How do I upsell items with Slide Cart?

Our paid plans (Growth, Pro, and Enterprise) offer an upselling feature that enhances your shopping cart and boosts conversion rate. Help customers discover products they'll love by recommending top-selling and related products directly from their cart.

Note for existing merchants: We recently unified our upsell system. What was previously called "Advanced Upsells" is now simply your main Upsells page, and "Basic Upsells" are now "Fallback upsells."

Overview of Upsell Types

Slide Cart now offers three ways to create upsell recommendations:

Manual Product Mapping - Link specific products to upsell when they're added to cart
Cortex AI Upsells - AI-powered recommendations via our Lifetimely integration which looks at frequently bought together products
Shopify Recommended Upsells - Automated upsells recommended by Shopify's API
Fallback Upsells - Universal products shown when no specific upsell exists

Setting Up Upsells

Manual Product Mapping

Create specific product-to-product upsell relationships for full control over what customers see.

To set up:

Go to Upsells in your Slide Cart dashboard
Click Create Upsell
Select your Trigger Product (the item that when added to cart, will show the upsell)
Select your Upsell Product (what you want to recommend)
Save your settings

You can create multiple upsell mappings for different products. When a trigger product is added to the cart, its linked upsell will appear in the recommendations.

Fallback Upsells

Fallback upsells appear when a product in the cart doesn't have a specific upsell mapped to it. Think of these as your "default" recommendations.

To configure:

In your Slide Cart dashboard, go to Features > Upsell Display
Scroll to Fallback upsell products
Choose one of three options:
Option 1: Do not show fallback
- Upsells only appear for products with manual mappings or Cortex recommendations
  Option 2: Use Shopify's recommendation API
- Automatically shows Shopify's suggested products based on:
  - Purchase history
  - Product descriptions (English storefronts only)
  - Related collections
- No configuration needed - Shopify handles it
  Option 3: Choose fallback products manually
- Select up to 5 specific products to always show as fallback upsells
- Click Select fallback upsells and choose your products
- These will display for any product without a specific upsell mapping

Cortex AI Upsells (Powered by Lifetimely)

The smartest way to maximize AOV is letting Cortex AI handle your upsell recommendations.

How it works:

Cortex analyzes your store data through Lifetimely to identify high-converting upsell opportunities
Receive AI-powered recommendations for which products to upsell together
Approve recommendations with one click
Lifetimely continuously tracks performance and refines future suggestions

To get started:

Navigate to the Upsells page in your Slide Cart dashboard
If you see products without upsells, click "Go to Cortex AI in Lifetimely"
Review and approve Cortex recommendations
Cortex will automatically create and optimize your upsells

Benefits:

Data-driven decisions based on your actual store performance
Removes guesswork and manual hours from upsell management
Continuous optimization through performance tracking

Display Options

Placement

Choose where upsells appear on your storefront:

Option 1: Inside Cart (Default)

With this option, your upsells will appear inside the cart.

Option 2: Next to Cart

This option allows you to take advantage of the full screen by displaying your upsells outside the cart when customers browse on their laptops or desktops. For a better shopping experience, when the screen gets too small (mobile, tablets, etc.), the upsells will default back to inside the cart.

Layout Style

When upsells are inside the cart, choose your preferred layout:

Carousel - Swipeable horizontal scroll
Vertically Stacked - Products listed one below another
Slider - Animated horizontal slider with navigation arrows

To configure:

Navigate to Features > Upsell Display
Select your preferred placement and layout style
Adjust Number of upsells to display (2-5 recommended)

Additional Settings

Upsell Button Action

Choose what happens when customers click an upsell:

Add to cart - Immediately adds the product to cart (default, highest conversion)
View product - Redirects to the product page for more details

Display Settings

Show compare at prices - Display original prices with strikethrough when products are on sale
Show upsell even if item is in cart - Continue showing upsells even after customer adds them (useful for frequently repurchased items)

Styling

For "Next to Cart" placement, customize the background color to match your brand:

Go to Styles section in Upsell Display
Select your color using the Next to cart placement bg color picker

Best Practices

Start with Cortex AI if you have Lifetimely installed - it removes guesswork and continuously optimizes
Use manual mapping for strategic pairings (e.g., phone case with phone)
Set up fallback upsells to ensure you're always maximizing revenue opportunities
Test different layouts - try Carousel vs Stacked to see what converts better for your audience
Enable "Show compare at prices" if you run frequent promotions
Review Cortex recommendations weekly during your first month to train the AI on your approval preferences

Migrating from Old System

If you previously used:

Advanced Upsells → Your manual product mappings are now on the main Upsells page
Basic Upsells → These are now Fallback upsells in the Upsell Display settings

All your existing configurations have been preserved during the migration.

Need Help?

If you encounter any issues or have questions about setting up upsells, please contact our support team.

Last updated: November 2025