Abandoning a shopping cart is widespread, unpleasant, and common. According to Baymard’s most recent data, the average reported rate of abandoned online shopping carts will be a dreadful 69.98% in 2022.
In other words, out of every 10 online shoppers who add an item to their cart, over seven will abandon the store without making a purchase.
Every year, it appears as though the issue worsens. The faster one takes measures to deal with this issue, the easier it gets to handle over time. But how can you lessen the impact of abandoned shopping carts?
The fact is that a large portion of internet buyers abandon their carts. They could put products in shopping carts, only to remove those carts before checking out.
An e-commerce website will experience a loss of revenue as a result. Fortunately, we can assist you in recovering customers by lowering abandoned cart rates, enhancing client retention, and raising your online revenues.
Let’s first understand what abandoned carts are, why customers don’t complete their purchases, and what abandoned cart recovery entails before we discuss the numerous tactics you may use to minimize shopping cart abandonment and increase revenue.
Understanding Cart Abandonment
When a customer chooses to abandon their shopping cart and leave your website, there is a low likelihood that they will come back on their own to finish their purchase.
The majority of online shoppers who abandon their shopping carts unattended won’t return to complete their purchases, according to a number of surveys and studies.
That low of a number allows us to conclude that the consumer has given up on their basket. The worst aspect is that every time a buyer removes something from their shopping cart, a possible sale is lost.
After leaving a cart empty, many of these customers would subsequently buy identical items from another e-commerce site or physical store.
Why Do Shoppers Leave Their Carts?
Online customers might leave their shopping carts empty for a number of reasons, including:
- comparison shopping to find the best deals from numerous vendors.
- examining the goods or services via study.
- searching for a promo code.
- worried about the security of payments.
- The deals on other websites are better.
- Unaware of any additional fees.
- The user interface on the website is choppy.
Fortunately, a strong abandoned cart recovery approach can fix every customer concern.
Understanding Abandoned Cart Recovery
A sort of internet marketing approach abandoned cart recovery aims to turn abandoned shopping carts into purchases by:
- Automating advertising and marketing efforts to re-engage potential clients.
- Enhancing your eCommerce site’s user experience (UX) with the goal of making buying simpler.
- Addressing the frequent problems that your prospective customers have.
- To decrease the number of abandoned carts, and increase brand trust and loyalty.
- Provide incentives to customers.
Virtually all sectors are impacted by shopping cart abandonment, thus eCommerce marketing professionals have developed tried-and-true strategies to entice customers to return to your website and complete the transaction.
Tips To Decrease Cart Abandonment
Inform Customers of Additional Costs
There are several possible causes of shopping cart abandonment. High taxes and unexpected delivery fees are two of the more notable examples.
Online customers leave their carts in 63% of cases because of high delivery prices. Unexpectedly high delivery charges may discourage a buyer from making a purchase.
Make sure that customers have a clear knowledge of the shipping charges and other additional expenses before they go to the final checkout page. In some cases, it can even make sense to provide free delivery.
Free shipping isn’t always a possibility, but providing it for select goods may help you lower your cart abandonment rate.
Do not provide longer delivery timeframes than anticipated
The anticipated delivery date for an item may not be disclosed until checkout in some online shops. Delivery times are frequently based on the customer’s location, particularly for companies that ship internationally.
A maximum delivery time of 4.5 days, down from 5.5 days in 2012, is what customers in the U.S. are ready to accept, according to a poll by Alix Partners of over 1,000 consumers.
But it also depends on the product. Naturally, as they are manufactured to order, custom products will take longer. To ensure customer satisfaction and since consumers frequently place urgent orders for perishables and home goods, delivery times should be as soon as possible. Contrarily, shipping times for consumer durables like furniture and vehicles are a little bit longer.
Offer Various Modes of Payments
If your online business only takes a few different types of payments, you risk losing out on potential purchases when a consumer leaves their shopping cart after discovering that their chosen payment method isn’t supported.
The checkout process may be made less difficult for customers by accepting a variety of payment methods.
For instance, the process of completing a purchase can go considerably more smoothly than it otherwise could if your online business allows Google Pay and Apple Pay rather than needing all visitors to enter their credit card data.
Offer Guest Checkout
One of the easiest and most efficient methods to reduce cart abandonment during the checkout process is to provide guest checkout.
Customers prefer using guest checkout in 43% of cases. In fact, even when they have accounts with online retailers, 72% of study participants said they generally use guest checkout alternatives.
Yes, it is excellent for visitors to register with your e-commerce site. The likelihood that consumers will return in the future may increase as a result. However, forcing all customers to register might lead to a decline in e-commerce revenues. Don’t undervalue the benefits of letting visitors make transactions without creating accounts.
Display Trust Badges
Trust symbols are graphic components on checkout pages that instantly convey to customers that an e-commerce business will protect their data.
Symbols that might increase internet shoppers’ trust SSL emblems, PCI-DSS security badges, and third-party endorsement symbols. Just a few examples of excellent trust symbols that you may use on your website are provided below.
