If you’re a Shopify merchant pulling in more than a few hundred orders per month, you’ve already tackled the hard part: driving shoppers to your store.
You’ve nailed your Facebook ads, perhaps dabbled in TikTok, or even tried the influencer route. By now, you know more traffic isn’t always the magic bullet for growth— learning how to increase average order value is often where the real gains lie.
Because at the end of the day:
Higher Sales = More Traffic × More Conversions × Higher AOV
Boosting any one of these variables can lead to higher sales. Some brands focus on increasing traffic, others optimize for better conversion rates, and many find success in improving AOV. The key is knowing which lever to pull at the right time.
For now, let’s deconstruct: How do you convince existing customers to add more to their carts without making them feel like you’re hounding them?
Here are 3 practical ways to bump up Average Order Value—and some tips on how ConvertWise helps you do it without turning your checkout into a pushy sales funnel.
Use a Rewards Bar to Incentivize Bigger Carts
One of the easiest ways to nudge shoppers to place larger orders is with a Dynamic Rewards Bar (sometimes called an in‐cart rewards bar). I mean, humans will be humans. They see a free shipping bar; they think, “I’m this close to a freebie anyway—might as well do it.”
Sure, free shipping is the most widely used reward, but you can find more creative ways to boost the cart total. For example, one of our merchants set a threshold value and saw more customers hitting it to unlock free delivery.
To check how this looks in action, try adding a product to the cart on this page.
Show Complementary Items on Product Pages
Your product detail pages (PDPs) should help shoppers find exactly what they need—and maybe a few things they didn’t even know they wanted. We believe AI-powered recommendations make that easier—driving more exploration and purchases.
“One of our merchants, James Duckhouse (eCommerce lead at a UK-based Sports Memorabilia store), says: “The ConvertWise recommendations feel like an actual store assistant saying, ‘Need a hand?’ Customers engage better and usually buy more.”
Sports Trading Cards saw a 30% surge in cart conversions within just a few weeks of using ConvertWise. In this conversation, James talks more about the impact of personalization and how it changed their sales game; watch it here.
By placing the right recommendations in the most intuitive places, your upselling and cross-selling will feel like a natural part of your visitor’s shopping journey—not a distraction.
Show Complementary Items Inside the Cart
It’s practically a crime to skip upsell recommendations in the cart—it’s like rushing someone to check out when they’ve only picked up a loaf of bread. But just having upsells isn’t enough; they need to feel relevant. If your suggestions seem too random or generic, shoppers might get annoyed and bail on their carts.
That’s why ConvertWise makes it super easy to set up the right in-cart upsell recommendations for your store. Choose from:
- Frequently Bought Together: “Customers who bought this vacuum often added these dust bags.”
- AI-based Recommendations: Automatically generated based on user behavior (“If you like this T-shirt, you might also like these jeans.”)
- Manual Recommendations: Perfect for merchants who know their inventory inside out (“We designed this brand-new scarf to pair perfectly with these gloves!”)
One of our merchants, Farmannori, an online Pharmacy brand based in Italy, saw their conversion rate from Add-to-Cart to start of checkout increase by 8% within just a month of using the app.
Alright, You Know What to do
Get cooking. Even small tweaks can make a real difference in your Shopify store’s revenue, whether it’s smarter AI-based recommendations, a well-optimized cart, or just a few well‐placed in‐cart discount codes.
200+ Shopify stores are already using ConvertWise to increase average order value (AOV) and boost cart conversions by up to 30%—all without interrupting the shopping flow. If you’re curious to see how it works, check out our demo store or book a quick call to see what best fits your store.
Either way, you’ve got all you need—start testing and watch your average order value soar.
