For many creators, digital products are an additional source of passive revenue to scale their online business. In 2020 alone, over 2 billion consumers purchased digital products. So, when done right, creators can make hundreds, if not thousands, of additional income from selling these digital products. However, many creators miss out on an opportunity to generate extra income and build a deeper connection with their audience.
By upselling digital products to an already invested audience, creators can provide their audience with additional resources and access to them, which can help them get more tailored and deeper support they are willing to pay for.
This guide will share best practices for upselling digital products.
Upselling vs. Cross-Selling
An important distinction to make is between upselling and cross-selling. Both upselling and cross-selling are “suggestive selling,” a sales technique that encourages customers to buy additional products or services based on their current purchase. However, upselling is how creators can build more sustainable revenue streams and deepen relationships with their audience.
Upselling is an offer that maximizes customer satisfaction and value by suggesting an offer that provides more value than the current offer. For example, if you are selling an online course, you could upsell to your customer by offering 1-1 coaching to go along with the course. Another example would be if you sold an e-book, you could upsell access to your Delphi clone so that the customer can have additional support to ask your clone questions or to clarify concepts. It’s adding value to another product.
Cross-selling is an offering of a compatible product or service. For example, if you sell Canva Instagram carousel templates, you could cross-sell Canva Instagram reel templates. Another example would be if you were to sell access to your premium content about building a workout routine, you could cross-sell access to your premium content about creating a nutritional plan. It’s giving you something else that you might want.
Types of Digital Product Upsells:
Identifying which digital products you can upsell with a current offering is important. Here are some examples of digital products that can be upsells:
Advanced Courses, Templates, or Ebooks: You can upsell more in-depth or niche courses, templates, or ebooks to customers who bought entry-level or beginner products from you.
Access to You: You can upsell direct access to yourself via 1-1 calls or indirect access to you via your Delphi clone or a community membership.
Know Your Audience:
To properly upsell, you need to know your audience. Market research data can provide the insights you need to find which offerings make the most sense. It can also offer insights into your audience’s deeper emotions, thoughts, and desires.
You can conduct market research manually by taking a deep dive into your social media analytics and insights.
Start by asking yourself:
- Why are my customers a part of my community?
- What is my customer’s desired outcome?
- What do my customers struggle with?
- Why did my customers invest in my current offering?
- What areas do my customers need additional support?
- What challenges could my customers face after investing in my current offering?
Next, take a look at:
- Age Demographic: What is the age range of your audience? What challenges does that age group face? What life stage are they at? What pressures does this age group often face?
- Gender: Does your audience skew towards one gender or the other? If so, are there specific challenges that that gender faces? What peer pressures is this gender challenged with?
- Interests: What is your audience interested in? What do these interests say about your audience? Which of your current offerings is speaking to those interests?
- Geography: Where is your audience based? Are they in cities? Are they in different countries? Are there specific challenges to where they live?
- Content Engagement: What content tends to get the most engagement? What content drives the most traffic for sales? Are there recurring themes or stories in that content? Why do you think that content resonated with your audience to get them to engage or buy?
To automate your marketing research, you can leverage your Delphi clone. Your clone analyzes interactions, tracks what topics or questions pop up frequently in its chat, and even gauges the sentiment behind responses. Your clone also allows you to get real-time, data-driven insights into what your audience is genuinely interested in or concerned about. From there, your clone can assist you in tailoring your content or products more effectively to meet your audience’s needs.
Optimize Your Sales Funnel:
The last thing you have to do when upselling is optimize your upsell into your sales funnel.
Sales Page: Ensure that your sales page includes the upsell. This could be a bundled offering or a pop-up screen asking the customer if they want to add the upsell to their cart after adding a product.
Checkout Page: Make it easy to add an upsell by adding the upsell on the checkout page. This could look like an easy-to-click option on the checkout page to add the upsell to a customer’s cart.
Email Marketing: Tailor your email marketing to your current customers to offer the upsell to them. This could look like sending them an email with the offered upsell 2 weeks after they purchased a course or sending them a private invitation to join your customers’ only community.
Clone: Set your Delphi clone to offer upsells if a user frequently engages in specific topics. For example, if a user continuously asks about weightlifting tips, it will trigger your clone to offer its premium subscription, giving your customer access to your gym, health and wellness tips, or other products and services related to health, naturally into the conversation.
Upselling Digital Products is a Win-Win:
Upselling digital products helps creators to build more stable online businesses and stronger relationships with their audience. If you have questions about upselling digital products or creating your Delphi clone to help you upsell, ask our Co-Founder Dara’s clone for support.