Cross-selling: How, when, where?

at what point in the shopping experience is this effectiv?

[tolachi]

I'm trying to figure out at what point to start cross selling. The shopping cart seems like the best place to sell impulse buy items. On product pages you can cross sell to items that would work well with that product. What about the level above that though. The customer has clicked through the home page to Men's and then to widgets. Should I be cross selling Men's wodgets in my sidebar at this point or should I be dedicate every bit of space to getting the customer to go a specific widget product page and not worry about cross selling for now?

I'm sure that there is no absolute truth in this situation, but I would really appreciate hearing about anybody's experience experimenting with cross selling.

[sun818]

My opinion is that cross selling before a customer has put an item in the shopping cart is noise. I like it when other relevant products are offered to me after I add a product to the shopping cart. If I need batteries or an accessory for that product, I want an opportunity to review my options at that point.

[CernyM]

It likely depends on your product line.

Though, it should be noted that Amazon cross sells all over the place - at basically every opportunity.

Clothing retailers also do a lot of cross-selling both before and after the shopping cart. Apparel sellers show what items coordinate well with the item being viewed, etc.

We do all of our cross selling prior to the cart (our current cart has limited functionality and is incapable of cross selling). We sell apparel, and definitely notice that customers will often buy the outfits we suggest via cross selling. Our basic theory was that we almost certainly have something that targeted visitors to our site will want. Cross selling gives us more opportunities to show them the piece that they may want.