Managing Promotions in Shopify: Product Bundling
This is the 4th post in our 5-part blog series exploring the huge returns you can see by using successful ecommerce promotions. Follow them all to get valuable tips on strategically planning promotions and how to execute them in Shopify.
- Price Discounts
- Buy One Get One
- Free Shipping
- Bundling
- Bulk Pricing
We’ll walk you through how to strategically plan each type of promotions, and show you how to execute them all in Shopify. Follow them to get valuable tips for growing your business!
Wine and a corkscrew. A DVD and popcorn. Hiking boots and merino wool socks. These classic bundles are examples of the brilliant promotional strategy called bundling. The idea behind bundling is that ecommerce retailers select several related products to sell together at a combined (and usually discounted) price.
While the idea of bundling is similar to a BOGO promotion in some ways, it introduces more variety and creativity in the product pairings. It’s a great opportunity to push multiple full-price items as a set or remind customers of other products that would complement their intended purchase. Bundling can also put together products in a way that your customers might not have considered, giving them new ideas for making the most out of your products.
And boy, does it work. Forrester Research has noted that product recommendations like bundles are responsible for 10 to 30 percent of ecommerce revenue.
The Benefits Of Product Bundling
From your customer’s perspective, purchasing a bundle is more expensive than just buying the one product they were originally looking for. However, if the bundle combination is on-target it will have a higher perceived value.
For example, a shopper comes to your site looking for a winter hat. While searching, they find a bundle that offers a coordinated hat, gloves and scarf — all for less cost than they’d pay for each item individually. It’s appealing to have winter gear that looks thoughtfully put-together. The customer appreciates the suggestion and is drawn in by the bundled discount. As a result, you’ve increased the customer’s order value and established goodwill that may lead to a greater customer lifetime value.
Product bundling can be a highly successful promotional strategy, creating opportunities to:
- Increase average order value
- Increase margins
- Gain exposure to new customers
- Make comparison shopping more difficult
- Improve the customer experience
Are you feeling inspired to try bundling up some of your best-sellers?
Create a Strategy for Bundling Promotions
There are so many ways to package product bundles (Upstream Commerce has a great little guide with 10 ideas to get you started).
The most basic options are to sell bundled products as:
- An entire package
- Complementary product recommendations while shoppers are browsing (Amazon is the king of this method — think “Frequently Bought Together” or “Customers Who Viewed This Item Also Viewed…”)
- Cross-sell options after products have been added to the cart
The key to bundling is not to jump into it willy-nilly. To see success, you need data to back up your choices. What pairings do your customers already purchase? Analyze your customer data and track product performance. This will help you create informed, strategic bundles that are likely to appeal to your customers.
Tip: Check out Shopify’s little-known feature called Cart Analysis. The cool reporting function provides reporting to help you understand your customers’ shopping behavior.
In addition to what the data tells you, all product bundles should:
- Make sense together
- Represent value to your customer (the bundle price must be lower than the individual products combined)
- Increase your overall margin
And finally, make it easy for customers to understand your bundled offerings. If your business sells a lot of products that can be bundled together, you could create a dedicated page like Sephora does.
Clearly display the promotional value of your bundles so customers immediately see the savings of buying products together. Highlight the amount or percent saved in comparison to the original product prices.
When you have figured out a bundle that you’d like to try offering, here’s how to make it work in your Shopify store…
How to Create a Bundle in Shopify
Shopify’s out-of-the-box functionality doesn’t include bundling, but no worries. We’ve got you covered. One of our favorite Shopify app developers, BOLD, has a Product Bundle app that is easy-to-use and comes with fantastic learning resources for getting you up and running. The Product Bundle app is free for the 30-day trial period, and then is $15.99 per month.
To use Product Bundle:
1. Go to your Shopify admin area and click on “Apps.” Click “Visit App Store” and search for “Product Bundle”. Download the app.
2. For the app to function with your theme, you must install liquid code. If you don’t know how to do this, BOLD provides instructions or will do this part for you.
3. Click “Create New Product Bundles”
4. Enter an internal name and a title (which will be the heading for the bundle in your store).
5. Choose whether you want to bundle specific products together, or whether to bundle collections (for example, customers can choose to bundle any shirt combined with any tie to receive a discount on both).
6. In the section “Select Products or Collections to Include in the Bundle”, click to “Add a Product/Collection”. At the top of the pop-up box are a series of search filters to help you find the specific product or collection you want. Or you can simply look to the “Results” section below and identify the product/collection you want to include in the bundle. Click “Add” and then “Continue with Selected Products”.
7. Add additional products/collections to complete your bundle.
8. Enter the bundle percent off or define a set bundle total dollar figure. The totals for the products you selected above will automatically change to reflect your settings.
9. From the three graphic options provided, choose how you would like your bundle to be displayed.
10. Click “Preview Bundle” to see how your bundle will be displayed. Note that the prices will not be accurate at this point.
11. Click “Create”. (This process may take a few minutes.)
Your new bundle will now appear on the product pages for all of the products or collections that you chose! (If you don’t see the bundle, you may have skipped the initial liquid install; see #2 above).
Using Shopify Scripts to Create Bundles
Shopify Scripts are a bit more complex, requiring in-depth coding. But they can be another great tool for creating bundles for your store. If you’re interested in how scripts could work for your Shopify store, call us! We love any opportunity for a bit of tech-speak (but we promise to take it slow so it doesn’t sound like we’re mumbling gibberish).
Growth Spark is an award-winning, nationwide team that helps e-commerce companies grow by building unique web experiences that convert visitors into customers. We are proud to be an official Shopify Plus Expert and can help you grow your e-commerce business. If you’re interested in learning more give us a shout!
