Order Bumps allow you to offer additional products to your students during their checkout experience, without slowing down the overall checkout process!
In this article:
View and Track Order Bump Purchases
About Order Bumps
Order Bumps are a way to offer additional products in the checkout when your students purchase one product. Order Bumps take advantage of the existing motivation and momentum of the primary sale to offer a related product: it could be digital resources or tools, additional one-on-one coaching sessions, a community, or even a course. They do this while keeping the checkout experience simple and straightforward, students simply check a box to add the product, and both purchases are handled in a single transaction.
Order Bumps are available exclusively to creators on TCommerce: Powered by Thinkific Payments. To access Order Bumps as well as other great TCommerce features, enable Thinkific Payments on your account: Thinkific Payments.
How It Works
There are two products involved in an order bump:
- The primary product refers to the original product that the student has selected to buy - the main product they have added to the checkout to purchase.
- The order bump is the complementary product that is offered during checkout, when the primary product is being purchased.
Any existing product on Thinkific can be offered as an Order Bump, as long as it is:
- Published and
- Not set to Private
Similarly, Order Bumps can be added to any existing primary products, as long as these are published and not set to private.
The Checkout Experience
Once you have added an order bump to a primary product, students who purchase that primary product will see it offered at the checkout. They will be able to select the order bump product, and have this added to their purchase with a single transaction.
In the example below, you can see that the order bump product is offered at the checkout for the primary product (the Mastering Pizza course).
After the Purchase
Once a student has purchased an order bump, they will automatically and immediately gain access to both the primary product and the order bump.
Access will be provided to each product individually, the same way it would if the student had purchased the products separately. This automatic enrolment will also trigger any welcome emails or other processes you have set up for both the primary product and the order bump.
To see how an order bump will appear or work, you can temporarily set the primary product (the product you are adding the order bump to) to hidden, to test the new order bump without anyone accidentally viewing or purchasing it.
For a more complete description, see The Student Experience section below.
Important Considerations
- You can only have one order bump added to any given primary product! If a primary product already has an order bump added to it, this primary product will not appear in the list of available products when creating a new order bump.
- Order Bumps have their own price, allowing you to offer a discount to students who are already buying one of your other products.
- Sales Tax and VAT are calculated on Order Bump products.
- Products priced with recurring payments (subscription or payment plan) cannot be bought using PayPal as a payment method, as per existing Paypal limitations.
- Order Bumps cannot be combined with Gifting or Group Order features. If an order bump is added to the product, the gifting and group order options will not be available.
- When you create an order bump then delete the product that was added to it, the order bump will be automatically deleted as well.
Order Bump Fields
How you craft your order bump to grab the attention of your students is an important consideration when growing your business. Check out some of our tips on crafting an effective Order Bump!
Order bumps include the follow information:
- Title: this will appear at the top of the order bump card
- Product card image: this will be auto-populated from your product
- Product description: a longer description of the product that will appear below the Title
- Price:the price of the order bump — what the student will be charged if they decide to add it to their purchase
- Strikethrough price: if set, the Strikethrough price will appear next to the price, with a line through it, as a way of suggesting that the order bump is being offered at a discount
* This uses the product card image for the course, community or bundle
Create an Order Bump
At this time, Order Bump products priced as a recurring payment (subscription or payment plan) cannot be added to a primary product priced as a recurring payment. We’re always working behind the scenes on feature improvements and if you have feedback on this, we want to know. Please send us a quick email to let us know what functionalities are most valuable to you!
- From your Admin Dashboard, select Sales
- Select Order bumps
- Click the Create order bump button
- Select the product you would like to offer as the order bump under Search for and select your product
- Click the Add order bumps to the following products button and select one or more products that you want to add this order bump to. Select from the list of the 25 most recently published products or use a search bar to find the right product.
- Click Confirm to confirm the products that the order bump will be added to
- Add a Price and, optionally, a Strikethrough price
- Add Order bump details, which will be displayed in the checkout where the order bump appears
- Click the Save button on the top right
Having trouble seeing your order bump on your checkout page after creation? Check out our troubleshooting guide!
Edit an Existing Order Bump
- From your Admin Dashboard, select Sales
- Select Order bumps
- Find the order bump you want to edit in the list of existing order bumps and click the Edit button for that order bump
- Make the changes needed
- Click the Save button on the top right
Delete an Existing Order Bump
- From your Admin Dashboard, select Sales
- Select Order bumps
- Find the order bump you want to delete in the list of existing order bumps and click the ellipsis button to the right
- Click Delete
- Confirm your decision by clicking Delete
Once confirmed, the deleted order bump will no longer appear on your list of order bumps, nor will it appear in the checkout.
If you prefer not to delete the order bump but do not want it to be active on any of your checkouts, you can find the order bump you want to remove in the list of existing order bumps and click the Edit button for that order bump. Then, open the Add order bumps to the following products dropdown menu and remove all selected products. You can also do this if you want to temporarily disable an order bump that you might want to use again at a later date.
The Student Experience
Order bumps are designed to be as intuitive as possible for the student, following patterns established by cart-based checkout processes across the internet. When the student decides to purchase a product that has an order bump offer attached to it, they will see a section at the bottom of the checkout page with the order bump card. To accept the offer, the student can select the checkbox and have the order bump product added to their order summary.
