Treat my articles as inspiration. Think about how my suggestions might work in your context. The handicraft market is very wide. My observations are generalized and will not necessarily be right in every case.

Free shipping, as you may be aware from your own consumer experience, is something that attracts customers a lot. The awareness that it is possible to avoid additional costs for a certain amount, which often constitutes several dozen percent of the entire order, is very tempting for the customer. Knowing this, you should to use it somehow to increase your turnover. After all, instead of one product, the customer may want to buy two or even three, or choose your premium product instead of the standard version.

So how do you determine and count this free shipping now? There can be many scenarios because you have many different products. As a general rule, consider the following:

1. How much is your cheapest product? – it’s good to have cheaper products, because they can attract the customer to your site first. They should not be caught in the free shipping limit – their role will be to encourage the purchase of another product, so that the customer places a larger order with free shipping.

2. How much does your flagship product cost? – I’m glad we practiced this topic recently ? A flagship product should be the product that customers like the most (or you assume they will like it the most). This product does not have to be the most expensive or the biggest. Instead, it is supposed to attract the attention of a potential customer to visit your website and see an even bigger offer.

3. What price differences do you have between your products? – here it definitely depends on what you are selling, but try to always have several products in different price ranges. They can differ, for example, in size, they can be in a set or separately or made of a different material … There are probably many combinations. But as I wrote in the first point – a cheaper product can attract a customer and the next ones are to confirm him in ordering more ?

4. Do you have premium products? – this is a bit related to the previous point. However, instead of a price cap on free shipping, you can also apply it to specific products, in which case it will be wise to choose premium products.

5. What are the competition limits for free shipping? – it is always worth observing what the competition is doing and how ? in the end, the client will also compare us with them. It is not necessary to fight prices and lower the limit at all costs in the case of handmade works – this way you kill the entire market (hence I thought, by the way, that compiling the global handicraft market in one place is not good for the industry, because as we know in other countries there are really big differences in production costs, which makes craftsmen from developed countries suffer, including you …).

6. How many products (optimally) would you like to sell to one customer in order to be ready in time? – quite important, because maybe you don’t have anyone to support you in case of a huge order. So you also can’t go too far ?

If you already have such data, also:

7. How big is the average customer order? – this is always a good starting point, because if the customer has been buying from you for that much, paying extra for shipping, then he would probably be willing to add another product so as not to pay for shipping.

8. How much do most customers order? – yes, this is different from the previous point ? If you have products that differ significantly in price, it is also worth considering this aspect, because in this way the extreme values ​​of orders do not distort the overall picture of customer orders.

And now you have some hints on what to pay attention to, but how to calculate it exactly? I thought about how to present it to you for a long time. I even wanted to prepare an Excel file to calculate it (and I love this program for solving such problems ?). However, in the end, I found that it would be too much for my interference in your prices. Therefore, I will write to you what are the different approaches to the topic, and you will choose the one that suits you best ?

1. Adding free shipping to selected products (as I mentioned, they can be e.g. only premium products)

2. Including shipping costs in whole or in part for each product (this is generally not welcomed, although it is usually not possible for the customer to see how this was calculated. Most customers, however, seem to be aware that shipping costs can be already included in the price of the product, so they do not want to pay them twice).

3. Set a level of free shipping that is still profitable for you, which means you have a high enough margin / hourly rate to cover these costs and still make money on the product(s).

4. Determining free shipping based on the region / country you are sending to.

5. Free shipping as a temporary promotion or for regular / new customers.

Congratulations on getting to the end! It was a very long and difficult topic, but I hope that I managed to get you inspired again to find the best solution for yourself. Also, give yourself time to check a given strategy and if it does not turn out as expected, you can always try another one ? Changes are not bad, it means that you are trying to adapt to the market and you are not standing still!

Good luck and let me know your thoughts!

Aga

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