An example from Raphael

Here’s a good example of how to offer upsells/cross-sells when adding to cart. This was extracted from a video shared by CRO expert Raphael Paulin-Daigle on his LinkedIn.

See the other two ways he talks about by watching his video on LinkedIn:

Relevance, relevance, relevance

In the example below of what not to do, I added a dress for a todler of 12-24 months. And one of the products recommended is for kids 5-6 years old. That is not a relevant suggestion.

Same with OKA below

I just added a chair, and it recommends similar chairs. It might cause me to doubt my choice and compare, which will delay my buying decision. Cross-sells would be better here.

Stats by VWO

According to VWO (Source), about 4% of customers buy upsells while less than 0.5% of customers go for a cross-sell. But in the checkout page, cross-selling goes up to a 3% conversion rate.

Upselling

Promote your most reviewed or most sold products
Give more prominent space for the upsell, display testimonials for the upsell
Make sure the upsells are not more than 25% costlier than the original product
Make add-on features like insurance pre-selected and ask customers to deselect if not required
Explain why the upsell is meant for them, why it’s better for them

And make sure the products are from the same category!

Cross-selling

Cross-sell products should be at least 60% cheaper than the product added to cart
Go for products that are easily forgotten

But if your cross-sell section isn’t convincing enough, it could do more harm than good, as demonstrated by this case study – they improved their conversions by 5.6% by removing the cross-sells from their product pages.