How to Increase Sales with Cross Selling

If you sell products then you should always consider cross selling.

Cross selling is the process of offering other relevant items on the product pages or at the checkout.

Take for example, when you cash out at the grocery store, they have magazines, gum and candy, all the impulse buys that you will grab while you are already buying other stuff. This technique has been around forever and you can also use it with ecommerce.

With the pageBuzz shopping cart you can set items for cross selling. For each item you sell, you can show other items that might be important for the buyer to consider.

For example, if you are selling paint, offer brushes, or paint thinner. If you sell kitchen faucets, offer Teflon tape and wrenches for installation.

When people buy things, they don't always know what they might need or even what they want. So showing them logical things that go with what they are buying is a great way to sell additional products.

In many cases, the person never considers the purchase.

For example with electronics. Do people regularly but batters when they buy electronic devices that need them?

If you tell them the item requires 4 AAA Batteries with a link, they won't hesitate to order them at the point of sale.

Every store does this with their warranty programs offered at the checkout. Fast food restaurants do this with "would you like a coke with your meal" or "would you like to super size that?"

It is part of doing business and it should not be ignored when selling products online.

If you don't want to populate items for cross selling, you can add options. Add an option for a pack of batteries, or something needed with the purchase.

But if you are completely lazy, just turn on the cross selling options and let the cart do it for you. The cart can select random items from the same category to display more than just the product on the page.

What else can you do to cross sell?

• Cross Promote with other Stores or Vendors

• Create articles on your website listing items that can be used together

• Offer discounts with other purchases from the same category

Cross Promote with other Stores or Vendors

You don't have to limit cross selling to your own website. If you are a lawyer offer you customers a free consultation with an accountant and have the accountant do the same for you.

If you sell batteries, have someone that does not sell batters offer them through you for the products they sell.

If you have a restaurant in a mall or in a small town, let other vendors reward their customers with coupons for a FREE sandwich or Drink at your store. That gives people an incentive to come in and eat at your restaurant.

Don't limit cross selling and cross promotion with your own store. Reach out to other vendors and work together to promote each other.

Create articles on your website listing items that can be used together

You can also write articles to show people what items they may need for a project.

You will see companies like Walmart creating pages with full meals for 4 people. The give you the recipe, the ingredients, calories and the costs.

They do this to promote multiple products at one time.

They might suggest a premade entree like lasagna. Then offer a suggestion that you should have garlic bread with that and a side of baked meatballs.

They organize it in such a manner that you have a complete meal, healthy and cost effective.

What do you have on your website? Anything like that? Probably not.

Then it is time to think about it. Create content that sells products for you, not just adding products to an ecommerce website.

The reason walmart is doing this is that it works. If it works for them, it can work for you.

We create articles about how to build websites not because there are not already 2 million already online, but because our customers want to hear it from us.

I get calls all the time, I don't know how to do this or that and I say, did you try searching google?

NO, they want to see it on pageBuzz. They want information and step by step instructions how to build a website.

We know how important this is so we continue to expand the articles and how to sections.

If you don't think it is worth the time, maybe you don't really want to run a website. maybe you just want to run a cash register at Walmart and let them do all the work.

If you want success, it takes hard work and you have to think outside the box. Don't stop once all the products are online for sale. Think how can you promote, sell and expand sales with the market you already have.

Offer discounts with other purchases from the same category

Another great way to cross sell is to use group discounts. For example, if you sell soap. Sell one bar for $2 with buy 2 and get one FREE. That way instead of people buying one bar, they buy 3.

Using the pageBuzz group discount feature you can set up discount groups and link similar items together to create different promotional discounts for different items.

One group may offer buy one get one and another may offer buy two get one half off. It is really up t you to figure out what types of offers you need to get people to buy more.

If you pair the display of other items and the lure of offering discounts for buying more, people tend to spend more.

Companies like amazon.com offer free shipping if you spend enough money. People almost always spend more to take advantage of the free shipping. Ultimately, something that costs them money makes them even more back in sales.

Run it like a Business

The problem we see with small etailers is that they want it to be easy. They load up a few items in a cart and they wait for sales. But you can't do that, you need to promote, advertise and work to keep any business you get.

With all the tools you have on your website, there is no excuse for not selling.

By using tools like cross selling you can expand what you already sell and get bigger sales from your existing customers.

You have to use your website to entice customers into spending more, wanting more and shopping more with you.