Cross-selling is an often overlooked but incredibly powerful strategy you can use to increase the average order value (AOV) in your online store.
In this episode, we'll walk you through 7 different approaches to get started with cross-selling. Whether you're using Shopify or any other ecommerce platform, you'll surely benefit by implementing at least one of these strategies in your store.
Helpful links for Shopify merchants:
Recommended AI-based cross-selling apps for Shopify:
Shoppable content apps for Shopify:
Create beautiful email signup forms, coupon boxes, and pop-up surveys for your store with Getsitecontrol.
Cross-selling is an often overlooked but incredibly powerful strategy you can use to increase the average order value (AOV) in your online store.
In this episode, we'll walk you through 7 different approaches to get started with cross-selling. Whether you're using Shopify or any other ecommerce platform, you'll surely benefit by implementing at least one of these strategies in your store.
Helpful links for Shopify merchants:
Recommended AI-based cross-selling apps for Shopify:
Shoppable content apps for Shopify:
Create beautiful email signup forms, coupon boxes, and pop-up surveys for your store with Getsitecontrol.
Hi,
You’re listening to Getsitecontrol Insider, a monthly podcast about all things ecommerce. In today’s episode, we’re talking about cross-selling strategies you can try in your online store. Plus, we’re sharing a list of helpful cross-selling tools in the description to this episode.
If you want to learn how to effectively suggest relevant products to your customers at the right moment, stay tuned.
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There are three main ways you can make more money from your ecommerce store:
· First, you can get more customers
· Second, you can get customers to spend more per purchase
· Or you can get customers to buy more often
On our blog, we’ve talked a lot about getting more customers through the help of SEO, content marketing, and social media. That’s why today, we’re going to cover ways to increase your average order value with the help of cross-selling.
Before we dive any deeper, let’s make an important clarification.
Cross-selling isn’t the same as upselling. It’s easy to confuse them, so here’s a TL;DR explanation of their differences:
● A cross-sell complements the purchased product
● An upsell upgrades the purchased product, whether through adding quantities or offering an improved version of the product
Let’s use the iconic example of McDonald’s to illustrate this point:
● When a cashier asks you, “do you want fries with that?” you are getting a cross-sell
● When you hear “would you like to supersize your order?” you are getting an upsell
It’s important you keep this difference in mind as we'll be talking about cross-sells, not upsells.
Now that we got this out of the way, let’s talk about cross-selling strategies you can try in your online store.
The first thing you can try is placing cross-selling popups strategically on your website.
In this case, we’re talking about pop-up product recommendations that show up in different parts of a visitor’s screen based on pre-defined triggers to display a targeted, relevant message.
For example, you can display a pop-up recommendation when a store visitor adds a product to their cart.
If you want to try popups for cross-selling, we recommend using floating bars and slide-ins. These formats work well for presenting an offer without interrupting user experience.
The last thing you want to do is get in the way of the shopper — you want them to add another product to the cart, not interrupt them while they are doing so.
The key tips to keep in mind when using pop-up recommendations are the following:
● First, the cross-sell should be as simple as clicking a button that adds the suggested product to the cart. Don’t take them to a separate page or anything else that requires work.
● Second, incentivize the offer. Discounts are always a good way to “sweeten” the deal. To keep your margins safe, you can use bundles instead of direct discounts.
● Finally, make sure that the offer is relevant and makes sense. For example, if one of your categories is running shoes, cross-sell running socks, or a deodorizer.
The second strategy is to feature cross-sells as a part of the product page
Remember the last time you shopped on Amazon or any large retail store?
On a product page, you are likely to see a group of recommended products below the fold. Unsurprisingly, these are cross-sells, AI-generated based on past customer behavior. This is the most popular cross-selling method because it’s the easiest one to implement – typically with the help of dedicated ecommerce apps.
The way you position these automated cross-sells is up to you.
Some merchants leverage social proof to indicate that other customers bought the recommended product. In other cases - for example, when a retailer is suggesting that you pair your suite with an accessory – they may tell you that the product works better or looks better with the cross-sells.
