Implementation of a cross-selling strategy for a large midwestern healthcare equipment company

The purpose of the current study was to test the implementation of a cross-selling strategy at a large midwestern healthcare equipment company (“The Company”). Fifty of The Company's most popular products were chosen to have 5 cross-sell suggestions generated for each of them. It was hypothesized that (a) cross-selling would increase the number of lines per order for those orders that contained a product for which cross-sell suggestions were generated, (b) that the purchase of those products that were offered as cross-sell suggestions would increase as a result of the program, (c) that cross-selling would be more successful on The Company's web site than with its sales force, and (d) that cross-sell suggestions that were lower in price than their base product would be purchased more frequently than cross-sell suggestions that were closer in price to their base product.; Results indicated that the generation of cross-sell suggestions was more successful in increasing the number of lines per order for The Company's less popular as opposed to more popular products. It was also found that the top cross-sell suggestions (i.e., those at the top of the list of products to offer) were purchased more frequently in conjunction with their base product than the bottom cross-sell suggestions. The hypothesis that cross-selling would be more effective on The Company's web site than The Company's sales force was not supported. Likewise, the relationship between the price of the base product and the price of the cross-sell product was not found to significantly effect the cross-selling results.; The potential effect that The Company's “transaction marketing” (as opposed to “relationship marketing”) selling approach may have had on the results along with suggestions for undertaking a cross-selling initiative are discussed. Finally, directions for future research based on the results of the current study are offered.