What is Upselling?

What is Upselling?

Upselling is a selling technique where the seller tries to sell or pitch a higher-value product that is similar to the product which the customer intends to purchase at the moment. This increases the value of the transactions and helps improve the average revenue per transaction. 

This is usually done by proposing a higher version of the product or a similar product with more features compared to the current product under consideration for purchase. The seller tries to drive the customer to understand the value of the higher-priced products so that they purchase them. 



An example of Upselling

Let us take the same Laptop purchase example discussed in our last post on Cross-selling.

Assume that you went to purchase a Laptop from an electronics store. The seller asked about your need for buying the laptop. You explained to him that you need it for your work. The seller tries to understand your context deeper by trying to delve deeper. He inquires about the type of work you would do. He gets to know that you are a Software Engineer and would require a higher-end version of the laptop in the future for better performance. 

Then the seller tries to propose to you to buy an enhanced version of the laptop with more features and capabilities compared to the one which you had initially planned. He tries to explain to you the features of the higher-priced laptop and the value which you may get buying it. You find the discussion convincing enough to purchase the higher-value laptop and finally purchase it. 

This way the seller was able to improve his revenue of the transaction and you as a customer were also able to derive a better deal in terms of value.


How does Upselling help?

  • Upselling helps to increase the revenue of the organization
  • Upselling helps the customer to get more value out of his purchase transaction. Customers usually agree to purchase the higher version of the product keeping their context and future in mind. Many customers buy high-value products by foreseeing the future Return on Investment (RoI).
  • Upselling also helps the seller build a better relationship with their customers.
  • Upselling is usually easier compared to another selling technique of Cross-selling. This is because customers are more likely to purchase a similar yet high-value and high-priced product compared to buying an add-on product which happens in the case of cross-selling. 


What is Cross Selling?

What is Cross Selling?

Cross-selling is a Selling technique in which the seller tries to sell an additional product or service to the customer in addition to the core product which the customer intended to purchase. 

This is done by trying to sell related products as per the context of the customer. With this approach, the seller is able to make additional revenue and at the same time customer is able to derive more value from the purchase transaction.



An Example of Cross-Selling

Let us try to understand this technique with the help of an example.

Let’s say you went to an Electronics store to buy a laptop. When you meet the sales executive, he shall ask you about your needs and the purpose for which you will be using your laptop. During your discussion, you mentioned that you require a laptop for office work.

After a while, you finalized one laptop for purchase at the store. Now during that time, the salesperson may propose to cross-sell another related product say a mouse or a headset which will prove to be helpful to you as part of your office work. This way seller tries to match your needs by trying to cross-sell a few additional products or services.

Seller may also offer some discount on the additional products being sold. For example, they may offer complementary antivirus software or laptop warranty services at discounted prices. This way as a customer you may also be able to get more value out of the price paid, otherwise, you might have bought it separately without much of a discount.


How Cross-Selling helps?

Cross-selling helps both the seller as well as the customer.

The seller gets to improve his organization’s revenue and also build a deeper relationship with the customer by providing more value for their buck.

Similarly, the customer also benefits by saving time and money which they might have spent exploring the other related products themselves later.

Contrary to what a newbie salesperson might think, Salesperson, should not hesitate to try to cross-sell add-on products and services to the customer. Cross-sell can be very helpful to the customer if the salesperson is genuinely interested in adding value to the customer.


What is Sales Velocity & How to calculate it?

What is Sales Velocity?

Sales velocity is one of the Key Performance Indicator (KPI) of your sales performance. As the name suggests, it tells you how fast are you generating revenue. It denotes how fast your leads are moving through your opportunity pipeline to actual conversion.

Measuring Sales velocity can help you understand how fast is your sales process to close deals. How certain process change in your team is affecting your sales performance. It can also be used as a benchmarking median score for comparing individual reps' performance so that you can try to mentor your team accordingly.


How to calculate Sales Velocity?

To calculate Sales Velocity, you need to have 4 data handy:

1. No. of Deal Opportunities
2. Average Deal Value
3. Win Rate
4. Average Length of Sales Cycle

All the above data can be easily retrieved from your CRM. If you are not using a CRM yet for your sales. Do try ToolsonCloud Sales CRM today.

Once you are ready with the above data, you can just plug in the data to the formula of Sales Velocity.

Sales Velocity = (Opportunities x Deal Value x Win Rate) / (Length of Sales Cycle)




How to improve Sales Velocity?

As you can infer from the formula, there are 4 levers to improve your Sales Velocity. Try pulling any one lever and it can skyrocket your sales velocity.

  • It can be increased by increasing your opportunity pipeline.
  • It can be increased by increasing your deal size.
  • It can also be increased if you try channelizing your efforts to increase your deal win rates.
  • It can be increased if you try accelerating your sales cycle to reduce the sales process duration.

Hope you liked reading this post. Feel free to share your thoughts.

Btw, ToolsonCloud CRM can help you with sales team performance reports and metrics. Do check out sign up for your free ToolsonCloud CRM account and boost your sales productivity.
Glossary of important Sales Terms

Hey folks, I keep hearing from newbie sales professionals that they get stunned hearing some new sales jargon every day and are sometimes left blank when they get asked about those from their bosses.

So, Here is the compilation of some Important Sales Acronyms that came to my mind instantly.

6 Proven Ways for Sales Suspecting
You might have read multiple articles on Sales Prospective guide, but this post is about Sales Suspecting. 

Yes, you heard it right! In this post, we shall explore 6 Proven Ways for sales suspecting.
What is Topline and Bottomline in Sales?
Hey friends, If you recently took up a role in Sales, then you would have frequently heard the two terms Topline and Bottomline from your executive level bosses. If you want know what are those, you have come to the right place.

These two Business Jargons have simpler meaning than they appear to be. Let me tell you what do they mean.

In any business, while you are doing sales, you would make revenue by selling something. Obviously, Once you sell the products or services, you cannot keep the whole revenue with yourself or organization. Major chunk of that revenue goes towards meeting the cost of making the product, income taxes, hr and administration costs involved in managing staff, etc. After deducting all these operating expenses and taxes, what we are left with is the net profit or net income which we can keep which belongs to shareholders and if they wish to, can be invested further into the business.

In this case, the revenue which you generate on making sales is called Topline and the net profit or net income which you generated after deducting all operating expenses and taxes from the revenue is what is known as Bottomline.

Whenever business executives discuss their financials, they monitor these two numbers very closely. Increasing Topline is one of the priority for them to increase the organization growth. However, with this they cannot ignore Bottomline growth because, if they are not left with enough cash after selling products and services, the business cannot survive for long and is not sustainable for long. 

Hence both the metrics should be monitored together since both go hand in hand for a sustainable growth of business.
What is RFI, RFP and RFQ in B2B Sales
Often, Sales Professionals in B2B Direct Sales would come across these 3 important sales terminologies.

1. RFI
2. RFP
3. RFQ