Chandler Olson
September 26, 2022
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Upselling and cross-selling play a pivotal role in an eCommerce marketing funnel, targeting existing customers who already love your brand and encouraging new customers to try more than one product. The strategy helps retain loyal customers and grow lifetime value.
So, what do upselling strategies look like, and how can you implement a successful cross-selling campaign?
Before we dive into practical (and effective) examples of upselling products, it’s important to understand the benefits of the strategy. While upselling and cross-selling are often used interchangeably, they work slightly differently.
Upselling encourages customers to purchase a higher-end product than the one they are interested in. By exposing online visitors to better models or versions of a product, it’s possible to increase the average order value (AOV) and improve customer satisfaction.
Cross-selling suggests related or complementary items to the customer, encouraging them to make an additional purchase. Effective cross-selling suggestions can increase sales and profit, reduce the selling cost, increase customer loyalty and provide a better understanding of customer needs.
Before making suggestions, it’s important to consider the customer journey and make the prompt at a strategic time. Consider the following tips when implementing an upselling strategy;
There are different ways to implement upselling and cross-selling strategies, helping to boost the AOV of your eCommerce store. The following Shopify stores showcase effective strategies with the help of a Shopify Upsell App.
Aviator Nation is a California brand inspired by the 1970s. The brand launches regular collections of stylish apparel, targeting new customers and retargeting existing customers. While launching its artist collection, Aviator Nation takes advantage of cross-selling strategies.
When customers view a hand-dyed zip hoodie, they are provided with a well-written product description, followed by a complementary product — hand-dyed sweatpants! By placing the two complementary products alongside one another, a customer can see the full look and be inspired to get the complete outfit.
Aviator Nation uses strategic wording and encourages the shopper to “Complete the look” with the second half of the full outfit. Further down the product page are “More items to consider,” which is a section that showcases other products that are similar in style or design.
Loot Crate taps into pop culture, fandom, and cult followings by selling collectibles, apparel, and gear using a subscription model. Loot Crate allows customers to geek out with a surprise unboxing by tapping into the fan culture.
One of the ways that Loot Crate boosts sales and captivates buyers is through the limited edition crate series. For example, the Junji Ito Artist Collection encourages fans to take advantage of the non-recurring crates.
By bundling licensed apparel, collectibles, and gear in honor of the Japanese author, Loot Crate cross-sells their products in a bundled crate. The campaign increases urgency and encourages a speedy sale by making the crate a limited edition purchase, grouping more than one item together and labeling the crate as a “surprise.”
MNML believes in keeping things simple and selling progressive apparel designs at fair prices. It’s not only their business that works effortlessly, but they also strive to create an easy shopping experience for their valued customers. Part of this strategy includes recommending products based on consumer interests.
For example, if a consumer shows interest in a paint splatter shirt, then the online shop recommends similar items below the product description. The online store’s system selects similar products to cross-sell based on the customer’s previous behavior.
As the customer browses the details of their selected shirt, they are presented with other similar design items, encouraging additional purchases. By branding these suggested items under the heading “Recommended for you,” customers are offered a personalized shopping experience that meets their needs and improves brand loyalty.
Limited Run Games produces small batches of digital and retro games. Not only does their small batch approach increase the sense of urgency for purchase, but their cross-selling technique further encourages the purchase of highly collectible items.
Limited Run offers the opportunity to pre-order products before they are available. As a customer adds a product to their cart, they are prompted to add another less-expensive, complementary item.
For example, when adding a PS5 Limited Run River City Girls game to the cart, the customer is prompted to add a limited trading card booster pack at a fraction of the cost. The low price makes it easier to decide, coming in cheaper than the original item.
The Jays Care Foundation is a charitable arm of the Toronto Blue Jays, promoting baseball as a tool to teach children essential skills, mainly focused on creating lasting change for marginalized youth. Jays Care 50/50 is a licensed raffle where individuals purchase tickets with the opportunity to win 50% of the total money raised.
In addition to early bird tickets, Jays Care 50/50 offers four raffle ticket bundle options.
For example, buying five tickets costs $10, making the cost of each ticket $2. The more tickets that a consumer buys, the cheaper the total cost of the ticket. To continue the example, the cost of 15 tickets is $20 (the cost per ticket is $1.3), the cost of 100 tickets is $50 ($0.50 per ticket), and the cost of 250 tickets is $100 ($0.40 per ticket).
The upselling technique encourages customers to buy more tickets to get the most value out of their money.
Create opportunities for your customers to buy more while they are already shopping on your eCommerce store and are in the purchase flow.