Tactic #3 is cross-selling during checkout
One crucial word to remember when talking about cross-selling is “intent,” which represents the buyer's desire and likelihood to purchase. The higher the intent, the more motivated a buyer will be to purchase.
Unfortunately, we can’t ever know what the intent is at any given point in a buyer’s life. However, we can infer it by several factors, such as their actions and the pages they visit.
Once a buyer adds a product to cart and goes to the checkout page, their intent is as high as it could ever be. They have already made up their minds about purchasing from your brand — that’s a big deal! — and they are about to put in their payment information.
At this point is where a cross-sell could come in handy, either on a slide-in or within the checkout page itself.
For example, when you add a potting soil bag to your cart and go to the checkout page, the retailer may offer you a compost bag.
Since they would assume you’re trying to renew your garden, this cross-sell make a lot of sense. It doesn’t interrupt you on the way to purchasing the product (a big no-no) and it’s also relevant. A perfect cross-sell.
Cross-selling strategy number 4: send post-purchase emails
Intent doesn’t disappear after a customer makes a purchase. It may diminish a bit, but it’s still there. That’s what post-purchase emails are for; they increase the lifetime customer value without disrupting the customer experience.
Better yet, you can include cross-sells in your post-purchase email sequence.
To do so, you need an email marketing platform with dynamic tagging capabilities that allows you to create a post-purchase email campaign.
In your post-purchase email campaign, you can do the following:
● Thank your customers for their purchase
● Mention the product they bought
● And add a dynamic tag that recommends similar products to the one purchased
If you craft your post-purchase emails with your marketing persona in mind, you can successfully use them to sell more to your existing customers.
The next strategy you can try is shoppable content
Consumers in industries like fashion, beauty, and home decoration are particularly motivated by the way a product matches an overall aesthetic. To match the behavioral patterns of these consumers with their goals, online retailers have developed "shoppable content,” which allows buyers to shop directly from an image.
Usually, shoppable images show a model wearing or using the products the retailers want to sell. (For home decor, a model may not be present, but the products are presented as if it was a brochure)
Shoppable content has the double benefit of inspiring buyers and showing how a product looks in real life, which may entice them to buy the entire set.
IKEA uses this method on its homepage, category pages, and product pages. They even mix a row of shoppable images with category-wide menus multiple times.
The same applies to online fashion giant ASOS, which usually leverages shoppable content on its product pages.
Check the description to this episode to find a list of Shopify apps to create shoppable content
Strategy #6: Bundle your cross-sells
The example of McDonald’s I mentioned earlier not only illustrates the difference between upselling and cross-selling but also the importance of bundling.
Bundling is the practice of selling a group of discounted products together as a package (or “bundle”). Although retailers may frown upon using discounts, bundles don’t carry that connotation — in fact, they increase the perceived value of the discounted products.
The magic of bundling is that the discounts motivate the buyers to take advantage of the offer presented, while retailers benefit by increasing their AOV.
All you need to do to use bundles is select a group of related products that you think sell well together, discount each product by a set margin, create a bundle, and promote it either on a popup or within the page.
Finally, you can always retarget your cross-sells
Post-purchase emails were one way to “follow” past customers so that you could sell them even more products. Another method that’s even more scalable than emails is to use retargeting.
Retargeting is the practice of presenting advertising (usually display) throughout the web, based on past visitor behaviors.
For example, if a visitor buys a pair of shoes in your store and you want to sell them socks, you could create a campaign on Facebook, Instagram, or Google display network and show them the suggested products.
The best part about all these cross-selling strategies? To implement them in your store, you won’t need a developer. All you need is a clear goal and the right app optimized for your ecommerce website.
For example, if you’re on Shopify, you can use the Getsitecontrol app to create cross-sell popups and apps like ReConvert to implement AI-generated recommendations.
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Cross-selling is a surefire tactic to increase your average order value, and it can be very efficient for any ecommerce retailer. If you own an online store, you’ll surely benefit from implementing at least one of the strategies we covered today.
Now that you have the knowledge and the tools to get things done, go ahead and give it a try.
And that’s a wrap for today,
Thank you for listening.
Until next time!