Most retailers are focused on improving their cart abandonment rate. And rightly so. With the cart abandonment rate at about 75 percent, retailers need to minimize this problem.
If your brand suffers from this problem, something in your checkout process causes ready-to-buy customers to leave without finalizing the purchase.
7 Best Practices for Guest Checkout
This post will examine the best practices for improving the guest checkout process while minimizing the risk of losing customers.
Offer One-page Checkout
Ideally, guest checkout should be limited to one page. All important information, such as contact information, billing address, delivery address, and payment details, could fit it. This speeds up the buying process, especially for consumers shopping on mobile.
Adding additional options like the PayPal button could reduce the on-form filling. Many brands use one-page checkout forms to increase conversions and improve customer experience.
Sephora is one such brand. They created a staged checkout, but everything appears on a single page.
Adidas is another brand that gets this concept perfectly. Their checkout form is simple, short, and self-contained. No navigation bar would lead users to other site sections, and no other annoyances that would slow down the buying process.
Pay Attention to Speed
Having a non-responsive site can hurt customers’ satisfaction with online shopping. One of the most common examples is pauses after pressing certain buttons.
Such delays in loading during the checkout process can lead customers to think that the site has poor performance and is untrustable.
A slow checkout page can be a result of several issues. For example, the site may have too many JS error issues, static content such as images and CSS files, or third-party tools/apps incompatible with the checkout. Low quality is another important factor leading to slow site pages.
Vitamin World is an example of a brand that pays special attention to speed and offers a seamless shopping experience for its users.
Allow Users to Save Information For Next Time
At the end of the transaction, allow users to save their customer details next time. This implies convenience and shows them that they are your primary focus.
Using the word “register” can put customers off.
For additional convenience, brands can allow automatic filling in details the customer has already given.
The benefits of saving details after the purchase should be clearly outlined. Users should also have a range of marketing preferences if they sign up.
Optimize Forms
Keep forms as short as possible and only ask for the necessary information to complete a purchase. For example, remove unnecessary fields such as the title (Mr./Mrs./Miss) and don’t ask for home and work phone.
Labels placed above fields are also easier and quicker to scan. In addition, localization is also made easier as there is more space for longer translations.
Autofill fields should be the norm. Not only does this save time, but it also reduces errors. In addition, the autofill option is known for improving online conversions.
Most browsers already offer this functionality, but brands need to make sure that their fields are properly tagged with labels that a browser will recognize for this to work successfully.
Allow customers to use the same address for shipping and billing without doing additional typing. In the billing part, summarize the shipping address as editable content.
Rebecca Taylor is an example of a brand that offers a seamless shopping experience for its customers.
Showcase Security Icons and Guarantee Messaging
Customer confidence can be boosted with messaging and trust icons. Nearly 51 percent of shoppers don’t purchase online because they are concerned about security.
This can be alleviated by placing security icons close to the credit card and payment fields.
Additionally, brands should remind customers of the value proposition and services such as risk-free shopping, satisfaction guarantee, free returns, and other benefits they offer.
Use Clear CTA Buttons
Specific CTA descriptions such as “complete order,” “continue shopping,” “proceed to checkout,” “apply promo code,” etc., should be used to describe the next step customers will be redirected to after pressing the button.
It is important to consider that shoppers anticipate the next thing after clicking a specific command.
CTAs should include action-oriented words and represent visitors’ actions well. Therefore, certain action-oriented words can help maximize conversions.
Have a Wide Variety of Payment Options
Offering a wide array of payment options is known to increase conversions. Alternative payment methods, or APMs, comprised nearly 55 percent of global eCommerce payments 2019.
Nowadays, there are more than 200 alternative payment methods. These include bank transfers, digital wallets, e-invoices, digital currencies, etc.
Although credit cards are still widely used, they are becoming increasingly dematerialized.
Shoppers typically prefer only one to two payment methods, so shopper recognition plays an important role.
Conclusion
Getting higher conversion rates from an eCommerce checkout form is something that each brand can control. All it takes is a little effort.
