10 Awesome Upselling Techniques to Try Right Away

Upselling is about getting the same customer to buy something else after an initial purchase. Here’s why you need to know how it works. Research says you’ve got a 60-70% better chance to make a second sale to an existing customer.

Upselling Techniques

Here are 10 proven upselling techniques you can use right away.

Offer Discount Subscriptions

Nick Bennett, founder of Growmeo Marketing, points to subscriptions for ecommerce businesses.

“A common strategy is to offer a 10% discount if someone chooses to subscribe to a recurring purchase of a product,” he writes. “When someone choose this option, they’ll automatically get the product shipped to them every month for a 10% discount.”

Give Annual Subscriptions

This is a good option if your customers currently pay monthly. Bennett suggests offering a free month for anyone who chooses this route.

Suggest Items

This technique works well with front line staff. If customers buy a computer, get workers to ask them if they need appropriate software and/or a case.

Use Emails

Placement is important for this technique to succeed. Gina Woods is an e-commerce business mentor and coach. She suggests using the thank you page/order confirmation section.

“Order confirmation in email has a 95% open rate,” she writes.

Personalize the Offer

“When you upsell, always try to personalize the offers that you are showing the customer. Choosing the correct upsell can go a long way in ensuring the customer clicks the “buy” button,” writes Joe Flanagan, Lead App Developer at GetSongbpm.

That can be as simple as offering a hoodie to someone who just bought a t-shirt. Works well in ecommerce.

Compare Plans

If you’re selling a service, try comparing the free version to the paid one. Visuals are good here and the effective ones use bullet points with checkmarks.

Put A Time Limit on The Offer

Creating urgency helps people to make a decision. Create a time limit on an offer. Or you can limit the quantities for the same results.

Learn the Rule of 25

Jake Rheude is VP of marketing at Red Stag Fulfillment. He explains:

“One key tip to remember is the rule of 25,” he writes. “Keep your offers from increasing the overall order cost by more than 25%. It encourages people to take the offer without feeling overwhelmed or backing out of the whole purchase.”

Rheude supplies a few good examples.

“Think of the cost of adding fries to a Big Mac, or upgrading a Tesla Model 3 to the long range package. It’s about 25%. Is it worth it for your customers to pay that extra 25%? With the right value proposition, enough of them will be convinced — so the answer is yes.”

Use a Tier System

Another suggestion is to divide your goods or services up into different levels. You need to get more specialized with each category.

“It is very important to provide what the customer requires at exactly the right time. Build these levels with more specific and specialised products upon the original tried and tested one.” — Andrew James Syrett Head of Sales at YourParkingSpace.co.uk.