Business marketing and business sales typically go hand in hand. Virtually, sales are not possible without marketing your products. In other words, to make sales, you would need to engage in marketing activities. We have covered the relationship between sales and marketing in another article.

RELATED: Is there any difference between sales and marketing?

What different sales strategies are available?

Many different sales strategies are available to adopt. A few of them include:

• Product demonstrations: You can choose to demonstrate how your product works or how your services operate. This boosts the authenticity of your product and would attract more attention to your business.

• Making cold calls: This is an attempt to grab the attention of people who have never expressed any interest in your product. You can place calls to their phones seeking to develop their interest in your products and services.

• Upselling

• Cross-selling

In another article, we have discussed the best sales strategies you can employ. These strategies are not only applicable to the end of the year but also to other periods during the year.

This article would however only focus on upselling and cross-selling.

RELATED: Best Sales Strategies for 2022

Reach us on 07034243326 so we can help you determine the best sales strategies to adopt for your business!

Upselling

Upselling is used to describe an attempt by a vendor to convince a customer to request and purchase something more costly compared to the customer's original demand. Generally, it is a technique that is geared at persuading customers to purchase a more expensive, premium, or upgraded version of a chosen product.

For example, a store owner can upsell a customer buying a silver watch by offering a more brilliant gold watch of the same brand. Another example can be seen when a smartphone vendor upsells a customer buying an iPhone X by persuasively offering the customer an iPhone 13 Pro.

Upselling is easier and more effective on existing customers than on new ones. It helps you build stronger and deeper relationships with your customers and a good upsell strategy will always keep customers coming back for more.

Cross-selling

This is a business practice to increase sales, in which businesses try to convince a customer to buy a related and complementary product or service to the original purchase of the customer. For example, the smartphone vendor can convince the customer to purchase a glass screen protector in addition to the iPhone X being purchased.

You would only cross-sell products that satisfy a related need that has not been satisfied by the customer’s original purchase.

Through cross-selling, you can direct the attention of your customers to products that they didn’t know you offered, and this would further boost their confidence in you as a good and caring vendor.

Both upselling and cross-selling are similar as they both try to add more value to the customers, inform the customers of new products (that were previously unavailable), and also employed sales tactics to increase business sales.

What are the differences between upselling and cross-selling?

1. Upselling seeks to add value to the customer by offering a more advanced, expensive, and premium version of the product the customer purchased. Cross-selling aims to add value by offering a complimentary product to the customer's purchase.

2. Upselling would always be possible where a more premium version of the product exists. Where it does not exist, upselling may prove difficult. Cross-selling will always be possible and effective as long as complementary products are available.

Which sales tactic should I use to increase business sales?

Before deciding on the best tactic to use, whether upselling or cross-selling, you must first assess your business products to identify those products which are complementary and can be used together to satisfy a particular need (These are the products you would cross-sell). You would also need to identify those products that are of the same brand and with a little variation in quality/quantity (These are the products you would upsell).

Identifying these products would help you determine the sales tactics to adopt. When you find out that you sell only one product or products that are largely unrelated an upselling tactic would be best.

Generally, however, it is best to adopt both strategies in your business as this would help you widen your product offers and give you more opportunities to make more sales.

Conclusion

Upselling and cross-selling are very important in your business sales, especially where you offer a wide range of both related and unrelated products. Adopting these tactics is a sure way of increasing your business sales and recording more revenue.

At SmartSMSSolutions, we can help you implement upselling and cross-selling sales strategies in your business. We can also help to promote your business brand through SMS marketing. Simply register with us or give us a call on 07034243326.

If you have any questions about upselling and cross-selling, leave us a message at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and we will get back to you.