Do you know what’s one of the most challenging parts of being in the eCommerce business? Yes, most definitely, handling shopping cart abandonments! At least, more than 6 out of 10 shoppers abandon their cart before checkout. This can be due to various reasons. The most common reasons are friction on-site or due to window shopping. Fortunately, these are preventable so that you experience less abandonment of shopping carts. Here are some tips on how you can minimize your cart abandonment.
Ways to Reduce Abandoned Carts
1. Allowing Guest Checkouts
Many sites have a mandatory account creation process. This irks many buyers as they feel uncomfortable sharing their personal information and emails. Many buyers may also want to use that site for once emergency purchases. Hence, they may want to avoid the process of creating an account for buying a product. The best bet, in this case, would be to not make the creation of an account necessary. Guest check-out saves time, but doesn’t save your data. It also uses your email only for updates about your order.
2. Shorter Delivery Period
When a buyer wants to purchase, they would want to know the expected date of delivery. Some Ecommerce sites do not show that until and unless you have made the final purchase. This makes the proverbial buyer wary. It may be kept in notice that buyers are expecting lesser delivery time now. You can attract your buyers by having a 3-5 day delivery policy according to their location. This, in turn, would hike their interest in purchasing from your site because of faster delivery.
3. Having No Hidden Costs
Don’t you feel duped coming across a wish-listed item at a great price only to be shown extra charges at checkout? This happens when the extra costs of purchases are hidden. Then, the buyer may abandon their cart and look elsewhere. The best way to avoid this is to have a fixed rate for shipping. You can also have a free shipping option above the purchase of a certain amount that can be obtainable. In the case of international shipping, you can mention an approximate cost and provide the exact cost when they put their address. In this way, you maintain transparency which most buyers value.
4. Improving Mobile Checkout Interface
Recent researches show that more than half of eCommerce purchases are done via smartphones. Along with this, it also shows that mobile devices account for most shopping cart abandonment. To stop that, the mobile user experience needs to be improved. To do that, friction needs to be removed. The flow of checkout on mobiles should also be checked. The smoothness between the cart and checkout should be kept in mind. There should be simplicity during checkout. For example, a buyer should be able to edit changes to their cart without having to go back. The buyer should also be given the option to add to the cart from the search option, like Expertrec offers. These small tweaks and changes also change the buyers’ mentality.
5. Comparison With Competing Ecommerce Sites
Customers abandon carts when they see the same product at a better discount. To tackle the problem, you can compare prices and try to have leverage. It can be done by giving an extra discount on prepaid purchases, or free cash on delivery. You can also have an offer for their next purchase, maybe a gift. This way, you will be able to attract customers.
6. Having Enough Payment Options
Gone are the days of debit and credit cards. With the advent of UPI, life has been made easier. You need not carry your cards to make a purchase. Some sites, however, offer a limited amount of payment methods. You need to have multiple payment options like EMI, UPI payments, Google pay, Paypal, or Cash On Delivery. Otherwise, they may move on to retailers who offer them the option they have been looking for.
7. Having Better Refund, Return, And Exchange Policies
Many consumers are wary of buying products online. It is because they cannot see the product in person. They place an order depending on what the websites show them. So naturally, they would be wanting to get their money back if the product is not up to par. On top of that, if the policy is such that it offers only partial refunds or store credit, it loses buyers. The site should have a policy that benefits the buyers so that they feel they can place their trust in the website.
8. Inclusion of Call To Action On Page
A lot of time, buyers abandon carts because the next step while checking out is not clear to them. It is then that a call to action comes in handy. Using CTA, you can show the next step of the checkout process. The customer would then know what to expect. It should also be made sure that CTAs for each step are understandable. For this, the words used should be customer friendly. It should be understandable and easy. Like after adding to the cart, the next option can be either to show similar products or to provide a proceed to checkout. You need to also make sure that the buyers can see their final purchases before they confirm their payment.
Summing Up
These are some of the ways through which you can decrease cart abandonment. You can also do a thorough search, find more information and work on them for your site. It is to be known though, that this can only be prevented by offering a smoother mobile experience, and enough payment options. Additionally, you can also give follow-up emails to the people who abandoned their carts. There will be window shoppers though. So, you need to distinguish between window shoppers and buyers who drop out because of interface issues. If you try to maintain all these things, handling the cart abandonment issues will be a piece of cake for you then! So, try following all the tips and give your customer a better experience.
