Maybe you are just venturing into running your own business.
Or, perhaps the weird and wild year that we’ve left behind is what has finally convinced you to move your business online.
Whatever your position is, you should know that shopping cart abandonment is a phenomenon that can have a severe negative impact on your business.
Abandonment happens when a potential customer adds an item to the cart but leaves your site without completing the purchase. Statistics say that over 88 percent of all possible deals end in shopping cart abandonment.
Fear not, as there are ways to fight it and significantly reduce your losses and turn them into profit. Here is how to fight shopping cart abandonment.
Use chatbots to increase customer engagement
The customers of today dislike doing business with soulless corporations. They want a unique shopping experience that feels as if it is tailor-made, especially for them.
AI-powered chatbots can help you provide each customer with a unique shopping experience. They use machine learning, and other Artificial Intelligence (AI) forms to learn about each individual customer, their habits, wants, and needs. Then, chatbots use this knowledge to predict and anticipate any query that a potential shopper might have.
In a way, shopping or picking services with a chatbot by your side is like having your personal shopping assistant. And, everybody likes to feel a bit special.
The more potential customers engage with your site, brand, or service, the closer they will feel connected to it. Thus, they will be more likely to do business with you. Chatbots are an essential step in increasing customer engagement, retention, and satisfaction.
Simplify the shopping experience
Sometimes, customers know exactly what they want – the make, the model, and how much money they want to spend.
Those potential buyers can be driven away if you insist on registering before using the check-out option. That is why you should include an option to shop as a guest.
Also, offer as many ways to pay as you can. Some people are not too comfortable putting their credit card info, for example, but they might have a PayPal account linked to the device they are browsing from.
Any additional form of payment that you add increases your chances of stimulating a potential customer to complete the purchase.
Make the process as smooth as possible
Completing a lengthy check-in process is similar to waiting in line at a store for a long time before getting served, and nobody likes that.
The least you can do is include a progress indicator to inform your customers how far along the shopping process they have already progressed.
Besides that, it is a good idea to streamline the entire process and put all the steps of purchase (Shipping address entry, choosing a payment option, and placing an order) on a single page.
When you streamline the shopping process, you make it much easier for the potential buyers to complete the purchase on the spot, thus making it less likely for them to change their minds and abandon the shopping cart.
Make it easy for customers to save their shopping carts, continue shopping and return to them afterward. Intuitive user interface and logical navigation options are essential for a pleasant shopping experience.
Also, fast loading times work in your favor. According to Visual Website Optimizer, you lose seven percent of potential customers for every additional second it takes your site to load.
Use remarketing to pursue those who leave their carts
No matter how hard you try to avoid it, shopping cart abandonment will continue to happen. Your best course of action, then, is to go after those who left their carts.
The good news is that you know what those potential shoppers want since they have come so close to closing the deal.
Almost any type of remarketing will do, but Facebook Remarketing ads might be your best bet. They are extremely visual in their nature, which makes them a perfect tool for reminding the indecisive customers just what they are missing.
If your product doesn’t have much of a visual appeal, Google AdWords and Bing Ads can work even better for your remarketing needs.
Some additional tips
Here are a couple more things that you should do to reduce shopping cart abandonment on your site:
- Be clear and upfront about shipping costs. If you can, offer free or flat-rate low-cost shipping as too high shipping costs can drive the potential customers away.
- Offer a money-back guarantee. Use customer reviews to let others know they can trust you, too.
- Make sure that your customers know that your business can be trusted. Make sure that the logos and the companies that guarantee the safety of your customers and their data are well known and well established. According to Shopify, more than sixty percent of people refuse to complete a purchase if trust logos are not present.
