Getting more visitors is hard and getting them to buy is harder. So once someone is already checking out, it makes sense to help them buy a little more. If you want to know how to increase average order value, the good news is that most of the levers are settings and page changes you control today: a smarter free shipping threshold, a couple of bundles, one well-placed add-on, and a follow-up email.
By the end of this guide you'll know your real average order value (AOV), have a target, and have a short list of changes you can ship this week and measure over the next month. The examples use an online store, but the same ideas apply to SaaS plans and service packages.
What you'll need
- An export of the last 90 days of orders, with line items (Shopify, WooCommerce, Stripe, and most platforms can do this) - A spreadsheet - Access to edit your product pages, cart, shipping settings, and email tool - About one focused day spread across the week
How to increase average order value in 8 steps
### Step 1: Calculate your real AOV and set a target
**Time: 30 minutes.**
AOV is revenue divided by number of orders. Use revenue after discounts and leave out refunded orders, or the number will flatter you.
Then look one level deeper:
- **Median order value.** Sort orders by total and find the middle one. If a few big orders pull the average up, the median tells you what a typical customer actually spends. - **Order clusters.** Group orders into $10 buckets and count them. Most stores have a clear cluster, for example lots of orders between $30 and $45. - **Segments.** Compare new vs. returning customers and mobile vs. desktop. Returning customers usually spend more, which tells you where the easy wins are.
Set a realistic target: a 10–15% lift over 60 days is a solid first goal. To see what that's worth in money, plug your traffic, conversion rate, and order value into the free [ROI Calculator](https://www.rankreactor.ai/tools#roi-calculator). For example, 400 orders a month at a $42 AOV is $16,800. Raising AOV by $5 adds $2,000 a month without a single extra visitor.
### Step 2: Find what customers already buy together
**Time: 1 hour.**
Your order history already tells you which products belong together. In your line-item export:
1. Keep only orders with two or more items. 2. List every pair of products that appear in the same order. 3. Count how often each pair shows up and sort from highest to lowest.
Your top 5–10 pairs become the raw material for bundles and cross-sells. Also check which products returning customers buy on their *second* order within 30 days. Those are natural "you might also need" items.
If you're new and don't have much data, use common sense: what does someone need to actually use the main product? Refills, cases, filters, a matching accessory, a setup service.
### Step 3: Set a free shipping threshold just above your typical order
**Time: 1 hour.**
A free shipping threshold is the simplest AOV lever there is, and it only works if it's set in the right place.
- Set it roughly **15–30% above your median order value**. If your median is $38, try $45 or $49. Set it too high and people give up; set it too low and you give away shipping on orders that would have happened anyway. - Check the math. The extra margin on the added spend should cover your average shipping cost. - Show progress in the cart: "You're $7 away from free shipping." Put the same message in the site header so people see it before they reach the cart. - Make it easy to close the gap. Keep a few useful low-cost items ($5–$15) in the cart so shoppers have something to add.
### Step 4: Build two or three bundles
**Time: 2–3 hours.**
Take the top pairs from Step 2 and turn them into bundles.
- **Price the bundle 10–15% below buying the items separately**, and show both prices so the saving is obvious. - **Name it for the outcome**, not the parts: "Weekend Starter Kit" works better than "Product A + Product B." - **Give each bundle its own product page** with real photos of everything included, and link to it from the main product page. - **Add quantity tiers** for consumables: "Buy 2, save 10%" or "3-pack" options right next to the single-item price.
Start with two or three bundles. A page with fifteen bundle options is just more to scroll past.
### Step 5: Add one relevant cross-sell on the product page and in the cart
**Time: 1–2 hours.**
Cross-sells work when they feel like help, not a sales pitch. A few rules keep them useful:
- **Relevant:** it should complement what's already in the cart. - **Cheaper:** aim for an add-on under about a quarter of the main item's price. A $12 add-on next to a $60 item is an easy yes; a second $60 item is a new buying decision. - **One click:** shoppers should be able to add it without leaving the page. - **One at a time:** one suggestion on the product page and one in the cart is plenty. Three pop-ups in a row hurt conversion.
A post-purchase offer on the thank-you page is also worth testing, because the main sale is already done.
Upsell and bundle apps often add scripts that slow your pages down. After you install one, run your product and cart pages through the free [Site Auditor](https://www.rankreactor.ai/tools#site-auditor) and compare the speed results with what you had before. A higher AOV doesn't help if fewer people get to checkout.
### Step 6: Make the higher-value option the easy choice
**Time: 1 hour.**
When people pick between options, how you lay them out matters.
- **Offer three tiers** where it makes sense (small/medium/large, or basic/standard/premium) and make the middle one the obvious pick. - **Default to the better-value size** in the product page selector, as long as it's honest. It should be the size most customers end up buying anyway. - **Show unit price** ("$0.80 per serving vs. $1.10") so the bigger option is clearly the better deal. - **Explain the difference in plain words.** "Lasts about 3 months" beats a list of specs.
For SaaS, the same idea means showing annual pricing with the monthly equivalent, highlighting the plan most customers need, and explaining each tier by what the customer can do with it.
### Step 7: Use email to raise the value of the next order
**Time: 1–2 hours.**
AOV isn't only about the first checkout. Set up two simple automated emails:
1. **Complete-the-set email**, 7–14 days after purchase, suggesting the item most often bought with what they ordered (from Step 2). 2. **Replenishment reminder** for consumables, timed to when they'll run out, with a bundle or multi-pack as the main offer.
When you do run a promotion, use a threshold ("$10 off orders over $75") instead of a sitewide percentage off. A threshold pushes people to add items; a flat percentage just lowers what you earn on orders you'd have gotten anyway.
### Step 8: Change one thing at a time and measure for two weeks
**Time: 15 minutes a week.**
Write down your AOV, median order value, conversion rate, and gross margin before each change. Then ship one change, wait two weeks (or at least 100 orders), and compare.
Watch conversion rate as closely as AOV. If AOV goes up 8% but conversion drops 10%, you're making less money. Keep the changes that raise revenue per visitor and drop the ones that don't.
Common mistakes to avoid
- **Discounting everything.** Sitewide sales train customers to wait and often lower AOV. - **A threshold that's too far away.** If free shipping needs a 70% bigger cart, most shoppers won't bother. - **Irrelevant recommendations.** "Customers also bought" blocks that show random bestsellers feel like noise. - **Stacking pop-ups and widgets.** Every extra step and script adds friction and slows the page. - **Ignoring margin.** A bundle that sells well but loses money on every order isn't a win. - **Looking only at the average.** A few big wholesale orders can hide that typical orders didn't change. Track the median too.
What to do this week
- [ ] Export 90 days of orders and calculate AOV and median order value - [ ] Set a 60-day AOV target and put a dollar value on it - [ ] List your top 5 product pairs from order data - [ ] Set a free shipping threshold 15–30% above your median and add a cart progress message - [ ] Launch one bundle and one cross-sell - [ ] Check page speed after any new app or widget - [ ] Write down your baseline numbers so you can measure the result in two weeks
Pick one or two of these, ship them, and measure. Small, steady increases in order value add up quickly, and every one of them makes the traffic you already have worth more.