Throughout the whole customer journey, the existence of trust symbols helps comfort customers. Additionally, by effectively communicating important information, these symbols prevent a drawn-out checkout procedure.
Utilize progress bars during checking out
Customers frequently want to know how long the procedure will take when making purchases from e-commerce websites.
Customers may abandon shopping carts without realizing their purchases are almost finished if they don’t know how far along they are in the checkout process at any given point.
To reduce shopping cart abandonment, including progress bars on all checkout pages so consumers may tell how much longer they must wait.
This is another example of how shortening the checkout process to enhance convenience might help your online business attract more customers.
Give clients the option to store their cart for later
It’s possible that a consumer doesn’t have enough time right now to finish the checkout process. They could, however, have every intention of finishing the transaction later.
Allowing customers to keep their carts for later throughout the checkout process will make sure that doing so is simple.
Add the consumer to your automatic abandoned cart campaign as soon as they save their cart.
Shopping cart abandonment will be a less major source of lost income if a consumer may return to their own shopping cart when they have more time for online shopping.
Optimize Page Loading Time
Slow loading speeds for all other pages on an e-commerce website, including the checkout page, may have a substantial negative influence on a high cart abandonment rate.
Keep in mind that your consumers are busy people. If the site performance isn’t ideal, customers could frequently click away before finishing their transactions.
Ensure that the performance of your website is optimized for all e-commerce shop versions. This also applies to your mobile website. According to statistics, mobile shopping is growing in popularity and may eventually surpass desktop internet buying.
In reaction to this trend, many e-commerce businesses are optimizing their mobile websites and applications while keeping in mind that mobile abandoned cart rates are higher than desktop at 81%.
Give Customers a Choice of Delivery Methods
When clients are determining whether to purchase, shipping costs and timeframes might be important factors. The fact that many websites delay displaying true shipping charges until customers are about to complete the checkout process is one factor in desertion.
As a result, some buyers may decide to buy before being discouraged by greater shipping fees. Others may add things to determine the exact prices.
The choice is important. While some customers prefer free or inexpensive delivery, others care more about efficiency and care. Sites should thus attempt to offer a variety of delivery alternatives to accommodate a range of client preferences.
Make Use of Analytical Tools
Retailers may monitor cart abandonment rates and spot patterns or shifts in consumer behavior using Google Analytics and other technologies.
Data may be evaluated to discover customer churn patterns or variations in the browser or device usage. This can assist merchants in finding solutions that increase checkout conversion and uncover problems that may affect cart abandonment rates.
Provide Chat Support
Customers expect an immediate response to their concerns or questions. They may quickly have their question addressed through live chat assistance, allaying any worries they might have that would stop them from making a purchase.
If you can’t deliver the nearly rapid responses that live chat implies, do not offer it as most people are not patient. According to research, the first response time of a chat tool should be less than a minute.
You may have a chatbot take over if need be, but provide customers the option to contact a real person if their issue is still unresolved.
Display Social Proof
When there are reviews, ratings, and customer photographs in user-generated material, potential consumers are more inclined to trust the company. Social proof is a psychological phenomenon where people presume that others would respond in a certain way in a particular circumstance.
Prospects will want to buy from you if they notice that other consumers are doing so and giving your items favorable reviews. Put user-generated content in the spotlight on your product websites, in email marketing, and on social media. Additionally, if your sales figures are strong, mention them.
Make use of exit-intent pop-up
Exit pop-ups are a specific kind of website overlay that appears when a user tries to leave the page in an effort to persuade them to stay. Exit intent technologies monitor a user’s mouse movement on a website.
The pop-up is initiated whenever the pointer moves outside of the browser’s active area, which is the window containing the page’s real content. Depending on the user’s profile or the webpage they’re seeing, you may adjust the messaging.
Customers who have added items to their shopping carts may be offered a promotion or discount coupon in the departure pop-up to persuade them to complete the transaction.
Analyze Funnel Leaks
To map out exactly where customers are dropping off, you may design thorough conversion funnels using tools like Google Analytics. You may generate a funnel visualization report to understand a complete portfolio of the customers that visit the page and make purchases versus those that don’t even initiate the process.
A high rate of abandonment on your checkout page may be a sign of confusing CTAs, insufficient payment alternatives, or inefficient site maneuverability.
The data may also highlight faults in your funnel; for example, users may be required to leave their shopping carts in order to check in, increasing the potential for drop-off. These insights allow you to modify the user flow.
Conclusion
Cart abandonment may be avoided to some extent. By optimizing your website, providing an easy shopping experience, and providing a range of payment options, you may lessen the likelihood of attrition.
You sometimes can’t recover abandoned carts, though. Examine your conversion funnels to identify window shoppers from clients who abandon your website as a result of website friction.
These tactics will increase sales and decrease cart abandonment. You may avoid abandoned shopping carts by speeding the checkout process overall, reducing unpleasant shocks, and utilizing effective abandoned cart advertising.
Another useful tip to automate the entire process of cart recovery is in the form of a plugin, namely, the ELEX WooCommerce Abandoned Cart Recovery with Dynamic Coupons.