Michael Campbell 
Upselling. It's the old... "Would you like fries with that?" Do it right and you'll increase sales by as much as 40%. Do it at the wrong time and you'll blow the whole deal. Here's how to avoid one of the biggest marketing blunders of all time.
It's no secret that fast food joints spend millions of dollars in research. What they discovered was, if they upsold at the time the order was placed... Would you like a drink with that today? How about fries sir? By doing so, sales increased greatly, sometimes as much as 40% of the total order.
But they also learned that timing is critical. Never say a word during the money exchange. Once the enter key is hit on the cash register, the total announced and the cash handed over, there is a legal contract in place. Buyer agrees to pay seller said price for said goods. Change is given and the buyer is wished a good day and encouraged to come again soon.
In the dirt world, the upsell takes place at the time of the actual order. This is the equivalent of placing the upsell on the order form. This works in the dirt world and for commodities like CDs and books. But never ask for an upsell on the order form, when you're selling a digitally delivered information product. You'll lose more customers than you'll keep.
Think of it. You've already done all the hard work. You got the visitor to your site. Your sales letter converted them from prospect to customer. They have their credit card in hand, ready to buy, they click the order form, suddenly see multiple products listed, instead of the one on the sales letter...
Woop! Woop! Shields up! Red alert! The whole process comes to a screeching halt. You blow the deal and the customer abandons the order form, never to be seen again.
So what went wrong? You lost their trust.
When a customer sees additional products at the last second, especially with info products, they're wondering what you're "not" telling them. If there is a gold and silver version available as well, be sure to tell them before they get to the order form, or offer it as an upgrade at a later date.
When you have multiple versions, best results will come when you tell them on the actual sales letter itself. Spell out the benefits of each level - bronze, silver, gold - and tell the prospect exactly what they can expect at the order form. But never upsell on the order form, or thank you for ordering page.
(Same deal goes any time there are additional products required, in order to make yours work... in other words, don't promise a car, when all you really deliver is the engine. Or another biggie is, don't promise f r e e shipping, then surprise them at the order form, it's only on orders over a certain dollar value.)
Remember, when it comes to actual payment on the order form, to grease the chute as much as possible. Minimize the steps. Remove all friction from the buying process. Get the money first, then soft sell, or recommend additional products, that are directly related to the one the customer just purchased.
Some marketers find increased sales by having upsells on the thank you for ordering page. They list up to four additional - but related - products. The logic being, the customer just purchased from you, trusts you, still have their credit card in hand, and are four times more likely to continue shopping.
But I found that, if you give a password on the thank you for ordering page, it's not a good idea to list additional products on that same page. If you do upsell on the thank you page, be sure to tell the customer how to bookmark the page, or add it to favorites, so they can find it again later.
When I had additional products on my thank you page, many people lost the download link to my product, creating a lot of customer service for me. There were also more returns and complaints about me trying to sell them, "so many other things."
When I cleaned my thank you for ordering page to nothing but the username, password and download link, I found that it immediately reduced customer support and refund requests.
After testing and tracking each step of the process, I decided to move the upsell into my product download area. It was only after I proved that I could deliver my digital product, that people trusted me and were "four times" more likely to purchase an additional product related to mine.
It also allowed a much softer sell of the related goods through product reviews. I found that once customers downloaded my PDF ebook and had it safely on their hard drive, they were far more likely to stay on my download page and read about the additional offers.
So even though you've seen it done a million times before - asking for additional sales at the time of the order - it's great for fast food and commodities, but never ever do it with digital products. Either tell them ahead of time on the sales letter, on the thank you page, or better yet... wait until the download area.
What's on your order form? Are you upselling? Is you're timing right? Are you greasing the chute and removing all friction from the buying process? Are you soft selling in your download area? Try it, and your sales could go up... way up. And who doesn't want more sales?
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