If you’re familiar in any way with eCommerce, which considering that you’re reading this you probably are, you’re probably aware of the tendency for shoppers to abandon their carts, often leaving for various reasons such as shopping on competitors sites and bad reviews.
Abandoned carts are common in the eCommerce world, about 70% of carts go abandoned, but how aware are you of the even more critical issue of checkout abandonment?
This is a serious issue because this is truly where the money is, and it often gets overlooked in comparison to abandoned carts. You may be wondering how common checkout abandonment is, and the answer is that it happens fairly often, because according to compass.co, about 25% of checkouts get abandoned.
With that said, it would probably be a good idea to optimize this process as much as you can to regain lost revenue and truly reach your business potential!
So in this article, we will go over the key differences between checkout abandonment and cart abandonment, the main causes of checkout abandonment, the solutions, and why optimizing isn’t enough when it comes to eCommerce and high risk merchants.
The Differences between Checkout Abandonment and Cart Abandonment
You’re at least aware of these common occurrences in the field of eCommerce, but are you aware of their differences?
In brief, the main differences between checkout and cart abandonment can simply be boiled down to when the client decides to abandon their cart and leave the site. When it’s an abandoned cart, this means that items were put in the cart, but they were abandoned before the checkout.
Similarly, when we talk about checkout abandonment, we’re simply referring to a customer leaving at the checkout process, oftentimes entering payment information but not fully purchasing. This can be a frustrating issue to deal with, because it appears that your marketing is working, and that your customers are interested in purchasing your products, only to then find out that they weren’t really going to buy… Or so it seems.
Fundamentally, in order to solve this problem, you need to understand the main causes before you can find the solutions.
The main causes of checkout abandonment
So why does checkout abandonment happen? It’s often because of several factors combined together, and rarely because of just one thing.
You have to keep in mind that the more complicated your checkout process is, the more likely it is that your customer will start to lose patience and want to go elsewhere. This is the fundamental underlying factor behind abandonment, and you need to assess your checkout experience.
Do you have any of these issues?
- An unoptimized and confusing checkout experience
- A very complicated checkout form
- Slow page loading speeds
- Glitches and errors when checking out
- Additional hidden charges
- Requiring users to create an account
- Not enough payment options in addition to popular ones
- Lack of payment security
- A checkout appearance that doesn’t generate trust
There could be other issues, but this list is a great starting point that can cover a lot of ground and get your optimization rates up. Also keep in mind that there are some points that have more weight than others, and you need to look at your analytics to see when and where your customers are dropping off.
Remember that in recent years, data from the Baymard Institute has shown that cart abandonment happens around 7 out 10 times, but it is also important to note that 2020 data has found that nearly 60% of US online shoppers abandoned due to just browsing, because they weren’t ready to buy. https://baymard.com/lists/cart-abandonment-rate
So you need to factor in looky-loos as well, but data will give a clearer picture, so start collecting it if you aren’t already…
Solutions
So what are the solutions to checkout abandonment?
It really depends on the quality of your current layout, but oftentimes it’s doing the right thing at the right time. More specifically, you need to consider that checkout abandonment happens due to 3 fundamental reasons.
According to the Baymard Institute, these are:
- Hidden fees at checkout
- The requirement to create an account
- An overly complex checkout process
These were found to be the most common reasons customers abandon at the checkout, so you want to make sure you address these issues head on, because these are the key movers that really make or break conversion rates!
With these in mind, you want to make sure that you at least have:
- In addition to payment security, a trust-worthy look to your checkout page
- Clear payment requirements that include fees regarding shipping
- A clear checkout process with minimal fields
- Eliminate the requirement for an account
- Quick page load speeds
If you can handle these issues, you’ll in all likelihood see an increase in conversion rates.
Why optimizing is not enough for High-risk merchants…
We’ve established what causes and what you should do when dealing with checkout abandonment, and by now you’re well aware of the benefits of optimization within the world of eCommerce.
However, things can get a bit more tricky as a High-risk merchant…
You may optimize your cart and checkout processes to avoid abandonments, and this will likely lead to more sales in the long-run, however, success for a business also depends on the industry that it operates in.
As a merchant operating in a high-risk vertical, you may likely find yourself dealing with abandonments and chargebacks even more frequently than traditional eCommerce merchants, and this isn’t really an optimization issue, it’s an industry issue.
Don’t get it twisted, optimization is crucial, but only if certain components are in place and the environment is right. So once you’ve done the legwork to optimize, what’s next?
If you’re operating a WooCommerce store and experiencing any checkout abandonment or general cart experience issues, our Web Development partners WP Concierges will guide you in the right direction.