Have you ever gone to a website, filled up your cart with all sorts of products, and then left without buying anything? We’ve all been there. That’s shopping cart abandonment, something that happens to the best of us.
But what if you could use shopping cart abandonment to your advantage? Well, you can. WooCommerce abandoned cart recovery is one of the best ways to increase your sales by turning abandoned carts into confirmed sales.
The process is simple! But before you can do that, you need to figure out how WooCommerce abandoned cart works. And most importantly, do you need a plugin? In this article, we’ll answer all of these questions and give you an easy-to-follow guide on how to take advantage of WooCommerce abandoned cart recovery. Let’s dive in!
What Is the Term Abandoned Cart?
You might have heard that one in four shoppers add items to their shopping cart but then never actually follow through with the purchase. That’s what you call an abandoned cart, and it can cost e-commerce stores an estimated $18 billion annually.
So how do you take advantage of abandoned shopping carts? The answer is to use a powerful tool used to reconnect with customers who have left their online orders incomplete. By using automatic notifications and personalized campaigns at key points in time, you can motivate shoppers to come back and complete their orders.
Do you need a plugin for abandoned cart recovery? Not necessarily. WordPress already has built-in features that allow store owners to track and manually follow up with shoppers who abandon their carts. However, if this manual process is too time-consuming for your business, a dedicated plugin could be the solution for making your abandoned cart recovery process more efficient.
Reasons for Shopping Cart Abandonment
You may be wondering why cart abandonment happens at all. After all, people add items to their cart, and then…nothing happens. We don’t need to speculate, the reasons are as varied as the shoppers themselves. The common reasons for shopping cart abandonment are as follows:
- Time constraints: Shoppers may become distracted or simply find that completing their purchase takes too long.
- Unexpected costs: Shipping and handling prices might become apparent to the shopper at checkout, causing them to abandon the cart.
- Lack of trust: Without customer reviews or other indicators of trustworthiness, shoppers may feel uncomfortable entering their payment information on your website.
- Poor user experience: An unclear navigational path on your website can lead shoppers to feel frustrated or overwhelmed when completing their purchase.
No matter what the reason, one thing is certain, WooCommerce provides a number of powerful tools and plugins for recovering those abandoned carts and turning them into sales!
Benefits of Using a WooCommerce Abandoned Cart Recovery Plugin
An all-in-one, handle-it-all plugin that can manage abandoned carts is beneficial for you and your customers alike. A WooCommerce Abandoned Cart Plugin can help you:
Recover lost sales
A WooCommerce Abandoned Cart Plugin facilitates the recovery of lost sales, by allowing customers to easily pick up exactly where they left off. This makes it easier for both sides: customers don’t have to scramble to remember what they were shopping for and you don’t have to do any extra work.
Get detailed analytics
You’ll be able to easily track shopping activities—which items were abandoned, when, by who, and more. This data helps you understand why people are leaving your store without making a purchase so that you can adjust accordingly.
Automate follow up emails and discounts
With this plugin, the process of sending follow up emails becomes easier than ever. You can personalize and automate emails according to customer preferences. Plus get discounts approved right away—with no need to manually check or approve discounts.
Making use of a Plugin like this will mean increased customer satisfaction and less work on your part, which is always a win-win situation.
Important Features of an Ideal Abandoned Cart Plugin
When it comes to abandoned cart recovery, if you’re using WooCommerce, you’ll want to consider using a plugin. A plugin allows for automation and helps to customize the abandoned cart experience for customers.
So what features should you look for in a WooCommerce abandoned cart recovery plugin?
Automation
The most important feature of any abandonment cart plugin is automation. Automation allows your WooCommerce store to automatically identify, track and recover carts that have been abandoned by customers. This can be done through an automated series of emails that remind customers that they have left something in their cart as well as offering any discounts or incentives available. This automation is key because it provides a far more personalized experience, unlike manual processes which could be time-consuming and less effective.
Discounts & Incentives
In addition to automation, another important feature of an abandonment cart plugin is the ability to offer discounts and incentives to customers who have left items in their carts. This may help fill the gap between simply reminding people about their forgotten order and actually encouraging them to complete the purchase process. You can use these discounts strategically by issuing them at particular points during the recovery process or when a customer has been away from your site for some time.
Reporting & Analytics
Lastly, make sure your chosen WooCommerce abandonment cart plugin gives you access to reporting and analytics features that allow you to track how effective your efforts are at recovering those lost purchases. With those insights, you can then optimize your strategies for better results in the future!
A Little About the Plugin
The basic goal of an abandoned cart recovery plugin is to allow you to send automated emails to customers who left items in their cart, reminding them to come back and complete the purchase. The goal is to draw those lost customers back to your store to close the sale.
The ELEX WooCommerce Abandoned Cart Recovery with Dynamic Coupons plugin is the way to go. If you wish to purchase the premium version, click the previous link. To help you out, most WooCommerce plugins offer a few additional features, like:
- To the recovery email templates, you can also include WooCommerce coupons or dynamically produced smart coupons.
