We launch one-click upsells

Attention Shopify customers! We can't offer this feature to you because we don't provide your checkout – see the Shopify upsell app instead

One-click upsells and cross-sells are a great way of encouraging people already deep in your sales funnel to buy more of your stuff. They allow you to increase the amount of every sale without having to invest any more time and energy in the process. Wohoot! This feature has understandably been much requested. So, here it is, with plenty of options for customisation so you can offer customers a higher value replacement product, an additional product or two, or discount other relevant digital creations.

Update: post-payment one-click upsells are also now available

Why you should use one-click upsells and cross-sells

Well, you can potentially increase the amount of every sale by simply selecting a few options in your SendOwl account. And the rewards can be impressive. We'll be monitoring our own figures to let you know what our sellers are achieving (update: available here).

The main psychology behind upsells and cross sells is that it's easier to sell to existing customers rather than new ones. In the book Marketing Metrics, the authors conclude:

The probability of selling to a new prospect is 5-20%. The probability of selling to an existing customer is 60-70%.

And although pre-checkout customers are not quite existing customers, they have said 'I like your stuff enough to select the Buy Now button', which is more than all those other people floating around the Internet.

What is the difference between upselling and cross-selling?

Upsells and cross-sells target people in slightly different ways. Upsells show people something more expensive and say 'why not have this instead?' This appeals to people who may have missed this option on your website, or who thought it was too pricey initially but now think 'what the heck! Why not!' because they have mentally committed to spending money and adding a few extra $ to an electronic sale doesn't feel like that big a deal.

You can also supercharge your upsell option by offering people a higher value product but with a bit of a discount. Sales legend Jeffery Gitomer summarises this point, speaking from a customer point of view: “When it comes to up-selling, tell me how I win. When I win, you win.” If you offer people an upsell plus discount then you are presenting them with a potential 'win' situation.

Cross-sells, in contrast, are about getting your customers to buy something else rather than something more expensive. This appeals to people who haven't thought things through (they really need one piece of software to make another work effectively), who would be interested in something related and would consider buying it sooner rather than later (the second ebook in a series, for example), or who can be moved by peer pressure (so you say: 'other customers have also enjoyed this cape crochet pattern – limited edition only!'). Again, adding a discount into the mix might help: so you could offer customers a bundle of goods at a discounted price for the lot.

For the purposes of this post, I’m going to use the terms upsells and cross-sells interchangeably though.

Best practice for upselling

One-click upsells add an extra step to your checkout process; occasionally, customers might also feel frustrated that you are 'getting in the way' of them making a purchase. This is something you might want to keep an eye on, because upsells and cross-sells should increase your overall profitability rather than boosting one aspect only to negatively affect another.

We've done what we can to make sure that you benefit from our new feature – our checkout is very straightforward already, it's mobile optimised and our page load time is very quick. One extra screen really shouldn't make too much of a difference. We've also kept the button copy polite and simple (yes please; no thanks) to keep people moving through your sales funnel, preferably in a good mood.

Do keep your upsells as relevant as possible to your customers though. If they can't see a potential 'win' in what you're offering then they have good reason to start feeling a bit narked ('why should I want an ebook on making garden gnomes? I want to buy an ebook on making tables so my partner will quit hassling me about our three-legged table!')

Upsells and cross-sells allow you to increase the amount of every sale without having to invest in extra marketing activities

For an interesting take on upselling best practice, read Len Markidan's post How to Use Upselling to Increase Customer Happiness, Retention and Revenue".

What you can do with SendOwl one-click upsells

1. Set up an upsell for each of your digital products so they are as relevant as possible to your customers
2. Ask a customer if they want to buy a more expensive product instead of the one they have in their basket
3. Ask a customer if they want to buy more preferably related products
4. Ask a customer if they want to buy a higher value product or an extra product at a discount
5. Add pictures of your upsell products so customers are more likely to convert
6. Use HTML to add videos of your product so customers are more likely to convert
7. Measure how much extra income you are making from upsells

We think this is a real game changer for SendOwl sellers and we're really excited to see how much extra income gets generated as a result.

Conclusion

Used sensibly, upsells and cross-sell are a fantastic way to increase the amount you make on each sale without needing to invest any more time or energy in the process – and SendOwl is one of the only ecommerce platforms for digital products around to offer this neat feature. If you aren't already a SendOwl seller why not join us and give your business a boost?

Thanks to Christopher Sutton of Easy Ear Training for providing the screenshots.

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