Top 20 Ways to Increase Average Order Value (AOV) for Ecommerce

Looking to see where your online sales strategy stacks up? When it comes to selling online there are a handful of key metrics that any online retailer should understand how to analyze. Not only can these metrics show how effective their current selling strategies are, but they can also help get a glimpse into consumer behaviour.

One of the most popular KPIs for ecommerce is called average order value (AOV). Like most metrics, AOV is not a perfect snapshot. AOV should be considered alongside other metrics, and in context, in order to get the full picture. But regardless of its imperfections, it’s generally accepted that if a business can increase AOV, it will increase revenue. And for that reason, adopting new tactics and strategies for increasing the average order value is important for all ecommerce brands. Keep reading to discover how to increase average order value for your business.

What is the Average Order Value (AOV)?

The average order value is exactly as it sounds—the average value of all online purchases made on a website over a set period of time. It’s a simple metric that can be found in the reporting section of any ecommerce platform. For example, if sales for the month were $30,000 and there were 300 customers who checked out, the average order value was $100.

Average Order Value = Total Sales Revenue / Number of Orders

In recent years, ecommerce experts have shifted their way of thinking about AOV. Instead of looking just at the average value of all orders, they encourage looking at the most frequent order value—or, the mode. (Remember that from math class?) To get a more clear picture of consumer behaviour and to develop better upselling strategies, ecommerce brands must know what the most frequent order value is, along with the “traditional” AOV.

How Can I Increase Average Order Value for Ecommerce?

From a hypothetical view, increasing AOV is as straightforward as building a brand with which customers have a trusting relationship. Customers will spend more money with brands that they trust; it really is that simple. Establishing a high customer lifetime value takes time and quality interactions (and of course, quality products or services, too). For example, think of a helpful and personable retail attendant bringing more clothing to a fitting room for someone to try on in real life. These kinds of interactions help build a relationship and also lead to more thoughtful and personalized purchases.

Now, what if ecommerce brands could translate these kinds of customer engagements to the online space? It would no doubt help build brand loyalty, and ultimately, increase AOV. Better AOV

There are two ways that ecommerce brands in the retail space can have more meaningful customer interactions and effectively build brand loyalty. We believe these are essential CX strategies for ecommerce brands looking to increase average order value in 2023.

1. Offer live shopping on demand

Through on-site live shopping, also called live video co-shopping, customers still get the convenience of researching and browsing products online on their own schedule but get the trusted guidance they’ve come to expect from shopping in-store. Customers can connect to a live retail associate, on demand. They interact in a one-to-one live setting when the customer needs or wants to—whether they’re looking for help, need some guidance, or are about to make a purchase. With live video co-shopping experience, live shopping associates can range from retail employees to personal shoppers to brand superfans.

Example: GhostRetail clients have reported metrics of 12x the standard conversion rates and 40% higher AOV. Live shopping associates can send products over to a customer, including the specific variants they may want, and even add them to the cart. This makes for more personalized and meaningful product recommendations, ultimately increasing average order value.

2. Offering personal shopping via appointment

Some customers may want to book an appointment for their online curated personal shopper experience. With platforms like GhostRetail, brands can leverage their existing customer service staff to take appointments for one-on-one video calls, meet customer needs, and humanize the online shopping experience. It's as simple as replacing a link to a video chat service, like Zoom or Google Hangouts, with a link to GhostRetail's video co-shopping experience.

20 Quick Tips for Increasing AOV

While live video shopping isn oen of the best strategies for increasing average order value, it's not the only one. There are a number of other proven tactics for ecommerce businesses looking to increase AOV that are worth looking at.

These 20 practical tips to increase AOV in ecommerce don’t require a big investment and most can be implemented quickly.

