Sales. It is a key factor in the success of a business. It can make the difference between a business thriving and a business failing. However, when it comes to sales reps, they do not spend as much time making sales as you might think. A sales rep only spends 37% of their time actually making sales.
So, what do they do with the other 63% of their time? Most of that is spent coming up with a sales strategy.
This can involve anything from cross-selling tactics, upselling products, coming up with cross-selling best practices, upselling best practices, and more.
Cross-selling and upselling are two of the biggest ways that you can increase sales. The problem is that some people do not know how to go about this efficiently.
If you are reading this article, you may be someone who is lost when it comes to sales tactics.
No need to fear. This guide will go over the effective ways, in which stores driven by Magento cross-sell / upsell related products to their customers. Read on to learn how to increase sales with cross-selling and upselling products.
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What Is Cross-Selling?
Before we can dive into practices for cross-selling, you need to understand what this is. Essentially, cross-selling is when you combine multiple products that you offer into one sale.
Let's say that you are walking into an electronics shop and are looking for a new laptop. You walk into the store mainly to look at laptops and do not think about what else you can get with them when you go in there.
That is where a sales rep comes in. If they notice that you are looking for a new laptop, they can start their pitch by offering you additional items that you are likely to want with that laptop.
One of the biggest items you can expect in that situation is a charger that goes with the laptop. You are going to need that to keep your battery life full.
If a sales rep gets creative, they can even start offering other items such as a keyboard, a mouse, a mousepad, and more. The point of cross-selling here is to offer additional items that go with the laptop. However, the twist is that the customer may not consider getting these items and these items are likely going to be more difficult to sell on their own.
So, using a cross-selling strategy can help a business unload a few extra items in their inventory that they may not have initially thought of. Businesses relying on Magento 2 get cross sell products programmatically thanks to multiple smart algorithms of specific extensions, similar to that we mentioned above.
What Is Upselling?
Upselling is another tactic that businesses use to increase sales. The difference between this and cross-selling is that this is typically an add-on or advanced product that the buyer does not necessarily need.
With cross-selling, you either package several items together or offer them at a discount. Or, you can focus on other items that someone is likely going to need or want with their main product.
When it comes to upselling, all of that goes out the window because the whole goal of this sales tactic is to get someone to spend more money by upgrading their product or experience.
Let's take Walt Disney World as an example. In their theme parks, you already have to pay a certain amount of money for a ticket that grants you admission to the park.
Now, no one is telling you that you have to spend more money in the park once you are through the gate. However, you may notice that one of their parks is crowded that day and the lines are getting long.
Are you going to stand in the standby line or are you going to take action to get around this?
Well, Disney World parks offer an add-on that allows them to significantly reduce someone's time waiting in lines. This option is called Genie Plus. It costs at least $15 per person per day and what it does is it gives a customer a reservation time to come back to a ride and wait in a much shorter line.
This is an example of upselling because Disney World is selling an add-on to customers that they do not necessarily need with their initial product. However, this add-on offers a more premium experience in their parks and it gets customers to spend more money in their parks.
Advertising Upsell Opportunities
Now that you have a better idea of what upselling is, it is time to find out how to take advantage of those opportunities when they come. The best way you can do this is by letting a customer know that they have the option to do so.
Websites powered by Magento 2 upsell products to customers automatically.
Let's say that someone buying a plane ticket from a budget airline. With those types of airlines, you only pay for the seat on your initial purchase. If you want almost anything else with it, you have to add it to your purchase.
Some of these websites upsell customers every step of the way. Once someone orders a seat for a certain flight, they will then start seeing offers for additional items.
One of these items can be a pre-purchased meal for a short flight. It can also be Wi-Fi that someone can use on the flight. Then, there are things such as purchasing a checked bag or even upgrading what section of the plane somebody can sit in.
All of these items mentioned above are upselling practices that budget airlines use to try to get extra money on certain transactions from their customers. The point of this is that airlines put these upsell opportunities right in front of their customers' faces. You may have to do the same to get customers thinking about these items and increasing your sales.
Just how effective is this for airlines? Well, they made nearly $103 billion in 2022 just by upselling products after the seat on a flight.
Using Automated Emails
Another thing that you can do to try to increase sales is to send automated emails for each completed transaction. That lets a customer know that their purchase went through smoothly.
However, as a business, you could use this as an opportunity to promote other products. One of these products can be a loyalty program.
Let's say that someone is booking a hotel from a third-party hotel site. This hotel site has a loyalty program in place that tries to encourage people to book more nights with them.
The cross-selling strategy here could be to offer someone a free night for every 10 nights that they book on that website.
Stores that use Magento 2 cross-sell products via automated emails. Such an email can let a customer know about this opportunity. It can also let them know how many more nights they need to book to receive a free night if they are already enrolled in the program.
With this system, you are offering a discounted rate on your rate per night to book on your website. In other words, you are giving your customers a good incentive to book more hotel nights with you than they otherwise would.
Analyzing Your Customer Base
Finally, you are going to want to know as much information about your customers as possible. You need to find out their age, their location, their gender, their interests, and more.
It can give you a much better idea of who is buying your product, who buys more of your product, and what you can do to get your customers to buy more of your product.
For example, let's say that you are trying to sell shot glasses in an online store. If you collect data from people who are signed up on the website that lets them buy your shot glasses, you can get a lot of information on your target demographic.
You can find out that people under 30 like shot glasses that are more edgy. At the same time, you can find out that middle-aged people are more likely to buy shot glasses with the logo of their favorite sports team.
The goal here is to figure out what your audience likes and how to sell them on buying more of certain products.
Learn More Cross-Selling Tactics and Upselling Tactics
These are just a few cross-selling tactics and upselling tactics that you can use to try to increase your sales. Remember, you need to give people a good incentive to buy an additional product no matter which path you choose to go.
This can be bundling other products they may need together, offering a more premium experience, offering rewards for staying loyal to your business, and more.
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