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So you want to launch a subscription box and don't know where to start? Girl, you are in the right place. I'm Julie Ball, a subscription box coach and your host here at Subscription Box Basics, a podcast for new and aspiring subscription box entrepreneurs that want to avoid overwhelm. So grab a coffee, some pen and paper and let's have some fun!
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Hey guys, I am so giddy with excitement today to share something with you that is going to increase your average order value. So this episode is for those who have already launched, and if you haven't already launched, then write this down so that you implement it as soon as you can, once you're launched. So welcome to Subscription Box Basics, the podcast. Stop what you're doing right now. If you love these episodes, do me a favor, head over to your podcast player, subscribe, rate, and review this podcast. It helps me get it into more people's hands and just spread the information and help each other out.
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So you probably want to know what I'm going to be talking about today, how to increase your average order value. So this is something that I feel like I should have been doing ages ago, but because of some of the limitations of our fulfillment structure in the past, we did not do it. So what we're going to talk about today is add-ons. So an add-on essentially allows you to add a product as an upsell or a cross sell during the subscriber flow. So let me paint the picture. Someone goes and adds your subscription box to their cart. As they are going through the subscribed flow, where they added to cart, and they put in their shipping information and their payment information, there's going to be an extra step. This extra step shows them potential products that they might like as well. And it is as simple as one click to add it to their cart that they're already going to check out with. So it's an amazing way to increase your average order value.
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So in today's episode, I'm going to tell you a little bit about my experience with it and give you some tips on how to strategize to use this, to really help you out, how to offload excess inventory, sell more product and increase that average cart value. So to give you a frame of reference, since we implemented add-ons one in four of our new subscribers have taken advantage of it. That means as they are subscribing to Sparkle Hustle Grow, 25% of the people are taking advantage of this add-on product. It's essentially doubling our average cart value for those who are subscribing for the monthly cart because what we're using as our add on product is last month's box. So we're offloading excess inventory from last month, and it's a way for them to get a box in their hands faster because we're going to ship this right away. Whereas with the monthly subscription, we ship in the first couple of days of the month. So say you subscribe on the 10th of the month. You're going to wait a couple of weeks before your first box shows up. So this is a way to get a box in their hands, faster, get them to experience it quicker and have that quick win. So again, I mentioned right now, one in four of our new subscribers are taking advantage of buying last month's box during that checkout process. No, I can't speak for everybody else. I do not know the average statistics for add-ons. But I will say that I use Cratejoy the add-ons feature is built in. It comes in out of the box. You just have to activate the add-ons app. And so there's no extra fee we have to pay for that. It's huge win.
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So let's talk a little bit about what to use as your heart add-on. So again, as I mentioned, we use last month's box. When we fulfill our boxes, we have our fulfillment center make extras, and then we can use those for customer service. We can use those for influencers and now, or we can use those as add-ons. And again, we just added this because the fulfillment center that we used was only doing our batch orders and I was managing one time orders from my home office. So now that we use ShipMonk for our warehouse, we had to just add an extra workflow essentially to make sure that these add-on products got shipped immediately instead of waiting for the big batch to go out.
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So what would you list for your add on? You could add on something like last month's box, or maybe you have a starter box that would be great to get in their hands right away. You could list excess inventory. Maybe you have 10 of this or 15 of that leftover or a hundred, whatever. You can list that as an add-on. And the shipping is going to be the same as what that product would be in the shop. So there's no extra configuration that you need to do for that. You could list exclusive items. So maybe you buy items exclusively for new subscribers when they go through the new subscriber flow and those exclusive items could be actually hidden in your shop. And they're only available at checkout. Maybe when you are sourcing products for a future box, you buy more than you need so that you can get a better deal. So say you have 200 subscribers, but you get a better deal for that product at 250 products. Then offer those extra products as an add-on. Now there's some things that you need to consider when it comes to logistics. As I mentioned, our previous warehouse didn't really have the right workload workflows to set this up and it was going to be a very manual process for me.
