Free shipping bar with pack upgrade button in cart: +24% RPV
Test run byConvertiblesCRO agency
Commentary byLiftArchiveOur analysis, not theirsAdding a free shipping progress bar with one-click 10-pack and 15-pack upgrade buttons to the cart drawer lifted revenue per visitor by 24% among shoppers who opened the cart.
Convertibles ran this test for a DTC food brand sold in packs and published it as a Convertibles case study.
The result reached an 88% probability to beat control on 119 vs 94 orders, so treat it as directional.
- Revenue per visitor: +24% for shoppers who opened the cart drawer, at 88% probability to beat control.
- Orders: 119 in the winning version vs 94 in control, a small sample.
- Earlier reads favoured a plain progress bar version, at +53% on day 39 and +32% on day 46, before the upgrade version finished first.
- The lift shrank as more orders came in, so the true effect may be smaller than 24%.
The change
Cart drawer adds a progress bar with a pack upgrade button.
Simplified mockup drawn by LiftArchive from the shared screenshots.
Control
The cart drawer showed cart items, a checkout button and a View cart link. It said nothing about free shipping or the pack discounts that start at 10 and 15 items.
Variant
A card at the top of the drawer held a free shipping progress bar with markers for the 10-pack and 15-pack discounts, a headline that changed as each unlocked, and an "Upgrade to 10-Pack" or "Upgrade to 15-Pack" button. The View cart link was removed.
Why it likely won
Our reading of the result, not the practitioner's claim.
- Shoppers did not remember the pack rules from the product page, so showing them in the drawer made the offer visible at the right moment.
- A button that raises the quantity for the shopper is easier than working out how many items to add.
- Some form of progress bar led control at every read, which suggests the message itself helped.
Caveats: Measured only on shoppers who opened the cart drawer, at 88% probability rather than 95%, on about 100 orders per version. The lift shrank from earlier reads.
Who ran it
Convertibles ran this test for a DTC food brand sold in packs and published the results (Convertibles case study). The numbers are theirs; the summary and commentary on this page are ours.
Read the original case study on Convertibles →
How to run this test on your store
- Hypothesis
- If we show a free shipping progress bar with a one-click upgrade to the next discounted pack in the cart drawer, then revenue per visitor will rise because shoppers see how close they are to a reward and can reach it in one tap.
- Primary metric
- Revenue per visitor among cart openers
- Guardrails
- Checkout start rate
- Conversion rate
- Margin per order after shipping and pack discounts
- Who should test it
- Stores where free shipping or a discount starts at a set quantity or spend, such as food, supplements or consumables sold in packs. If you have no threshold, or most carts already qualify, there is little for the bar to do.
Questions
Does a free shipping progress bar increase revenue?
In this test, a progress bar version led the plain drawer at every read.
The winner added 24% revenue per cart opener, though on a small sample.
Should the bar count dollars or items?
Use the rule your store actually applies. This brand tied free shipping and discounts to pack size, so the bar counted items.
How should an upgrade button add items to the cart?
Raise the quantity of lines already in the cart rather than adding new lines.
New lines can duplicate items and lose subscription settings.
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