How to prevent and reduce abandoned carts in your eCommerce | Stage Try
As an online retailer, we are sure you know the importance of preventing abandoned carts.
A shopper might abandon their cart for many reasons, but if you can’t reduce your cart abandonment rate, it can have a big impact on your bottom line.
In this blog post, we’ll share some tips for preventing cart abandonment on your eCommerce site.
What exactly is “an abandoned cart”?
“Abandoned cart” is a term used in online retailing to describe the phenomenon of a shopping cart being abandoned by a customer.
This occurs when a customer adds items to their online shopping cart but does not complete the purchase.
In most cases, the customer does not intend to abandon their cart, but something interrupts their purchase process, causing them to leave the site without completing the purchase.
The abandoned cart rate is the percentage of online shopping carts that are abandoned by customers. This is the number you want to keep low, while your conversion rate must be high.
Why do people abandon their online shopping carts?
As we mentioned before, there are many reasons why a shopper might abandon their cart.
Let’s take a look at some of the most common:
–Not ready to purchase: The shopper wasn’t planning on buying anything when they visited your site. They were just browsing.
–Forgetfulness: The shopper meant to come back and purchase the item later, but forgot.
–Wanted to compare prices: The shopper wanted to make sure they were getting the best deal before completing their purchase.
–Technical difficulties: The shopper experienced some sort of technical difficulty, such as a slow loading page or an error message, which prevented them from completing their purchase.
– Didn’t like the shipping options: The shopper didn’t like the shipping options offered by the store, so they decided not to complete their purchase.
– Customer service issues: The shopper had a problem with customer service and decided not to complete their purchase.
Whatever the reason, abandoned carts can be a frustrating experience for both customers and online retailers.
Retailers lose out on potential sales, while customers may never come back to the site if they have a bad experience.
If you can identify why shoppers are abandoning their carts, you can be one step closer to creating a strategy to take them all the way to completing their purchase.
The impact of cart abandonment on online stores
Abandoned Carts can have a big impact on online retailers, both in terms of lost sales and in terms of reputation.
While a certain number of abandoned carts is to be expected in any online store, a high abandoned cart rate can be detrimental to the business. Not only does it mean that potential sales are being lost, but it can also discourage customers from returning to the site.
When a shopper abandons their cart, it results in lost sales for the retailer. And it’s not just one sale that’s lost, but all of the future sales that shoppers could have made.
In addition, cart abandonment can damage a retailer’s reputation. If a shopper has a bad experience on a site, they’re likely to tell their friends about it. Enough of that and it can irreparably damage the retailer’s reputation.
Preventing Cart abandonment
The only good abandoned cart is the one that doesn’t exist. In an ideal world, online retailers wouldn’t have to worry ever about them.
However, the world is not perfect and it can be hard to convert the sale and prevent abandoned carts. Hard, yes, but not impossible.
Here are a few strategies you can use to prevent abandoned carts:
–Offer free shipping: One of the most common reasons shoppers abandon their carts is because they don’t like the shipping options. By offering free shipping, you can remove this obstacle and make it more likely that shoppers will complete their purchases.
–Allow guest checkout: Another common reason shoppers abandon their carts is because they don’t want to create an account. By allowing guest checkout, you can make it easier for shoppers to complete their purchase without having to create an account.
– Offer discounts and promotions: Shoppers are often looking for a good deal, so by offering discounts and promotions, you can entice them to complete their purchase.
– Provide clear and concise shipping information: Make sure your shipping information is clear and easy to understand. This will help shoppers know what to expect in terms of shipping times and costs, and make it more likely that they’ll complete their purchase.
–Make the checkout process easy: The easier the checkout process is, the less likely it is that shoppers will abandon their carts. So streamline your checkout process and make it as simple as possible.
Reducing cart abandonment rates on your eCommerce site
It is safe to assume you can’t prevent all abandoned carts, so the matter now becomes what to do to make the number of abandoned carts as small as possible.
Just like when preventing them, there are a few simple things you can implement in your store to reduce the abandoned carts rate to the minimum possible.
Let’s take a look at these simple strategies:
–Increase customer confidence: This can be done by ensuring that your site is secure and by offering clear and concise shipping information.
–Make the checkout process easy: The easier it is for shoppers to purchase items on your site, the less likely they are to abandon their cart.
–Increase engagement: This can be done by offering discounts and promotions, or by providing interesting content that encourages shoppers to stick around.
–Follow up with abandoned carts: This can be done by sending them an email or a text message, or by giving them a call. By reaching out to shoppers who have abandoned their carts, you can encourage them to complete their purchases.
How can Try Before You buy help you with abandoned carts?
Try Before You Buy is a great way to prevent abandoned carts. By allowing shoppers to try out your products before they purchase them, you can increase customer confidence and reduce the chances of them abandoning their cart.
In addition, it can also help increase engagement on your site. If shoppers are able to try out your products before they purchase them, they’re more likely to be engaged with your site and less likely to abandon their cart.
Finally, this relatively new model can help you follow up with shoppers who have abandoned their carts. If you know that a shopper has tried a product but didn’t purchase it, you can reach out to them and offer them a discount or promotion. This can encourage them to complete their purchase and reduce the chances of cart abandonment.
If you want to learn more about how Stage Try helps you reduce abandoned carts, you can read our post about it here.
Recovering abandoned carts
One of the best ways to convert an abandoned cart into a purchase is to follow up with the customer. This can be done through many kinds of follow-up tools.
By following up with customers who have abandoned their carts, you can encourage them to complete their purchases and reduce the chances of cart abandonment.
Here are some of the ways you can follow up with a customer who left an abandoned cart:
–Send an email: This can be done automatically through your eCommerce platform, or you can reach out to the shopper yourself. In your email, you can include a link to the items that were left in their cart, as well as a discount or promotion to encourage them to complete their purchase.
–Give them a call: This can be done manually, or you can use an automated system. When you call the shopper, you can offer them a discount or promotion, or you can simply remind them of the items that they left in their cart.
–Reach out on social media: This can be done by sending them a direct message, or by posting about your discounts and promotions on your social media accounts. By reaching out to shoppers on social media, you can encourage them to complete their purchases and reduce the chances of cart abandonment.
If you’re an online retailer, then you know that abandoned carts are a frustrating reality. Try as you might, there are always going to be customers who add items to their cart and then leave without completing the purchase.
While it’s impossible to completely eliminate abandoned carts, there are some things you can do to minimize them. Every store is different are so is every customer. Nobody knows better than you how you can implement the suggestions we made in this blog on your online store.
Though more art than science, finding that sweet spot where you and your customers are both satisfied can take some trial and error, you can rest assured there are tried and proven ways to lower the abandoned carts rate that you can apply in your store as it fits best.
