Selling complementary products is one of the best ways to increase patronage and maximize your niche. Customers love the comfort of buying most of what they need on the spot. Having goods that complement each other in your store can help you attract new customers and keep pre-existing clients.
Complementary goods examples abound in most brick-and-mortar stores as well as e-commerce websites. If you drop ship T-shirts, adding trousers and jackets can help increase your sales and store popularity. In this post, we consider how adding complementary products can help you expand your dropshipping business.
Complementary Goods Definition
Complementary products in marketing are those that are used simultaneously to meet a particular need. For example, in making tea, you need milk and coffee. Hence, milk and coffee are complementary products. Also, books and pens are complementary as they are both required for writing. Oftentimes, a complementary product cannot give customers the satisfaction they desire when used alone. There has to be another product that will help improve the amount of utility and value for both products.
Benefits of Dropshipping Complementary Goods
Cross-selling offers lots of opportunities to both starters and veteran dropshippers. Apart from increasing the business's total revenue, below are some other benefits to be derived from selling complementary goods.
1. Sell for higher profit margins
By offering a pair of complementary products for sale, you can make more profit from low-profit goods. For example, the profit of many printers is very low. However, the profit margin on printer ink is much higher. Therefore convincing your customers to buy both printers and ink from your store can increase your average profit margin.
2. Increase the potential for more packaged sales
Having more complementary products can help you offer more packaged deals to customers during promo periods. This is often encouraged in dropshipping, especially when the packaged items are coming from a single supplier. Having more packaged deals helps increase your products' overall value and makes it easier to give discounts on the whole package than on individual products.
3. Reduce risks
Most e-commerce stores are at risks of cart abandonment, especially when a customer discovers that the other product needed to derive maximum satisfaction from a listed item is missing. To reduce the risk of cart abandonment, be sure that you have more complementary products that your customers may also be willing to purchase. For instance, Amazon displays at least three complementary products for each item customers try to order.
4. Improve store flexibility
Having complementary products of various kinds from your niche keeps your customers from getting bored with your store. Customers are more flexible in choosing from available options than being stuck with single options time and again.
5. Easy management
Managing a store that offers a single product requires lots of creativity to stay afloat. However, Cross-selling makes it far easier to get creative with store management strategies. For instance, before the checkout page, you can display "Frequently bought together items" to improve customers' experience. With this approach, you also make it easier for customers to see some of your other products they may not be aware of. Somehow, you will be maximizing your advertising costs.
The complementary good definition given above was adopted to give a clearer insight into the term for practical use.
6. Increase customer average lifetime value
Once your customers can trust that all they need to meet a particular need can be gotten on your e-commerce store, you can be sure they will always come back. You can also get recommendations from them so new customers can patronize your business. Eventually, you get to keep your customers for longer. You may find loyal customers that could account for a huge percentage of your monthly sales and profits in the long run.
Complementary Products Examples for Dropshipping
Complementary products, when paired, are meant to take care of a specific need. You only need to look across your niche to find two or three complementary products that people need. You can start adding more as you grow your business.
In case you need some ideas as to what type of complementary products toucan add to your store, below are some ideas. We have chosen some of the hottest niches so you can make your choice right away and get started.
1. Foods
More people are now spending more time cooking due to reduced office hours caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. As such, kitchen appliances are among the hottest products selling in this niche.
Try dropshipping kitchen appliances such as food processors (graters, blenders, mixers). Remember to add napkins. You can also try vacuum flasks and electric jugs. Getting a new set of cooking utensils means creating more space to keep them. Add kitchen cabinets to your catalogs. List cookery books and cooking apps to keep your customers happy.
2. Gardening
Many people now have more time to care for their gardens and lawns. As festive seasons approach, gardeners and enthusiasts will be busy cleaning the lawns and backyards.
Dropship garden tools such as pruning shears, mowers, spreaders, and container collecting trash. You can also add gardening books to your catalog.
3. Home office/homeschooling
As remote working and e-learning take center stage in this present age, the need for both software and hardware is high. Try dropshipping video conferencing software and hardware such as webcam, tripods, backgrounds, LED lights, etc.
4. Petcare
During the lockdown, more people had pets or got closer to their lonely pets. Pet care items are on the bestsellers list on major e-commerce stores. Ask suppliers for pet food, pet food dispensers, pet supplements, and pet toys.
5. Gaming
The gaming niche has always been a vibrant one and there is no limit to how creative you can be when cross-selling. There are always new gamepads, gaming gears, and chairs. Add gaming guides for popular games and headphones.
6. Apparels
The end of the year is when many people will like to change their wardrobe or add a few more items. Get into the Christmas season with Christmas decorations, Christmas-themed apparel (red gowns, head warmers, boots, white gloves, socks). You can also dropship costumes and casual wear.
Conclusion
Identify a complementary good in your niche and find out more complementary products that are selling fast. Understanding and implementing complementary goods economics may be the best step you will take to expand your dropshipping business this year. Remember that SaleYee.com is always here to help, with a wide range of kitchen supplies, gardening tools, office furniture, pet products and so on.
