How much of yesterday's revenue did your website generate from cross-sell activity?
Few online retailers monitor the effectiveness of their product recommendation engine even though it can be one of the highest converting areas of a website. In a recent study performed by SiteClarity, 33% of multi-item purchases included at least 1 item that was recommended. Additionally, 15% of all visitors clicked on a recommended item link during their session.
Cross-sells are an integral part of user navigation and should be analyzed at the same level as landing page optimization and onsite search results. Some of the key metrics include:
- Total demand from cross-sells and % demand as compared other sections
- Top performing recommended items (Impression-to-Purchase & Click-to-Purchase)
- Top performing recommenders (i.e. which items promote sales of other items)
- Clicks and other clickstream statistics from cross-sell links
By analyzing the causal relationships between items, companies can redefine cross-sell initiatives and drive more revenue. Furthermore, marketers can use enhanced cross-sell information to craft more targeted messaging.
Measuring cross-sell behavior isn't limited to just online retailers. Websites promoting other services can implement the same data collection and analysis strategies. For example, banks can promote specialized services to checking account customers and gain useful insight into which recommended services are most appropriate (or which content areas are good for recommending other services).
In short, companies looking to increase average order size or create a more personalized user experience should re-examine the cross-sell recommendations they make and allocate resources to measure and optimize these recommendations. It may be the most cost-effective strategy to increase site revenue.
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