I love Michel Fortin. He is probably one of the best writers on the Internet. Well, today I had the pleasure of reading his blog post about upsells and what’s wrong with them. I agree with the man 100%. Before I give you my personal opinion on this mess and my ideas for a solution and how it can actually make you more money, I’m going to briefly tell you what he said.

In a nutshell, what Fortin says is that upsells aren’t evil by nature. There is nothing wrong with the checkout gal at Mickey D’s asking you if you want fries with your burger. The problem, as he so eloquently states it, is when they take your money, hold your change hostage and then badger you to death with one upsell offer after another until you finally get so ticked off that you either give in or cancel your order. You certainly won’t ever go back to that place again.

If you know me at all, you know I hardly ever offer an upsell. I don’t personally believe in them…at least not in the traditional sense. What I do is something that other marketers do and I feel is the best way to handle upsells. I make two offers at the time of the original sales pitch. In other words, I say, “Okay, you can get just this one book for $27 OR if you purchase volumes II and III (normally $27 each by themselves) I will throw them both in for just an additional $17.” I will then present the person with two order links. They then have the choice of which one they want to use.

My contention is this. If you make the upsell offer at the time of the original pitch and make it compelling enough, you’ll end up NOT ticking off your customer and will end up making more sales in the process. I can say this because it works for me.

Now, I know there will be those who will say that the other method works just as well. Maybe it does. But is your customer going to be happy with you? Will they buy from you again having seen you use these strong arm tactics? I think not.

In either case, it’s your choice. I’ve made my opinion quite clear on this matter, as has Michel Fortin.

My money is on the big guy.

To YOUR Success,

Steven Wagenheim

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