Feature
The Gist
- Rising challenge. Shopping cart abandonment rates soar to 85% for mobile users, posing a significant challenge in converting interest into sales.
- Major deterrents. High shipping costs, complex checkout processes, and payment security concerns are primary causes of shopping cart abandonment.
- Solution-focused approach. Streamlining the checkout process, addressing high shipping fees, and leveraging technology like AI can reduce abandonment rates.
According to a recent Statista report, shopping cart abandonment rates are alarmingly high, reaching 70% overall and escalating to 85% for mobile users. This has long been a critical challenge in the ecommerce world, often acting as a stumbling block in converting interest into sales. Essentially, this phenomenon occurs when customers fill their online shopping cart with items but leave the site without finalizing their purchase, abandoning a cart full of products. Understanding the reasons behind this behavior is essential for retailers aiming to streamline their checkout process and enhance the overall shopping experience. In this article, we will examine shopping cart abandonment, the reasons why it occurs and some strategies to prevent it from happening.
Introduction to Shopping Cart Abandonment
Shopping cart abandonment occurs like this: A consumer is searching for a product or service and uses Google to locate it online. They may have found it at an online retailer they are not familiar with, or they may have seen it listed on a familiar site such as Amazon. No matter which retailer they select, they visit the brand’s website and begin to peruse the products they are interested in. They see one they would like to purchase, so after looking it over, they add it to the site’s shopping cart. They notice some items that are accessories to their main item, so they add those to their cart as well. A day later, the items remain unpurchased in the still-full cart, marking it as abandoned.
Often, consumers add items to their carts without intending to purchase them, using the cart to compare prices, mull over decisions or as a makeshift wish list. Regardless of the underlying reasons, the pervasive nature of cart abandonment represents a significant challenge for online retailers. The widespread occurrence of abandoned carts across various industries suggests that there is no easy fix or single identifiable cause for this issue.
Related Article: Avoiding the High Costs of Shopping Cart Abandonment
Understanding the Causes of Shopping Cart Abandonment
Understanding the causes of shopping cart abandonment involves looking into various deterrents that prompt customers to leave without completing their purchases. These reasons include, but are not limited to, high shipping costs, which can make the overall cost of purchase unappealing; complex checkout processes, which can frustrate or confuse shoppers; and payment security concerns, where customers might feel their financial information is not safe. Each of these factors directly impacts the customer's decision to proceed with their purchase, highlighting areas where improvements can significantly reduce abandonment rates.
High shipping fees, unexpected by consumers accustomed to Amazon's free shipping, frequently deter purchases. The reluctance intensifies if the shipping cost approaches or exceeds the item's price, significantly increasing the likelihood of cart abandonment. Understanding that high shipping fees are a significant barrier for many consumers, it becomes imperative for businesses to highlight their shipping policies more prominently. This might involve offering free shipping thresholds or loyalty program benefits that can help offset the cost of shipping, thereby making the overall purchase more appealing.
Most shoppers have encountered checkout issues, such as adding items to their cart only to find them missing at checkout. This frustrating experience may compel them to painstakingly re-add the items or abandon the site altogether in search of alternatives. The issues of checkout problems, such as items disappearing from the cart, and improperly designed checkout forms that frustrate users, call for a robust solution. Ensuring website stability and thoroughly testing the checkout process across different devices and browsers become essential. Proper use of autofill functionalities can significantly reduce the friction of re-entering information, making the checkout process smoother and more user-friendly.
Poorly designed checkout forms disrupt the payment process. Ideally, form fields should simplify data entry, such as auto-formatting phone numbers and auto-filling saved credit card details — leaving only the security code for the shopper to enter. These conveniences are lost with flawed designs, further complicating the checkout experience.
If the form is poorly designed, with mislabeled fields, for instance, autofill features fail, forcing shoppers to manually input their information. This inconvenience, requiring them to retrieve their card and enter details manually, often leads to cart abandonment, and is a major deterrent for many.
When the shopping cart is being used as a wish list, the shopper has no inclination to check out. They are simply adding items to their shopping cart to see what is available that they are interested in, comparing prices, and saving it to order at a later time and date. Amazon responded to this use of shopping carts by providing customers with the ability to create wish lists where items can be saved for later, shared with friends and used as gift wish lists for parents.
Acknowledging that some customers use the shopping cart as a wish list indicates an opportunity for businesses to implement a dedicated wish list feature similar to Amazon’s. This allows customers to save items without the pressure of immediate purchase and enables businesses to send targeted reminders or offers related to these wish-listed items, potentially converting interest into sales at a later time.
Jackie Walker, retail experience strategy lead, North America at digital consultancy Publicis Sapient, told CMSWire that if you think about customers today, and the ecommerce experience paradigms that have been created, we can start to see that cart abandonment can in actuality be a learned customer behavior and it is not necessarily even indicative of a real problem. "For example, think about the way that retailers have managed allowing customers to track items of interest,” said Walker. “There are lists, shopping lists, wish lists, favorites, and then, of course, adding to cart and using the cart itself or a cart ‘save for later’ feature as a list. If you talk to customers about how they use Amazon, some will talk about using categorized wishlists, but some will just swear by Add to Cart / Save for Later as the primary way that they track prices and manage lists.”
When websites configure their shopping carts to expire too quickly, they are robbing their customers of the ability to control their own narrative, and contributing to the loss of a customer. This occurs when a shopper returns to their cart the next day, only to find that it has been emptied, and they must go back and locate the items they had previously added to their cart. Although there are some under the mistaken impression that by making shopping carts expire, they are manipulating customers into making purchases, this couldn’t be further from the truth, and in fact, often causes the opposite to occur. Unless there is a valid reason to make shopping carts expire, for example when items in the cart are on sale for a limited time, it should simply never be done. This respects the customer's shopping process and minimizes the inconvenience of having to locate and add products again.
