How to Increase Basket Size in Retail: Proven Strategies to Boost Your Average Sale

Increasing the average basket size is a critical goal for e-commerce businesses aiming for growth. It reflects not only on the volume of products that customers are purchasing but also on the effectiveness of merchandising strategies and sales tactics.
By focusing on fundamental techniques such as upselling and cross-selling, retailers can effectively encourage customers to add more items to their cart, ultimately increasing the average basket size. Additionally, the personalization of customer experiences has taken center stage in today’s market, with data-driven insights paving the way to understanding and influencing consumer behavior.
In this article, we cover the common challenges e-commerce businesses face to increase the average basket size, and proven strategies that’ll help you boost your average sale.
Key Takeaways: How to Increase Your Basket Size
- Increasing basket size is pivotal for revenue growth in e-commerce.
- Personalized shopping experiences appeal to customer preferences.
- Innovative technology is instrumental in improving sales strategies.
What is Basket Size in Retail?
Basket size is a key performance indicator in retail and e-commerce that tracks the number of items a customer purchases in a single transaction. It's a reflection of consumer behavior, indicating the effectiveness of marketing efforts, store layout, and product assortment. Strategically, a larger basket size often correlates with increased sales and revenue, marking it as a critical metric for retailers to monitor and grow.
How to Calculate Basket Size
To measure basket size, divide the total number of items sold by the total number of transactions. This calculation gives a clear picture of what an average customer purchases per visit.
Formula to Calculate Average Basket Size (ABS)
ABS = Total Volume of Sold Products/Total Number of Customer Transactions
For instance, if our platform's data shows that we have sold 200 items over 100 transactions, our average basket size would be 2 items per transaction. Monitoring this number helps us tailor our personalization services to encourage customers to add more products to their baskets, directly influencing sales volumes and revenue.
Common Challenges of Increasing Basket Size
Increasing the basket size is a very common challenge for e-commerce businesses, as it requires a deep understanding of your customers’ behaviors and preferences.
Here are the most common challenges retailers face when trying to increase basket size:
- Inadequate Personalization: Customers expect a personalized shopping experience. Failure to provide such experiences can leave them dissatisfied, affecting basket size growth.
- Poor User Experience: A convoluted or non-intuitive shopping journey may frustrate users, leading to cart abandonment before adding additional items.
- Pricing and Shipping Transparency: Hidden costs or unclear shipping policies can deter customers from adding more items to their basket.
- Limited Payment Options: A lack of diverse payment methods may restrict the customer's ability to purchase more.
- Neglect of Data Utilization: Not leveraging customer data effectively can result in missed opportunities for cross-selling and upselling.
- Failure in Urgency Creation: Without a sense of urgency, customers might postpone buying, thus not increasing the basket size at that moment.
How to Increase Basket Size in Retail
In this section, we'll explore concrete steps to increase basket size in retail and delve into how technology, specifically Clerk.io, can be a catalyst for such growth.
3 Easy Ways to Increase Average Basket Size
Offer Personalized Experiences: Consumers expect personalization in their shopping journey. It's essential to tailor suggestions and promotions to individual consumer preferences to enhance their basket size.
- Implement cross-selling by suggesting complementary products.
- Use up-selling techniques to encourage the purchase of a higher-end product than the one in question.
- Keep essential items stocked to prevent lost sales opportunities. Regularly monitor and replenish inventory.
4 Tools That Will Help You Increase Your Average Basket Size
Boosting basket size is crucial in driving your e-commerce growth, but success depends on more than just knowing the right strategies—it’s about implementing them effectively.
That's why we created 4 easy-to-use tools that’ll help you effortlessly increase your average basket size:
Site Search: Our AI-driven search engine empowers customers to find exactly what they are looking for with efficiency and precision. It is designed to boost sales by improving the search experience on your site with a personal touch. You'll significantly increase customer satisfaction and conversion rates, ultimately leading to an increase in your average basket size.
Product Recommendations: Tailor each customer's shopping experience with personalized product recommendations. This feature adapts to your customers' behavior to increase relevance and encourage additional purchases. Implementing our product recommendations can significantly boost your sales by presenting customers with options they are more likely to buy, enhancing the overall shopping experience and customer retention.
Email Personalization & Automation: Connect with your audience through customized email campaigns that resonate with the individual needs and preferences of each subscriber, leading to improved open and conversion rates. You'll achieve a more targeted outreach, leading to deeper customer engagement and increased effectiveness of marketing campaigns.
Audience Analytics & Insights: Gain a comprehensive understanding of your customers with advanced analytics that inform your strategies and help hone your marketing efforts. With our audience analytics and insights, you'll make data-driven decisions, effectively optimizing marketing strategies and improving customer targeting and retargeting, which in turn can lead to higher conversion rates and enhanced customer loyalty.
How Does Clerk.io Increase Your Basket Size?
We help grow your average basket size with smart strategies that encourage your customers to buy more. By leveraging customer insights, we provide personalized product recommendations they love, making it easy for them to add extra items to their cart.
Check out how our tools helped Eva Solo increase their average basket size by 81%.
Do you want to see how we can impact your basket size directly? Book a free demo now.