With the biggest shopping season of the year just around the corner, the success or otherwise of an e-commerce internet business for the entire year can hinge on the results of the next couple of months. In the U.S., in 2009, the period from Labour Day (first Monday in September) to November 15th was especially bleak, as online sales slumped by 56 percent with shopping cart abandonment reaching a staggering 83 percent, according to SeeWhy, which tracks data relating to conversions as well as abandonment rates.
 
With the lingering effects of the recession still being felt, this year appears to be continuing in the same vein, so, if you have an e-commerce business, now would be an opportune time to take a look at the main reasons shopping carts are abandoned prior to purchase in order to proactively address them and avoid being part of this year’s cart abandonment statistics.

Top 5 Reasons Why Shopping Carts Are Abandoned

A May 2010 Forrester Research study gave the following as the top 5 reasons shopping carts are abandoned during online shopping:

  1. Cost of shipping and handling (44%)
  2. Not ready to make the purchase (41%)
  3. Decided to check prices on other web sites (27%)
  4. The price of the item was too high (25%)
  5. Wanted to save cart and decide later (24%)

One thing that is noticeable in the top five reasons is that they have nothing to do with checkout functionality or web site design, and that most, if not all, can be taken care of without too much trouble. If you can get to them all before the shopping season heats up, that would be ideal; if not, take care of what you can, but make a point of attending to the rest in time for the following year.

Tips To Reduce Shopping Cart Abandonment Rates

Here are a few suggestions for addressing these issues:

  • Try offering reduced, or even free, shipping and handling. Shipping costs are something consumers look at very closely when making online purchasing decisions, so the lower you can make yours, the better the chance of a purchase being completed. Of course, free shipping isn’t always an option for some companies. Another option could be to offer reduced shipping rates on purchases above a certain amount, with reminders to the shoppers if they’re approaching the threshold for reduced shipping. That may just be the final nudge they need to get them through the checkout process!
  • As can be seen from the reasons above, in the case of 4 out of 10 shoppers carts are abandoned because the shoppers aren’t quite ready to complete the purchase. So, why not give them the opportunity to get more information about a product or service via e-mail (or text, etc.)? And/or offer them a chance to qualify for some type of special promotion or to subscribe to your newsletter. An abandoned shopping cart can be just the beginning of a potential relationship between your company and the shopper, allowing you to continue marketing to them, since they’ve already shown an interest in your products or services.
  • Over 50 percent of shoppers are abandoning carts either due to prices being too high or to see if they can get a better price elsewhere. As in the foregoing tip, this presents you with the opportunity of re-targeting your visitors and trying to find out why they didn’t complete their purchase. You can then analyse that information and see what opportunities it presents to you to rectify the situation.
  • If possible, offer the option of a persistent shopping cart, which saves a shopper’s items so they can come back later and complete their purchase. If this is not feasible for your business at this time, it might be advisable to put this close to the top of your priority list to have in place in time before the next major shopping season comes around. If your site already has this functionality in place, extending the “persistence” factor (the length of time items are retained in a shopping cart) out as close to the end of the year as possible may go a long way to helping reduce rates of abandonment.
  • Here’s a bonus tip – give shoppers the option to checkout as guests rather than having to register an account, since many are wary of the idea of setting up accounts every time they want to buy something online. So, just make that optional and many people will feel more comfortable about completing the process.

The end of year shopping season can quite often be the difference between a successful and an unsuccessful year for an e-commerce internet business, and, with shoppers still being very selective about how they invest their increasingly hard-earned income, you’d be well advised to try to implement as many of the foregoing tips as possible to keep your customers happy and keep your virtual registers ticking over.

A UK internet business coach can provide the assistance you need to get your e-commerce site ready so opportunities aren’t squandered in the upcoming shopping season.

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