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Now, in hindsight, I wish I would've figured out a way to make it work because I had no idea that it was going to convert so well. So if you fulfill at home, you got to think about, will you send that item right away or would you ship it with their next box? So if it's a small item, maybe it fits right in that box and there's no additional shipping or again, you might want to ship it right away so that they can get that quick win, that immediate gratification of getting something quickly. You want to think about will there be an additional fee for shipping? So if were shipping it separately from your batch or your subscription products, you may need to think about that. Will there be an additional fee for shipping? So make sure you account for that when you create the product in your online shop. Now again, I use Cratejoy, so we're just listing these as one-time products. And we activated the add-ons app, which when you go into the subscription products tab, it now adds an extra step that you get to configure.
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With Cratejoy, you can add one to three items. And for us, we're only adding one item because we want to focus on selling those extra boxes. So keep in mind that if you have three things listed, people are most likely going to choose that first one listed the one that's at the top. One, because it is at the top and visually, that is just kind of this way to make it seem more valuable. But two, especially if they're on mobile, that might be the only add-on that they actually see without having to scroll. And then sometimes you guys, you know, we don't always scroll. So there might be that the visual of it, you might only see that top one. So make sure if you are listing two or three products as an add-on, list the one that you want to sell first. The one that is going to be most important for you to get out the door or maybe has the highest profit margin. List that one first.
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Another tip about choosing your product is you're probably going to want to choose products that are either lower or the same price as your subscription product, but not higher. This is not really the time to upsell them to a higher tier or priced product. This is something where they're already going to commit to your subscription. This is just a way to say, "Hey, you might like this too." Think about when you're buying things on Amazon. And you get that little note when you add something to your cart, says "Other buyers bought this too", or "You might like this." You probably have seen it on tons and tons of e-commerce sites. This is kind of a way to do that.
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So when it comes to Cratejoy, you can customize the add-ons page, which is super cool. And if your product, your add on product, happens to be out of stock, it automatically won't show it. So that's a nice thing you want to keep on top of your inventory, of course. And Cratejoy does send a notification if your inventory is out of stock. So that would be a good opportunity to then go in there and swap out your add-on products.
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But the good news is if it's out of stock, it's automatically just not going to show it. You can change your add-ons at any time. So again, with Cratejoy you can list up to three. So maybe you have something that's more seasonal, or maybe you ran into a lot of excess inventory. You can swap things out to help you with your inventory management. So if you're taking notes, guys now is the time to jump into your software and see what you have lots of excess inventory with, and then configure your cart to have the add-ons. I cannot wait to hear how this has increased your cart value. Again, I'm going to say it one more time. One in four new subscribers are adding our last month's box to their cart while they're ordering. This is such an amazing revenue builder with very, very little work for you to do.
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I hope this has been helpful. If you have any questions, hit me up in my DMs over on Instagram. I want to hear what you're using for your add-ons. And guys, if you want more tips like this, make sure you are subscribed to our email list. If you go over to SubscriptionBoxBootcamp.com, you can jump on our email list and you will be notified when these podcasts go live. You will be notified when we have new resources dropping like the new book that is coming out within weeks. I'm so excited. It's called Subscription Box Basics A 30-Day Plan to Get Your Box Idea Off the Ground. This is for our pen and paper people. Those that love to write down their ideas and map it out. This is going to be a workbook that you work through over a 30-day timeframe. And by the time that you're done with the book, you are going to not only know whether or not this is a business venture you want to pursue, but you'll also have already mapped out your plan, your stage one, which I call the idea stage. So it's a super fun and impactful book. I cannot wait to get it in your hands. So again, go over to SubscriptionBoxBootcamp.com, get on the email list. So you don't miss any more of my free resources. Thank you guys as always for listening. Make sure you DM me and let me know how an add-on feature is working for you. And I'll see you in the next episode.