Making Additional Sales More Effectively
1. Upsell to customers
What is an upsell? An upsell takes place when you manage to sell to your customer an additional product other than what he originally intended to buy. For example, if a customer buys a laptop from you and you offered him to also buy a printer - a product that is related to the product that he bought - the sale of the printer is what you call an upsell. This is one way to maximize sales - you offer a buying customer an additional product to buy. This strategy actually works most of the time.
2. Cross-sell to customers
What is a cross-sale? In essence, it is similar to an upsell. But in an upsell, you are offering your customer an additional product that is related or is considered an upgrade to the product that he just bought. In a cross-sale, you are offering a completely different product. For instance, if a customer just bought a handbag from you and offered him to also buy a jacket, the sale of the jacket is called a cross-sale. This strategy is ideal for businesses that sell a wide variety of unrelated products and/or services (e.g. a store that sells clothes, furniture sets, jewelry, etc.).
3. Attach discount rights to a product
One way to sell a product more effectively is to attach discount rights to it. How do you do this? For example, you can attach to a laptop a discount right that grants its buyer the right to buy a printer from you at 20% discount. This 20% discount would not have been available to customers that did not purchase a laptop from you. This strategy actually works in two ways: 1) it makes the primary product (laptop in this case) more attractive and 2) it encourages a buyer to buy an additional product (printer in this case). This strategy can result into an upsell or a cross-sale.
4. Offer samples of new products
This is especially useful when offering a new product which your customers may still not be familiar with. For example, it will help if you offer a free taste of a new food item.
Make the discount right a limited offer
How will this benefit you? For one, it will encourage customers to make a purchase as soon as possible. This is because they will attempt to avail of the 'discount right' before it expires. This strategy actually affects the buying behavior of customers. You want them to make that purchase as soon as possible because it sometimes happens that a customer changes his mind about buying a certain product after some time has passed.
5. Offer short-term installment (w/ interest)
You can maximize sales by applying interest rates to your products. Of course, applying an interest rate is not attractive. But you make it acceptable by offering to sell the product in installment basis. For example, you can offer your customer the option of buying a laptop from you in installment basis but at a 5% interest rate. That 5% interest rate is already considered an additional sale on your part.
6. Offer short-term installment (w/o interest)
Why would you offer to sell a product in installment basis without applying an interest rate? This might be ideal on products that do not sell very well. For example, if you discovered that one of your products is not selling well, you can sell it in installment basis without interest.
7. Offer numerous payment methods
This is especially a good strategy to use when selling products online. This is because customers around the world use different payment methods. For example, a customer might have wanted to buy a laptop from you but because you only accept payments via credit card and the customer wants to pay using PayPal instead, that customer might ultimately decide not to buy from you. You do not want this to happen.
8. Train your sales representatives
Doing cross-sale and upsell correctly will largely depend on the persuasiveness of your sales representatives. Even if an offer is good, a customer might not be moved to avail of it if the sales representative is not persuasive or skilled enough. This is why it is important that your sales representatives undergo thorough training.