eCommerce

How to Increase Your Average Order Value with Guided Selling

November 30, 2023
|
Blake Imperl

Want to increase your average order value by over 40%? Discover how guided selling helps DTC brands drive AOV higher and the steps you can follow to do the same.

What’s the one thing consumers really want when shopping online? A personalized experience – and they’re happy to spend more if they get it. Research shows that people are 40% more likely to spend more than they planned if their shopping experience is highly personalized.

Delivering a tailored shopping experience is a highly effective way to boost your average order value (AOV). But how do you create that “personal” experience?

Guided selling! Guided selling, or more commonly referred to as quizzes, provide hyper-relevant product recommendations based on customer preferences, wants, and needs. And those recommendations can lead to higher transaction amounts. 

But don’t just take our word for it. After launching their quiz, Digioh customer Haute Hijab saw 60% higher AOV compared to their overall site averages.

Unlocking Higher Average Order Value With Guided Selling

With a carefully crafted quiz, you can offer shoppers a concierge-like experience – and that can lead to higher AOV. In fact, 54% of retailers say that product recommendations are a vital driver of AOV. 

Make Buyer Decisions Stress-free With Recommendations

Thanks to online shopping, consumers have more options than ever. But having too many options can lead to mental fatigue. More than half of surveyed consumers (54%) said they abandoned their purchase from an online retailer because it was too difficult to choose a product.

Product recommendation quizzes solve this problem by helping shoppers find exactly what they want or need. And when your quiz recommends multiple products, there’s a good chance that shoppers will purchase more than one item, boosting their order value in the process.

Quizzes provide data-backed recommendations that take the stress out of decision-making and help shoppers feel confident tapping the “checkout” button.

Offer Personalized Bundles to Solve Customer Problems

Quizzes are a great way to help customers find what they need, but they can also help customers find complementary products to support their goals. 

Offer these complementary products in a personalized bundle (like “complete the look”), and you can quickly boost your AOV. 

With Digioh, you can display personalized bundles right in your quiz results. If your quiz recommends multiple products, you can display an “add all to cart” button, making it easy for shoppers to buy multiple products with a single click.

When you encourage shoppers to purchase more items - and make it easy to do so - it often leads to higher order values. 

In fact, bundles helped dog food brand Maev boost their AOV by 15%

Not sure how to get started with bundling? Let’s look at some examples for inspiration.

Bundling Done RIGHT With Quiz Recommendations

example of bundling in product recommendations to increase aov
Pete & Pedro’s quiz makes it easy to add all of their recommended products to your cart.

Pete & Pedro’s quiz helps men find their perfect personal care products (hair, fragrance and body), and their quiz results page makes it easy to bundle their recommended products.

Shoppers can view their results for each category (hair, fragrance, etc.) and choose to:

  • Add all products in a category, OR
  • Add ALL of the recommended products from all categories

With the click of a single button, shoppers get all of the products they need – and Pete & Pedro get an AOV boost.

show subscriptions in recommendations
Moon Juice displays add-ons in their quiz results, which are complementary products that support the quiz-taker’s goals.

Another way to offer bundles and boost AOV is to display complementary products as “add-ons.” Offering add-on products is a strategy that works well for supplement and self-care brands like Moon Juice.

Moon Juice’s quiz results page recommends additional products that support your goals based on your quiz answers. Let’s say that you’re dealing with brain fog and fatigue. Moon Juice’s quiz may recommend products designed to:

  • Boost your energy 
  • Improve your focus

But what if you also shared that you’re experiencing hair loss? Your results may also recommend an “add-on” supplement or multivitamin that supports hair health. 

Shoppers are likely to purchase your “add-on” recommendations. Why? Because they’re hoping you can solve all of their problems. Those extra products may be just what they need to reach their goals.

Add-ons are a simple and effective way to boost AOV, and you can offer them right in your quiz results.

Highlight examples and give insight into what Pete & Pedro and Moon Juice are doing right with their bundling options.

  • If a quiz recommends multiple products, show a button to “add all to cart”
  • Vertical examples: supplement brands can show multiple products in a “stack,” skincare/haircare brands can show products in a routine (Customer example: Pete & Pedro)
  • Can also present additional products as “add-ons” (Customer example: Moon Juice)

Offer Subscriptions to Boost Monthly Recurring Revenue

Ecommerce subscriptions are a dream scenario for businesses focusing on increasing average order value rather than recurring revenue. Subscription e-commerce is expected to rise from $120.4 billion in 2022 to $904 billion in 2026.

