Tracking your average order value can be important for lots of reasons. Here we’ll guide you through the ins and outs of this metric, and how you can boost AOV within your business…
Understanding how much money your customers are willing to spend on your retail business can be very telling of many things, including how popular your brand is and how well-optimised your website from a conversion perspective. So, how can you use the average order value metric to your advantage and boost sales?
Below, we’ll guide you through everything you need to know about this handy metric, including how to calculate it, the best ways to boost it, and why yours might be decreasing.
Average order value – or AOV – is an e-commerce metric that measures the average total across orders your customers place with you over a defined period. Basically, this just means that you’re able to work out the average amount of money being spent on each order during a specific time window – this could be anything from quarterly to yearly.
This is useful for understanding how much value you’re getting out of your customers and helps businesses see where their ROI and other metrics are coming from.
Ready to calculate your AOV? Simply enter your overall revenue and number of orders in our calculator below…
Essentially, by dividing your total revenue for the period by the number of orders placed, you should be able to work out your average order value.
For example, if your total revenue is £100,000 and 1,000 orders were placed, this would mean that you have an average order value of £100.
Now that you understand what AOV is and how to calculate it, you might be wondering what a good AOV looks like. However, it should come as little surprise that every business will have a different threshold for what they deem to be a desirable average order value.
Whether you’re a start-up or a large business, it’s still important to track this metric and ensure it’s on a steady upturn no matter how big or small the numbers are.
Below, we’ll guide you through five of the best tactics to increase your AOV…
Whether you choose to offer free shipping above a certain order amount, or add on a free gift after customers spend over a certain threshold – there are many tricks you can use around incentives to boost your AOV.
The reason that this tends to work is that retailers use their customer data to inform their decisions about what exactly to offer. For example, if a common frustration is that their customers reach the checkout and find that there’s a shipping charge, then this can be offered for free once customers hit the minimum desired order value.
It’s also important to look at your current average order value to work out what the minimum should be. The best practice is to aim just above your average because while some might be spending above this value, it will encourage others to spend a bit more, too.
Why buy one item when you can buy two and get a discount? This clever technique is used almost everywhere, including online retailers and massive supermarket chains.
From buy-one-get-one-half-price to bulk buying certain items for a percentage off the total, offering volume-based discounts that suit your customers’ needs is a great way to boost your average order value.
Upselling and cross-selling can be tricky territory to navigate. However, if you do your market research and take the time to understand your customer’s buying habits and budget requirements, you should be able to sell them better products at a higher price point.
Be careful in this area, though – since too much upselling and cross-selling can distract customers during the purchase journey and even potentially deter them from completing a transaction.
Forging customer relationships is super important. Setting up things like point-based schemes for returning customers not only builds customer retention but also allows you to evolve alongside changing customer preferences.
For example, the cost-of-living crisis means that customers are less likely to place repeat orders for their favourite products as often. Therefore, it would be beneficial to offer discounts based on previously bought items.
As always, customer service is at the heart of everything in the retail industry. Whether this means boosting the budget on your customer service output or focusing on training your agents – the interactions your customers have with your business can make a huge difference to your AOV.
Make sure your agents have a full understanding of the products, know how to talk positively about them, and can tackle any queries or concerns with efficiency. The more your agents know about what you can offer and how this can benefit the customer, the better your AOV should be because customers will feel that they can trust your business.
AOV decreases can be due to several factors. While your average order value could be declining because you’re not offering incentives, loyalty schemes, or upselling and cross-selling, sometimes it can be out of your control.
External factors like financial crises can have a big impact on average order value simply because your customers don’t want to spend like they used to, or can’t because of financial constraints. The best thing to do in these circumstances is to reach out to your customers in whatever way you can, whether that be through email marketing or social media posts.
Reminding your customers that you’re there and using some of the tactics above where possible could eventually bring your AOV order value back up.