Highlight user-generated social content. Let customers easily gain access to organic social content that is shared by real customers. This helps them to trust the brand and products they’re considering buying. This content can range from social media posts to more traditional reviews or testimonials.
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Bundles or gift sets. Creating bundles of items at a price point that costs less than if the items were purchased individually is a super effective way to get customers to order more items. A product bundle helps to increase the “perceived value” of the purchase. Make sure the bundles logically make sense, like matching up accessories to a specific product, which the customer was probably thinking about grabbing anyway.
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Offer a free shipping threshold. This one really works to drive up total revenue. To calculate the free shipping threshold, a business must figure out the modal order value (most common order value or average amount spent) and then bump it up slightly, but not too much, for a customer to get free shipping. For example, if the modal order value is $25, the free shipping threshold should be offered on orders over $40. With this type of incentive, many shoppers will add something else instead of opting to pay for shipping, helping to drive revenue growth and giving customers a real incentive to try out more products.
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BOGO promotions. Everyone loves getting something for free! Offering a buy-one-get-one-free promotion on a certain item can help encourage customer behavior to stock up and spend more money while the sale lasts, boosting AOV even despite the free items.
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Experiment with website copy. How the website sounds (tone, voice, style, copy placement, etc) plays a major role in guiding customers to make a purchase. Experiment with different headlines, CTAs, and descriptions to see what works best.
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Upsells and cross-sells. Making product recommendations based on other retail purchases on ecommerce websites is a fantastic way to boost AOV. Sometimes the customer is unaware there may be a complementary product to what’s already in the cart or a past purchase, or perhaps there’s a way to upsell them on a higher-tier item that they didn’t know existed. Try adding upsells and cross-sells to the product page, in an add-to-cart pop-up, or even in the cart or at checkout.
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Personalized recommendations and offers. You’ll often see personalized product recommendations based on other retail purchases. This is a smart way to make customers feel like the brand understands their unique tastes and style to recommend the best buy for their needs, helps build brand loyalty, and drive a higher average order value.
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Easy and / or free returns. Customers won’t be as hesitant to purchase a few more items they’re considering if they know that the return process isn’t a hassle. Offering easy and free returns is a surefire way to bump up AOV and hopefully get customers hooked on a new product to mitigate the likelihood of returns and drive max customer loyalty.
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Loyalty programs. Ecommerce businesses that sell consumable products (something that needs to be continually repurchased) should absolutely set up a loyalty program. These programs are part of an overall customer retention strategy, to help build brand loyalty and ongoing relationships with customers that will use your products in the long term, increasing AOV.
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Better customer support. For ecommerce businesses to increase AOV they must look at how helpful they are in guiding customers to make purchases. Certain indicators like conversion rate and cart abandonment, along with AOV, can give a clearer picture of where online shoppers are dropping off. Businesses looking to improve customer support may consider tools like live chatbots, live video co-shopping, better help or FAQ pages, and contact phone numbers or emails.
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Gift with purchase. This is a simple marketing campaign to drive more sales, but it can work like a charm. Just offering a buying incentive like a free gift or gift card with the purchase can be enough for many people to hit the checkout. The free shipping threshold type of strategy can work here, too, only instead of offering free shipping, you offer a gift or gift card for purchases above a certain value or with a certain total number of products purchased.
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Offers in the cart or at checkout. Customers may have loaded up their carts but aren’t quite sure about pulling the trigger. In order to target website visitors who want to buy, but need a push, businesses can have special offers on what’s already in the cart, or right on the checkout screen. Bonus points if the offer encourages customres to add an additional product to their order.
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Post-purchase upsells/cross-sells. This great little tactic involves sending a follow-up email or text with an exclusive offer. The offer may be a discount price on a related product to what they just purchased, or maybe just a straight-up “thank you” discount code usable for the next 30 days. By personalizing the offer, you're that much more likely to create loyal customers.
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Offer a price-match guarantee. What stops some customers from making an online purchase is the thought of paying a higher price when they didn’t have to. By assuring customers that they will not lose money on this purchase they are more likely to feel comfortable hitting the checkout. Outline the price match guarantee and how it applies (make it easy to do).
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Offer payment plans for higher-priced items. This one is becoming more and more popular but is a great way to gently push online shoppers into buying higher-priced items. Using a reasonable interest rate (or going interest-free), offer financing for customers by the way of monthly payments.
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Abandoned cart email campaigns. Sometimes online shoppers just need the tiniest push to commit to a purchase. Maybe they ran out of time, maybe they got distracted by something else, or maybe the price point was just a little too high. Sending them a gentle reminder with a limited-time discount on that item might be just what they needed to make that purchase after all.
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Be strategic with web design. The way that higher-priced items, programs, or services can be highlighted on an online store makes an impression on customers. By drawing attention to the higher-priced items using captivating web design, they will get more attention from online shoppers.
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Offer free trials. For ecommerce businesses that offer prescription-based services, offering a free trial goes a long way in building brand loyalty and converting a new customer into a long-term customer.
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Limited time offers. This tried-and-true strategy creates a sense of urgency around the purchase and helps encourage customers to buy now. These can focus on holidays, seasons or limited-stock items.
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Exit-intent pop-ups. When a customer is about to leave a website, a pop-up window with a special offer can entice them to stay and make the purchase. These generally offer a discount on their purchase or a free gift—just enough to make them reconsider.

What is the AOV for my industry?

To truly analyze where an ecommerce AOV stacks up, it’s essential to look at the industry averages. These should be taken into consideration alongside a company’s unique selling and revenue goals. According to Little Data, here’s what the average AOV looks like for a few key ecommerce fields.

All Shopify websites - $70
Beauty - $70
Health & fitness - $76
Fashion - $97
General ecommerce (US) - $97
Home & garden - $353

What’s Stopping your AOV from Increasing

In our recent blog post called Foolproof Tactics for any Business to Increase Online Sales, we touched on why many ecommerce businesses are seeing a drop in sales. In that post, we dove into factors like increased competition, higher Google Ads and other acquisition channel costs, supply chain issues, inflation, the impending recession and unemployment rates. These are factors beyond the control of businesses but are important to consider when analyzing sales and AOV.

Other impediments to increasing online sales revolve around ecommerce companies simply failing to stay ahead of the curve. In 2023 it is imperative to consider adopting more flexible ecommerce store tech, know how to compete with the return of in-store shopping and truly invest in improving CX and customer support overall. Check it out to learn more and read the list of tactics.

Conclusion

At the end of the day, whether you're starting out with a fledgling Shopify store or managing demand or retention for a major ecommerce brand, increasing AOV, in the long run, relies on making meaningful interactions with customers, developing relationships and earning brand loyalty. We believe that to do this, retail ecommerce companies must get hyper-focused on providing the best and most personalized cutomer experience in a highly competitive environment. Exploring the newest tech and smartest ways to connect with customers is part of becoming a CX leader in the ecommerce space. GhostRetail exists in order to help merchants achieve this next-level standard of ecommerce customer experience.

If you’re curious about offering live video co-shopping to build up your repeat customer base, connect with the GhostRetail team today and we'll show you what it’s all about. Video co-shopping with GhostRetail makes it easy to connect customers with real, live, in-store salespeople who know the products and can help shoppers make meaningful purchases. It helps shoppers through conversion stumbling blocks, increasing sales and boosting brand loyalty.

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Ecommerce