- Graph-based recovery reports, rules and triggers, order details, direct WooCommerce connection for orders, guest user cart recovery, editable email templates, and email logs are just a few of the sophisticated features it offers.
- The plugin also comes in a premium edition that enables users to customize the GDPR message that appears.
- The premium version also allows you to filter order reports using custom dates and set up timers that decide when a shopping cart is considered abandoned.
With this WooCommerce plugin, you can enjoy all these benefits while saving time and effort by automating recovery efforts.
Automate Your Abandoned Cart Recovery
If you’re using WooCommerce to power your online store, you can easily set up an automated abandoned cart recovery system. This means that store owners can take advantage of the efficient process of recovering carts without having to manually email customers.
To access the plugin’s settings, go to WordPress Dashboard > Plugins > Installed Plugins > Abandoned Cart > Settings after downloading and activating the plugin.
General Settings
Choose the WooCommerce order statuses that reflect a successful cart recovery, enable the Enable Abandoned Cart button under Configuration settings, and enter the time limit beyond which a cart will be regarded abandoned to mark an order as finished.
With the premium version of the plugin, you can additionally specify how long after that the cart is considered to have expired and is no longer receiving recovery emails. This helps you prevent irritating clients who have grown disinterested in your services.
If you want to record abandoned carts for guest users and just the valid email format, respectively, the next step is to enable the option next to Guest Users settings.
Check the box under Notification Settings and edit the email’s body and subject as appropriate if you want to send the store owner an email when the cart is found.
You may enter the GDPR compliance message that you want to display and where you want it to appear in the GDPR Settings.
Email Settings
Here, you may adjust email settings like email triggers, rules, and templates. This area allows you to define the circumstances under which recovery emails should be sent, the templates for those emails, and the automatically created smart coupons.
- Email Rules
To create a new rule, click Add New Rule, enter a suitable Rule Name, choose either AND or OR as the Rule Type and finally click Add Filter to apply the changes. The many attributes include, among others, User role, Total amount, Number of goods, and Product ID.
- Email Templates
You have the ability to create, edit, and delete an infinite number of recovery email templates provided in this part. These email templates, together with the dynamically generated smart coupons that you set here, will be delivered on a regular basis to the visitor’s email address.
By selecting Add New Template, a new email template will be created.
Choose whether you want to upload an email template or alter an existing template, enter a template name and email topic, allow or deactivate the ability to include a coupon code, and more on the add new template page.
Enter the prefix for the coupon code, select the kind of discount (fixed or %), enter the discount amount, and decide if you want to make the coupon valid just once.
The customer’s email address or the items in the abandoned cart can also be used to link the coupon code.
You may edit the email body with the help of the available powerful shortcodes and specify the number of days or months after which you want the voucher to expire. Also, you have the option to send a test email to yourself to see how it would appear in your customers’ inboxes.
Click Save Template once all of the options have been set up.
- Email Triggers
Recovery email triggers are customized in the email settings, under the Email Triggers tab. You may change the trigger time for the emails, toggle triggers on and off, and get rid of them from this page.
You’re ready to go! Using dynamic discounts in automated abandoned cart recovery emails, you can now begin recovering abandoned carts from your WooCommerce store.
What Is the Best Way to Increase Conversion Rates?
When it comes to getting customers back to complete their purchases on your WooCommerce site, there are a few approaches you can take.
Email Reminders
You should start by setting up automated email reminders for abandoned carts. This way, the customer will receive an email reminding them of the products or services they have left in their shopping cart. With this approach, you can also include special deals or discounts to help nudge them back to your site and complete their purchase.
Retargeting Ads
If email reminders aren’t doing the trick, retargeted ads on social media and other platforms can be effective at bringing customers back to your site. You can create ads that are tailored to the visitors who have abandoned their cart, reminding them of what they were looking at before they left and encouraging them to come back and finish the purchase.
Plugin Solutions
As discussed above, the third way you can help increase conversion rates is with a WooCommerce abandoned cart recovery plugin. These plugins help automate some of the processes listed above, such as sending email reminders and tracking visitors who have left your site without completing their purchase. The plugin also allows you to track customer data such as product views, clicks, and purchases, giving you more information about what drives customer behavior.
Conclusion
Shopping cart abandonment can be like an itch that’s hard to scratch; there are ways to make it better but it’s still a problem that needs attention. Thankfully, WooCommerce has several ways to help combat it, from setting up abandoned cart recovery emails to installing plugins to do the work for you.
Whether you’re a new or experienced user, using the ELEX WooCommerce Abandoned Cart Recovery with Dynamic Coupons plugin is a great way to make sure potential customers don’t slip through the cracks. With the right setup, you can turn your abandoned carts into conversions and keep growing your customer base.
