In recent years, the wholesale distribution industry has experienced a significant shift toward eCommerce. With the advent of digital sales channels, wholesale distributors are presented with unprecedented opportunities to improve operational efficiency and drive growth. One of these areas is the ability to maximize average order value (AOV) – the average amount of money customers spend on an order. By employing these five eCommerce strategies, wholesale distributors can significantly boost their AOV and overall revenue:
Personalized Recommendations
Digital commerce platforms provide wholesale distributors with valuable customer data, including purchase history and browsing behavior. Using analytics tools, distributors can gain valuable insights from this data to offer personalized recommendations to customers such as related or complementary products based on their previous purchases. These targeted suggestions not only increase the chances of cross-selling but also encourage customers to add more items to their cart.
Volume Discounts and Bundling
eCommerce platforms enable wholesale distributors to implement dynamic pricing strategies with ease. By promoting and displaying volume discounts, bundling options, and free shipping directly on their eCommerce site, distributors can incentivize customers to buy more items and benefit from cost savings, thus increasing their AOV. Instant price markdowns also eliminate the need for customers to pick up the phone and negotiate a better price.
Up-Selling and Product Tiering
eCommerce platforms provide an ideal environment for implementing up-selling and product tiering techniques. Wholesale distributors can strategically display higher-priced or premium products alongside lower-priced options, highlighting the added value and benefits. Up-selling gives distributors the ability to showcase a premium product’s benefits over the customer’s current product using online product comparisons. With the help of rich product descriptions and specifications, customers will be able to make an educated decision that justifies trying the suggested up-sell item.
Cross-Selling and Related Product Promotions
Sophisticated eCommerce platforms enable wholesale distributors to promote related products and cross-sell during the checkout process. Recommend additional or complementary items to help simplify the customer shopping experience and remind them of additional products they may need. Another way to effectively cross-sell products is by showing additional purchases made by other customers who bought a similar product. It gives customers a chance to see what others in their industry are buying and may even spark additional product purchases. Cross-selling techniques not only enhance customer satisfaction by offering a complete solution but also contribute to the distributor’s bottom line.
Minimum Quantities on Orders
Setting minimum order quantities is an easy way to increase AOV in wholesale distribution. Establish a threshold for minimum order quantities to encourage customers to add more items to meet the requirement and secure their order. With up-selling and cross-selling measures in place, most customers have no trouble meeting the minimum order quantity. Additionally, this approach helps streamline operations and optimize logistics by reducing the number of small, low-value orders.
Summary
As a distributor, applying these tactics to increase AOV with your eCommerce platform enables you to drive larger orders, deliver better customer experiences, and make it easier to get more out of every transaction.
Don’t underestimate the power of AOV. It plays a key role in the site optimization equation, a simple formula that calculates just how much revenue your digital branch is producing for you. By increasing any one of the three variables in the formula – sessions, conversion rate, and AOV – you can significantly impact your online profits. To learn more, read Unilog’s 3-part blog series called 3 Metrics that Directly Impact eCommerce Revenue. Part 1 breaks down the sessions variable, Part 2 explains conversion rate, and Part 3 highlights AOV.