Cross sales - discuss
 

I've been buying cross sales for years now. In all that time I have never once had someone pull them, or been unhappy with any arrangement with me on them. Quite the opposite. I have had people come back to me months after we started buying their cross sales to thank me for bringing them the extra revenue.

The cross sale has gotten a bad reputation based on a few bad apples who misused them on their own proprietary merchant accounts. A lot of people got stung due to this, so I understand the bad taste left but I think it's time to set the record straight on them. They work. They're profitable, and if you're not using them, you are leaving money on the table.

Thoughts? For? Against?

Cross sales are shit

:2 cents:

http://i.imgur.com/nRbKbOV.gif

I see no issues with cross sales if they are done properly. So long as they are unchecked and clearly marked, no issues at all.

It's just like how the super market tries to upsell you small items when you check out by placing them at the register. Hell, Fry's Electonics makes you hike down down an aisle half the length of the store trying to upsell you one last night on your way to the register.

the issues with cross sales have always hinged around deception and lack of disclosure. In the last 10 years, I have always used cross sales. It has probably been 5 years since they have caused me any trouble at all. I see a lot of sites, often those being pushed hard on tubes, being very aggressive with cross sales and these days I don't know how they stay in business, unless they are opening up dozens of merchant accounts using different principle information. Generally what I see as the worst offenders are not sites or landers being promoted by the programs themselves, but those being promoted by "whales", the perceived value of being able to have one person push 100 or more sales to your site every day is too alluring to not jump at, even when the payout they demand is so high that the site has to get way too aggressive and have multiple cross sales that you can't un-check, and often that recur. for $50

If your cross sale is a product who's content does not conflict or overlap with your main offer, you provide full and clearly visible disclosure, allow people to easily opt out, make sure people understand that they have signed up for two products not one, and provide an extended trial period for your cross sale so that the customers that did not notice, have a chance to cancel before being re-billed, then there is no issue with them.

for those who feel that no one really wants a cross sale, I have used un-checked cross sales on some products for years as well and have at times had as high as 20% takers, so one in five have read the disclosure and decided to ad the second site.

Right, and this is precisely how a cross sale should be used. Pre-checked or not. Pre-checked isn't the devil, either. I'm surprised at how many people will insist on NO pre-checks but then wonder why they don't get any joins.

The offer itself, as stated above, shouldn't conflict with the original purchase. In my experience, a cross sale within the same niche isn't as good as an offer that brings a mega or multiple niche offering.

Such a dirty word in adult yet you now see pre-checked cross sales on most mainstream sites now. Hell I signed my kid up for ABCMouse.com and it had cross sales on it.

Done clean and above board I see no issue with them.

WebsiteSecure.org has inspected and certified join pages for many companies in mainstream and adult. Cross-sale is much too broad a term. A clearly stated cross-sale unchecked or perchecked, above the submit button is 100% ethical. However there are a lot of sites that aren't doing that.

The worst cross sales I see these days are on mainstream sites. One actually had a cross sale stated in their TOS page to begin 90 days after a member cancels and thought a link to their TOS above the submit button was sufficient.

There is a lot of money to be made with ethical cross sales that add value for the consumer. The best ones I've seen include a legitimate discount price on another relevant site as a value added offer.

If anyone running ethical cross sales wants to improve their ratios by having their sites certified, be sure to contact me.

Good luck canceling ABCMouse. They attempted to rebill me three times after I canceled and sent them written notice via email. As of the last time I checked a few months ago, ESPN insider won't let you cancel without calling them by phone and having someone try to guilt you into not canceling. Fandango had a checkbox saying essentially leave this checked if you want to get your movie tickets sent to your email and you want to agree to be part of our mail spam system with third parties buying your info from us. If you uncheck the box you just got your tickets, but because of the wording I'm sure many people mistakenly opted into spam mail hell.

The most egregious billing practices are happening in mainstream these days and it's not mom and pop sites. :2 cents:

No bad name to cross sales.
Bad name to prechecked cross sales.
Worse name to hidden (prececked obviously) cross sales.

I'd like to know where you're buying them. Been impossible to find any without major cb issues for years and years now.

We have dozens of merchants successfully buying and selling cross sells. As stated above, disclosure and ethics are important to keep chargebacks down and customers coming back.

Mitch

Hmmm...
 

I am so out the loop... I didn't think they were allowed anymore :error

well Mitch, I'm one of them and I've been a loyal customer for many years now. How about hooking me up with someone trying to sell? I need more volume :)

nothing wrong with a cross sale, as long as the surfer can see it and be able to opt out, before he clicks the join button ...

hit me up

the main problem with cross sales is the fact most people on gfy think that cross sales = card banging.

bernie4366 on skype