Should you learn how to raise prices as a DTC ecommerce brand?
Yes, you should.
Is it easy to increase prices for an ecommerce business?
No, it’s not.
Can businesses increase prices, and why?
Yes, because they can (& you can).
So, how do you increase product prices?
Will you lose customers if you raise prices?
TL;DR: You won’t. There’s proof (with a caveat).
If customers love your business or brand, and if they see value, they'll stay.
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Mistakes to avoid when raising prices as an ecommerce brand
Higher prices won’t drive away customers when done right but it can be disastrous with the wrong approach. Here are common mistakes when raising prices that brands should avoid.
- Not knowing the cost of your product,
- Not knowing your competitors’ pricing and therefore, overpricing or underpricing your products without knowing it
- Raising prices without taking into account market research and other kinds of data and relying on assumptions alone
- Not highlighting the value you offer to customers
- Not mentioning the amount of the new pricing and the percentage of the increase
- Not stating the reasons for the price change
- Announcing the price increase too close to the implementation thereby giving customers less time to prepare
- Being too cold and impersonal when announcing the change
- Not explaining what options the customer has
Consumers still purchased products with increasing prices for a full decade and a half even before the pandemic began.
When to announce that you’re raising your prices
Just as important as the “how” to announce rising prices is the “when”.
When breaking the news, timing is crucial. You don’t want to inform your customers too late, say a week before because it catches them off-guard and betrays their trust.
At the very least, give your customers a month’s notice before increasing your price. The more advanced the notice, the better.
Rising prices are not the end of the world
Product markups (the difference between prices at ecommerce checkouts and the marginal costs incurred by your business to make the product) went up 25% between 2006 and 2019.
Take key household items, for instance. According to research, prices already reached the sky in the years leading up to the pandemic. Consumers still purchased products with increasing prices for a full decade and a half even before the pandemic began.
But customers were 30% less price sensitive in 2019 (meaning they could care less about price increases, as long as these brands were their favorites, than they were in 2006.) Now, the world is riding on higher prices with an overall rising inflation globally.
In the United States alone, new data shows that most businesses in the United States have been making profits. In fact, 2022 has been the best year for most businesses since 1950, according to a Bloomberg report.
You might think that raising prices as a DTC business will turn customers away. In most cases, this doesn’t happen as long as you hold up the ethos of your brand, value your customers’, and deliver products that surpass their expectations.
Here’s how to raise prices as a DTC eCommerce business:
Send a plain text email letter from the founder
Use an plain text letter format (a simple, no-frills, no-HTML, text-based email) from the “founder’s desk” with your name and a photo to let your customers know that your prices are going to increase.
Here’s how Nicole Gibbons -- Founder & CEO of Clare Paint -- wrote out an email doing just that.
A simple, text-based email backed by reflections on problems everyone is facing.
When you are a solo entrepreneur providing services, this is a no brainer. But even if you have a small team (or a large team) and especially when you are a super-large ecommerce enterprise, this simple email method holds a lot of meaning.
We’ve also seen similar emails being sent out as clarifications on events based on news reports, as a way to handle PR or brand image disasters.
Give your customers a chance to lock in existing prices
Kimai Jewelry uses a smart two-step email marketing sequence (less for marketing, but more as a reminder) with a “Shop Now” button to help existing customers latch on to existing prices.
The first email is much like the simple email (as above) explaining the situation, expounding on the “Why”[ See more of this below], and exact date from which prices are going to increase.
It’s always a smart thing to keep your customers posted.
The second email in the sequence, however, continues with the help extended by the brand (Kimai, in this case) to help customers purchase products at existing prices (saving money, as an appeal, never ceases to work).
How about doing a mix of both the simple letter approach and the email sequence approach?
That’s what Weezie did:
Clearly explain the “why”
In all of the above approaches and ways to increase prices for your products, you’d have noticed a recurring theme: a clear explanation as to why you are increasing prices:
- Your own increasing input costs
- Higher shipping costs
- More costs due to rising operational expenditure
- Inflation
- The pandemic,
- Any other black swan events
- …a change in product positioning or branding decision or a competitive pricing decision, or
- just because you want to focus on profitability of your eCommerce business.
Explain the why.
You can't be clearer than Weezie :
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FAQs
Will I lose customers if I raise prices?
Not necessarily; if customers value your brand and products, they are likely to stay, especially if you handle the price increase well.
How far in advance should I announce a price increase?
At least a month, but the more advance notice, the better for customer trust and preparation.
What’s the best way to announce a price increase?
A simple, text-based email from the founder explaining the reasons for the change is a highly effective method.