Finally, when shoppers are forced to re-enter information due to a problem with the checkout process, faulty design, or personal error, at a certain point, many will abandon the cart rather than do so. Nobody enjoys having to re-enter information, any more than they enjoy having to repeat themselves in a conversation. If it happens more than once, the chances of shopping cart abandonment go up exponentially.
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Incorporating a feedback loop where customers can report issues with the checkout process, including any instances of having to re-enter information, is invaluable. This not only aids in identifying and fixing technical issues but also demonstrates a brand's commitment to customer satisfaction and continuous improvement.
Related Article: How AI Is Changing Ecommerce Personalization
Effective Strategies to Reduce Abandonment
To minimize shopping cart abandonment, a comprehensive approach is needed that goes beyond simply allowing items to remain in a user's cart indefinitely. The approach should address the multiple facets of the shopping experience that contribute to abandonment, tailored to the nuanced needs and frustrations of online shoppers.
Additionally, brands should consider the rise of hybrid shopping, that is, shopping both online and in brick-and-mortar storefronts. Walker said that according to Forrester, roughly 70% of all in-store sales in the US will be digitally influenced by 2027 — meaning that at some point in the shopping journey, a customer used a digital channel to aid in the purchase. “Many customers use digital channels in the consideration phase to discover and evaluate products, and then go into the store for confirmation and ultimately make the purchase in-store. We do not yet have the capabilities in most cases to account for this online/offline behavior when it comes to understanding cart abandonment.”
Focusing on high shipping fees, one effective method is a greater level of transparency — brands must communicate shipping policies clearly and upfront, perhaps offering free shipping thresholds or rewards for loyalty program members to mitigate the impact of these costs. Transparency ensures that customers are not taken by surprise by additional fees at checkout, which is often a point of friction.
When it comes to checkout problems and poorly designed forms, ensuring the stability of the shopping cart across various platforms and devices is paramount. This involves thorough testing and optimization to prevent items from disappearing from the cart unexpectedly. In addition, the checkout process itself should be as streamlined as possible, using autofill options efficiently to minimize the need for customers to re-enter information. This not only speeds up the process but also reduces errors and frustration associated with manual data entry. The road to completing a purchase should never be complicated.
Bogdan Rancea, co-founder of review site Ecommerce Platforms, told CMSWire that strategies to address shopping cart abandonment are their most effective when they tackle the root cause of why customers don't follow through with their purchase in the first place. "The most common reasons are similar to what you might see in a brick-and-mortar store (for example, impatience, confusion, unexpected costs, privacy concerns, and indecision),” said Rancea. “But to root out what makes your customers abandon their carts, you need to keep a close eye on your own analytics to try and understand what parts of your marketing or product offering need improvement. It might be your brand perception, onsite content and internal linking strategy, website's structure, checkout process, product photography, unexpected delivery fees or exemptions, accessibility issues, or something else.” Rancea suggested that understanding the reasons for shopping cart abandonment on your website can help you prioritize which strategies to implement.
As mentioned, introducing a wish list feature can serve dual purposes: It allows customers to save items for later without clogging the shopping cart and provides businesses with valuable data for personalized marketing efforts. This feature can be especially useful for customers who are not ready to make an immediate purchase but show a clear interest in certain products.
Regarding the expiration of shopping carts, extending the duration that items remain saved or linking them to customer accounts for easy retrieval on subsequent visits can significantly improve the shopping experience. This flexibility respects the customer's decision-making process and reduces the likelihood of abandonment due to the inconvenience of having to locate and add products again. Additionally, if a customer exits the site with items in their cart, preserving these items allows the business to send email reminders, prompting a potential return and purchase completion:
Empathy and Understanding Over Technology
Employing technology to tackle shopping cart abandonment offers a variety of strategies that can significantly enhance the online shopping experience and reduce abandonment rates. By leveraging advancements in web development, analytics, and AI, businesses can create a more seamless, engaging, and personalized shopping journey for their customers.
However, it’s important to note that although technology can be useful for solving the problem, often the application of empathy and an understanding of what customers go through during the checkout process can help brands to better understand why the problem occurs. Connor Butterworth, CEO and owner of Southwestern Rugs Depot, an online rug store, told CMSWire that his business experienced high shopping cart abandonment rates, and after a thorough study of his customers' shopping behaviors and gathering feedback, they realized the issue wasn't singular.
"A major factor was that customers felt overwhelmed during the checkout process. There were too many steps, some of which seemed unnecessary. We had to address this issue, so our approach began with simplification," said Butterworth. "We streamlined the checkout process to the bare essentials, eliminating any step that wasn't necessary for completing the purchase." Butterworth said that another hindrance was the lack of a guest checkout option. "Requiring people to create an account before completing a purchase would often drive potential buyers away. Swiftly, we introduced a guest checkout feature, offering the option to create an account after purchase completion.” Butterworth said that this change alone had a significant impact on reducing their shopping cart abandonment rate.
Finally, Butterworth noticed that surprise costs at the final stage of checkout led to many abandoned carts, especially unexpected shipping fees. "To tackle this, we decided to include all costs upfront, with free shipping always being a staple, along with a hassle-free return policy. Clients felt more comfortable knowing they'd be taken care of if they were unsatisfied with the product."
Final Thoughts
Shopping cart abandonment remains a pervasive challenge for online retailers, but one that can be effectively mitigated through a comprehensive approach that prioritizes customer experience. By addressing high shipping costs, streamlining the checkout process, leveraging technology such as AI for personalization and payment optimization, and fostering transparency, businesses can create a seamless and enjoyable path to purchase, delivering a user-friendly and trustworthy online shopping experience.
