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One of the most daunting challenges of an eCommerce business is shopping cart abandonment. While the right marketing tactics enable store owners to drive traffic to their website; the battle is lost when the user doesn’t purchase the items in the cart and instead abandons it.
What is shopping cart abandonment?
Shopping cart abandonment is when a customer adds items to their cart, starts the checkout process but leaves it midway and doesn’t complete the purchase.
Till date, shopping cart abandonment leaves eCommerce businesses vulnerable to sales. Which is why it is crucial that you rethink your approach on how to use an abandoned cart as an opportunity instead of a miss.
However, before that, you need to understand some of the main reasons why your customers tend to abandon your cart.
What are some of the reasons for shopping cart abandonment?
As a store owner, if your customers are abandoning their cart then it is a loss in sales that affects your business growth. Mentioned below are a few common reasons why shopping cart abandonment occurs:
Complicated website – Online shoppers usually have a short attention span. If your website or checkout process is too complicated, then they may not stick around until the end.
Limited payment options – Not everyone will want to share their credit card details, especially if they are shopping on your website for the first time. By not offering all possible modes of payment, you end up losing customers.
Shipping costs – A small shipping cost might be acceptable to your shoppers. However, they are likely to abandon their cart if their total payable amount increases significantly at check out.
Passive browsing – Often online users just browse the stores with no intention of buying. They simply see the products and add them to their cart. You can use this information to incentivize them and encourage them to make the purchase.
Lack of trust – A spammy looking website will not instill trust in its users. So, instead of something like yourgardening-suppliesstore.com, go for something like yourgardening.store. Building an eCommerce store on a short, keyword-rich and industry-specific domain extension such as .STORE helps you in owning a brand that is unique, memorable, and most importantly…trustworthy.
How can you prevent shopping cart abandonment?
Here are certain ways you can address shopping cart abandonment.
1. Offer incentives
Often cart abandonment happens at the last stage, right before the payment. And more often than not, it is because of the final payable amount that has increased significantly because of high shipping/processing cost or taxes.
The way to overcome this is to offer incentives in the form of exciting offers or discounts. A few things that you can offer include free shipping, free gift, complimentary service, etc. These offers make the user see the value for their money and encourages them to complete the purchase.
2. Offer multiple payment options
Online shopping is all about convenience and the more convenience you offer, the lesser will be your shopping cart abandonment rates. This implies giving your users all possible payment options whether it is credit card, debit card, net banking, or any other local payment app.
The more options you offer, the easier it’ll be for your customers to complete their purchase. It would be silly to lose customers just because they don’t have a way to pay you.
3. Ask selective information
The more seamless your checkout process, the happier your customers will be. Don’t ask them to fill out a long form with tons of information when they are checking out. Offer the option of signing up for an account or continuing as a guest.
Moreover, ask for simple information such as name, email, postal address, and payment details. So, keep it short, simple, and to the point.
4. Make the checkout process mobile friendly
The world has moved on to mobile devices making everything available on the go. People are shopping online while commuting to work. Since a majority of online shoppers use smartphones, having a checkout page that is hard to navigate will hamper your sales. You need to ensure that all the pages of your website work seamlessly on mobile devices for enhanced customer experience and less shopping cart abandonment.
Final thoughts
The ultimate objective of any eCommerce store is to increase sales and convert passive customers into active ones. This will only be possible when you provide a seamless shopping experience to your users.
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