Monthly recurring revenue helps businesses maintain steady cash flow and leverage the power of convenience.

Will your ideal customer need your product again in a week, a month, or three months? Offer them a subscription right in your quiz results. You can even offer a 10% discount for signing up for a subscription. Why? It’s more profitable to sell to an existing customer than it is to attract new customers.

Our quizzes integrate neatly with Recharge (if you use Shopify) to offer subscriptions directly on the quiz recommendation page. Even if a customer doesn’t subscribe, you can make it super simple to purchase all the recommended products with one click to boost your AOV.

Want to experience the power of Digioh and Recharge? Read through our guide to make integration a breeze.

How to Add Subscriptions to Your Quiz Results the Right Way

Our quizzes are designed to integrate seamlessly with your online store and will fit perfectly into your existing product or result pages. If your subscription options look out of place or like an afterthought, they won’t be effective.

If you look at the screenshot below, you’ll see a great example of the right way to add subscriptions to your results.

add subscriptions to quiz results to increase AOV
Bonafide gives quiz-takers the option to purchase a subscription with the click of a button.

Bonafide uses the power of discounts to offer 20% off of your first subscription. When you click on “View Plans +,” you’ll see the:

  • Single box price
  • Monthly price
  • 3-month price

Of course, the three-month plan offers the best per-month price and even has a “Best Value” label next to it. Let’s check it out below.

example of easy add to cart options for subscriptions

Notice that buyers can rest assured that they can cancel anytime, and free shipping is provided.

Rebuy shares some insights into how subscription programs helped OLLY boost AOV by 25%. Re-engaging customers is a powerful revenue generation tool, and subscriptions are one of the best ways to achieve this engagement.

But some customers won’t sign up for a subscription.

What can you do? Cross-sell. Think of a sale as your first invite into a customer’s life, but once you get to know the buyer, you realize that you can help them with so much more.

Post-Purchase Cross-Selling Opportunities

You’ve done it! A shopper went through your sales funnel, purchased your product or service, and even took your product quiz. Now, it’s time to leverage the data that you collected to:

  • Educate the buyer on the product they bought and those they may need in the future
  • Introduce complimentary products to the buyer
  • Sell more products

How?

Let’s assume that you sell haircare products. A customer’s hair is curly, and every time the slightest drizzle drops from the sky, it frizzes up. You learned this information from a product quiz that the customer took looking for something to solve their frizz problem.

They already purchased an anti-frizz serum, but you have other products that will help them tame their mane.

You can now cross-sell:

  • An anti-frizz leave-in conditioner
  • Hairsprays for frizz

Because frizz is caused by a lack of moisture, you can educate the consumer on how hair moisturizers get to the root of their problem and can even work to repair damaged hair. You can also sweeten the deal by offering:

  • Discounts
  • Free shipping

You already sell complementary products that your target audience needs. Educate them on these products and how they solve their problems, and then recommend these products to boost AOV.

How powerful is cross-selling?

  • 80% of ecommerce businesses cross-sell to improve sales
  • 21% of company revenue is driven by cross-selling (for companies that have an effective cross-selling system in place)

Cross-selling opportunities empower your brand to increase average order value and better serve your customers. It’s a win-win for everyone.

Tip: If you haven’t already, now is a good time to send a post-purchase survey to the customer (immediately after the purchase) to gain even more feedback. You’re on the customer’s mind once they click “buy,” so they’ll likely reply quickly. Check out our post-purchase survey examples for more information on how these surveys work.

Final Thoughts

Quizzes are an effective way to boost AOV and unlock the zero-party data brands need to personalize::

  • Offerings 
  • Communication
  • Product bundles

You have opportunities to better serve your customers and increase customer lifetime value in the process. Happier customers will rely on your products and services for longer. And just a 5% increase in retention can lead to a 25%+ profit boost.

Quizzes help you realign your focus to solve customer problems, personalize offers, and sell bundles that are laser-targeted to consumer pain points.

Blake Imperl
VP of Growth Marketing
Blake Imperl is the VP of Growth Marketing at Digioh and host of 2% the Podcast. He is a D2C marketer turned SaaS marketing leader having served at companies like Attentive, Wonderment, Tone, and Carro.

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