If you are running an online shop or even a market stall or Etsy shop, you’ll find that pricing is one of the most difficult things to get right, to balance making it profitable for you, but also a price that people are willing to pay. Value is about perception, and there are ways in which big & small businesses frame prices, and build strong brands to increase the perception of value and therefore price. Another way to increase profitability, particularly as material costs are rising, is to use methods to increase the order size rather than just the prices of the items themselves. Here are a few ideas.
Bundling
We’ve touched on this in last week’s article, but partnerships or collaborations can give you options both to increase the reach of your business and give you other products you could bundle together, cross-sell or up-sell. You could also make other products yourself and bundle them together. For example, you could sell a box of cookies and a box of macarons. Or even package them together in the same ‘box’.
Up-selling
You could sell a box of 6 mixed brownies that will cost more than a box of 6 brownies of all the same type. Or up-sell one of your bundles.
Cross-selling
If you are crafty in other areas you could create a new type of product, such as greeting cards and sell them as an add-on to buying a box of cupcakes.
You could also look for complementary products to buy wholesale that your customers would buy with your bake. It’s worth speaking to your existing or potential customers to see what they want. Instagram polls have worked well for many bakers on simple decisions on flavours of new products and so are worth it for new add-on products as well.
Offering free shipping on higher order values
If you post your bakes, you’ll want to either factor in the shipping and packaging cost into your product cost or charge it separately at checkout. One way you can use free shipping offers to encourage people to buy more is to set a minimum order value to qualify for free shipping—a tactic used by many online shops.
Offers
Particularly if you have a market stall or physical shop, offers like ‘buy 1 get 1 half-price’ or ‘buy 3 for £XX’ can increase the average order value whilst providing the customer with a good deal. They’ll get to enjoy more of your delicious bakes! You must make sure you will still make enough to cover your costs though, so be careful with offering discounts.
Loyalty incentives
Have you ever offered your most loyal customers something extra? While this may seem to reduce average order size. You are encouraging loyalty long-term and could offer a discount on an up-sell item or bundle that would increase the average order value overall.
