Cart abandonment is a huge problem in eCommerce. It’s been reported that over 60% of online shoppers abandon their carts before they complete checkout.
This means that businesses are missing out on potential revenue from these customers, and the cost of acquiring new ones can be prohibitively high. But what if there were a way to reduce cart abandonment?
First, let’s jump into understanding exactly what our interpretation of shopping cart abandonment is.
What Is Shopping Cart Abandonment?
Put, when customers add things to their online shopping carts but then abandon them before paying, it’s known as shopping cart abandonment.
Concerning the above statistic, framing the significance of this eCommerce dilemma implies that around two out of three people who add items to their online cart will leave without purchasing. That’s a lot of missed conversion chances and revenue loss.
How to Reduce Shopping Cart Abandonment & Recapture Conversions
There is a multitude of reasons why customers abandon their shopping carts. It’s essential to digest the following information so that you can try and reduce these occurrences. Here are some of our fool-proof strategies:
1) Include Social Proof
Adding social proof such as customer testimonials, number of sales, product reviews, and ratings will help to reassure your customers that they’re making a safe purchase decision. In addition, this will help to reduce cart abandonment.
2) Use Trust Badges
Trust badges, such as security seals and trust logos, are an excellent way for customers to verify they’re shopping with a trustworthy online vendor. Again this can contribute to reducing customer anxiety and fear around their purchase decision.
3) Simplify the Checkout Process
When customers are presented with many options and payment complications, they can quickly become overwhelmed and abandon their shopping carts. You want to keep things simple for your customers to reduce cart abandonment.
4) Include a Countdown Timer
Adding a countdown timer on your product pages shows potential customers an impending product scarcity, which encourages them to purchase. This can have a positive impact on reducing shopping cart abandonment.
5) Offer Free Shipping
Free shipping is a great incentive for customers that may be browsing your online store but haven’t made up their mind yet. If possible, discuss this with your fulfillment company and see if faster shipping options are available. Also, by adding free shipping to particular products or offering free shipping after the customer spends over a specific dollar amount, you’re encouraging them to spend more money on your store, which will help to reduce cart abandonment.
6) Add Checkout Instructions
Adding checkout instructions to the homepage of your website is a good practice for new users who may not be familiar with how online shopping works or incomplete carts. You can also consider adding step-by-step visual guides of the checkout process, which can help to reduce shopping cart abandonment.
7) Use Abandoned Cart Emails
It would help if you considered using abandoned cart emails as part of your customer retention process. If a customer adds items to their shopping cart and doesn’t return, they usually mean business and will likely abandon the checkout process. You can send abandoned cart emails via third-party services to encourage the customer to come back to your store, which will reduce shopping cart abandonment.
Bonus Tip: Understand The Power of FOMO
FOMO is the fear of missing out on good things that others are doing. So, when you use a social proof notification to demonstrate that other people have purchased your items, it encourages visitors to do so as well. Always consider this when structuring your landing pages and put yourself in your customer’s shoes.
Conclusion
Shopping cart abandonment can be frustrating for online businesses. Fortunately, with the right strategies to reduce customer indecision, you can rest assured knowing that you’re doing your part to keep potential customers engaged and interested in what you have to offer. If it becomes difficult to scale things up and deliver all these value propositions, consider involving specialists. You could outsource marketing or even look into eCommerce fulfillment. But remember always to keep things simple and take them step-by-step – put yourself in your customer’s shoes.
