I went to buy an Avante, but the contract was signed for Genesis...

Have you ever experienced this? Electronic products also have different product models and prices depending on some specifications. This is upselling. According to Forrester Research, strategic use of upselling and cross-selling can increase sales by 10-30%. Upselling and cross-selling are the most basic strategies used in e-commerce marketing. Let’s learn more.

Upselling = Offering a higher version

Upselling and cross-selling strategies may seem similar, but they are different. For example, if you are buying a $1,000 13-inch laptop, the seller can offer the customer an upgrade or upgraded version of the CPU, etc.

▲ Laptop purchase screen

▲ McDonald’s upselling techniques

Upselling is a popular offer where you offer an upgrade or an additional item to purchase, such as McDonald's "Would you like a drink?"

Cross Selling = Inducing additional purchases

Once a customer has chosen a product to purchase, cross-selling involves suggesting compatible or additional products to the product they have chosen. For example, if a customer is purchasing a laptop or computer, you might suggest purchasing a printer as an additional option.

▲ Additional printer purchase suggestion

▲ Additional printer purchase suggestion

The “Related Products,” “Also Bought,” and “Products that People Who Bought This Product Also Bought” lists that usually appear at the bottom of a shopping mall product description page are typical examples of cross-selling.

Purpose and Effects of Upselling vs Cross-selling

From the seller's perspective, there is an advantage in increasing sales, but if you are conducting a promotion from a long-term perspective, product composition and UI that do not harm the purchase process are essential. In a way, almost all products in the current Korean open market can be seen as having upselling and cross-selling applied. However, if you show too many products, the effect is actually reduced. It is most important to place upselling and cross-selling products in the right place.

So, which is more effective in generating sales: upselling or cross-selling?
▲ Comparison of sales effects of upselling and cross-selling (source: Predictive Intent)

According to predictive intent, upselling is known to have a 4% sales increase effect, and crossselling is known to have a 0.2 sales increase effect. The upselling effect is 20 times higher than crossselling. This shows that once a purchase decision is made, the additional purchase rate is very low.

Upselling techniques

Overseas sites basically utilize upselling. For example, when selling a service, they usually organize three or more plans, place the most important product in the center, add banners such as Most Popular and Recommended, or suggest an annual plan (yearly payment) with a 10-20% discount on monthly payments.
▲ General Price Plan Table

How to upsell

In the case of the e-commerce platform Shopify, there are various apps that support upselling functions. A representative example is the Product Upsell by Bold app. With a simple installation, it suggests upselling products or cross-selling products in a pop-up form when a customer clicks Add to Cart.

▲ Upselling App by Bold

Reccomendify is an app that suggests cross-selling products on the Cart page, right before the checkout page.

▲ Reccomendify App

_

In addition to the examples above, if you apply upselling and cross-selling techniques according to the products you sell, such as offering discounts based on the number of products purchased (Qty) or the number of types of products purchased (Total Qty), it will help increase sales. How about analyzing your existing sales data today and devising your own upselling strategy?