Once the student completes their order, the following events will occur:
- The student is charged the full order amount, which appears as a single charge on their bank account statement
- The student is automatically enrolled in both products
- The student will receive a single receipt (if you have enabled Student Order Receipts) which will show an itemized list of both the primary product and the order bump
- The student will receive a Welcome Email for each product they have enrolled in, that has a welcome email enabled
- The order will appear in the student's order history and details, which they can view from their Student Dashboard
View and Track Order Bump Purchases
Once a purchase including an order bump is complete, it appears in the Orders table much like any other purchase. The purchase will appear as a single order, with a total amount equal to the total of the primary product and the order bump.
To make it easier to determine which orders included an order bump — and which order bump it was — the Orders table includes an Order Bump column. This column lists the product name of the order bump.
In addition, the Order details will display the primary product and order bump (if any), with a line item showing the individual amounts for each.
Additionally, you can use the the TCommerce Feature = Order Bump filter in the Revenue Dashboard to analyze the transactions that used Order Bumps.
Refund Order Bumps
Transactions that include an order bump can be refunded normally: take a look at our article on Thinkific Payments: Refunds for more details. You can capture a partial refund if you need to return only the order bump amount. Remember that refunds do not automatically unenroll a student: you will have to do so manually if you wish them to be unenrolled.
Frequently Asked Questions
Order Bumps Set Up
I really want to use Order Bumps, but TCommerce isn't available in my country — is there some way I can get access without using TCommerce?
Order Bumps are currently only available for creators using our TCommerce suite of tools, which includes Thinkific Payments.
Who has access to the Order Bumps menu? What user roles can create Order Bumps?
Only Site Owners, Site Admins, and External Partners are able to view, create, edit, or remove order bumps.
Can I offer a product exclusively as an order bump?
Yes! If you want to make something available exclusively as an order bump, you can use our Hidden feature. Setting the product as hidden will ensure that no one comes across it accidentally while browsing your site, but will still make it available to use as an order bump.
Can I add an order bump to a free product/bundle?
Yes! Free products or bundles can have an order bump added to them.
Can I add a pre-order product as an order bump?
No, pre-order products are not currently available for order bumps. You also cannot add an order bump to a pre-order product. Your product must be published.
What happens if I delete a product that is part of an order bump?
When you create an order bump then delete the product that was added to it, the order bump will be automatically deleted as well.
Order Bumps and Other Features
How do order bumps work with Affiliates? Will they get credit for an order bump?
While this can get tricky depending on how you have set up your affiliate commissions, the short answer is that commissions are calculated only based on the primary product purchased, regardless of whether or not the student decides to add an order bump to the transaction.
For example: an Affiliate receives a 10% commission on all sales of a product, which sells for $100. A student decides to buy the product and then, during checkout, also includes a $25 order bump in their purchase. The Affiliate would receive $10 (10% of $100) — the order bump would not be included in the calculation.
This is also true for flat per-purchase commissions: an order bump does not count as an additional purchase when calculating Affiliate payouts.
How will order bumps work with Revenue Partners? What happens if I offer the course at a discount as an order bump?
Since Revenue Partner commissions are always a percentage of a given product, the interaction is relatively straightforward: a Revenue Partner will receive a share of revenue only for the products they have been assigned, regardless of whether they are offered as the primary product or as an order bump.
For example: a Revenue Partner receives 20% commission on the sales for Product A, which is offered at a regular/primary price of $100. A student purchases Product A at the regular price, then adds a $50 order bump (for Product B), for a total transaction of $150. The Partner would receive $20, because that is their share of the payment for Product A; the order bump is for a different product, so it is not included.
If the student instead purchased Product B at its regular price, then chose to add an order bump for Product A at a discounted rate of $50, the Revenue Partner would receive $10, which is 20% of the $50 generated by Product A.
Can I use the Order Bump feature together with Gifting or Group Orders?
No, Order Bumps cannot be combined with Gifting or Group Order features. If an order bump is added to the product, the gifting and group order options will not be available.
Order Bumps Experience
What happens if a student has already purchased an Order Bump product? Will they still see the Order Bump product during checkout?
No, if a student already has the existing Order Bump product, it will not show up during checkout to prevent duplicate purchases. The Order Bump product will appear on the checkout page for existing students if it is a product that has not yet been purchased.
How do order bumps affect the after-purchase flow I've set up?
Order bump offers, if purchased by a student, do not affect the After Purchase Flows you have set up for the primary product. However, a purchase made that includes an order bump will only trigger the After Purchase Flows for the primary product.
Can students purchase an order bump with a coupon?
Because order bumps are treated like separate products (and may already be discounted), it is not possible to use a coupon to get a discount on an order bump product. A coupon for the primary product will still work as expected, but if a student tries to enter a coupon code for an order bump product, the code will show as invalid during checkout.
For example, if a student purchases Product A and then, during the checkout, adds Product B as an order bump, they will not be able to use a coupon intended for Product B to receive a further discount on the order bump price.
If you want to ensure that students are receiving a discount on a product offered through an order bump, we recommend you simply set the order bump price to the discounted amount and use the Strikethrough price field to indicate that a discount has already been included.
Will my order bump product be available for purchase when a student enrolls for a free preview of a product?
Yes, The order bump product associated with the primary product will be available on the checkout page as an add-on option. If the student chooses to add the order bump product at checkout, they will be charged for the order bump product (if it isn’t offered as free) and will also be signed up for the free preview that they were originally purchasing.