharing and Why are People Cracking Down?
Explore the implications of password sharing on business growth, revenue, and security, and discover strategies for converting unauthorized users into paying customers
10 Second Teleportation
An intriguing exploration of peculiar user activities

Get Started for Free

Start understanding and upselling your customers today.