If you’re an online retailer selling on an e-commerce site like Amazon FBA or your own website, you’ve probably already encountered and struggled with the problem of shopping cart abandonment, which happens when a customer adds an item to their cart but then leaves the site prior to checking out. This is known as cart abandonment on Amazon.
Since you can’t always tell how long or why a person put your item into their shopping cart but never checked out, details you glean from your own website can help you address these issues on Amazon. As an Amazon FBA seller, you must me mindful of cart abandonment on Amazon even if you cannot address all the causes behind it.
E-commerce businesses of all sizes and shapes experience cart abandonment, and there are steps that you can take to increase the chances that the person will become a converted buyer and check out with the items in their cart. Your cart abandonment rate is something you should calculate and better understand, especially if you operate your own website.
Your cart abandonment rate equals 1- {the total number of shoppers who checked out with their transactions divided by the total number of shoppers who added something to their cart}. Any e-commerce merchant will be familiar with cart abandonment and understand that it’s a major pain point that keeps you from being able to grow your profits. It’s simple, however, to ignore how much of a major impact cart abandonment can have.
It’s anticipated that more than $4.6 trillion in sales on e-commerce website are lost every single year due to cart abandonment. The most likely items to be abandoned in a cart are clothing, tech and housewares, and nearly half of all shoppers admit to abandoning something during a check out in the past year. That’s compared with only one-quarter of people who walk away from a purchase in an actual brick and mortar store.
Average cart abandonment rates across all industries are over 75%. This happens every single day, and mobile drives a tremendous amount of e-commerce traffic, but has even a higher average abandonment rate of 80%.
Some of the most common concerns that lead customers to abandon their car include:
• Issues related to security
• Complex check out procedures
• Required registration
• Hidden fees and costs
• High shipping costs
There are things you can do to evaluate your current cart abandonment statistics and work to improve them. This will not only enhance your profits but the overall experience that customers have in working with you, and this process is instrumental in protecting your business if you are an e-commerce site operating on your own.
If an average check out form contains 15 fields, for example, you can simplify a check out by reducing this. Showcase your security credentials, be upfront about any fees and costs and offer affordable shipping. All of these can entice a buyer who is already on the edge of checking out with your product in their cart, to take the next step.
All entrepreneurs understand the concept of shopping cart abandonment: when shoppers add items to their cart but then fail to make the purchase. That leaves the online business knowing the shopper had the intention of buying one or more products, but something interrupted that shopping process.
This is hardly a rare occurrence. The average checkout abandonment rate is a sky-high 80%, and this can be a frustrating situation for plenty of online businesses. It means the loss of a sale and the possibility that their website and its checkout system created issues for the buyer.
Why does shopping cart abandonment happen so often?
While we know the damaging effects of shopping cart abandonment, the question is how to deal with customers surfing the web, trying to find what they want at the cheapest price. If your item isn’t the cheapest, they may simply leave it in the shopping cart. On the other hand, you may have a vastly superior product to the cheaper ones.
The best approach the sellers can take when it comes to lost sales is retargeting shoppers. The other is to carefully build up a relationship with them.
It’s also worth reviewing your website. Be certain you’re not losing sales due to:
• Shipping costs
• Your checkout procedure
• Failure to personalize the shopping experience
The bottom line is you want to focus on saving those sales. Part of the key to doing that is to be certain your digital marketing campaigns are designed to not only attract new customers but also keep existing customers coming back. When a shopper visits your site, you want to think about ways to keep them engaged with your brand and eager to come back for additional purchases.
Once you spot a shopper who has left their shopping cart, giving them promos that entice them to come back is a smart move. Send them a cart abandonment email, reminding the customer of the items in their shopping cart. Then offer a discount, along with recommendations for similar products they might be interested in. Your product recommendation could help customers make that final decision about buying from you.
You should also offer to help answer any questions they might have.
Another way to prevent shopping cart abandonment is through Amazon listing optimization. It’s a critical strategy that holds out the potential to bring your product listings to page one of Amazon search results. That’s going to generate more sales.
Numerous components go into a high-converting Amazon listing. Your Amazon product page that shoppers visit after doing a search for items should include:
• Product titles
• Product images/photos
• Written descriptions
• Bullet points of special features
• Pricing
• Customer reviews.
This is also a great place to make coupons and discounts available, and to provide your customers with notable shipping options.
Listing Optimization involves the use of highly searched keywords related to your products in the descriptions. Doing this enhances the rankings your products get on Amazon search results – essentially the same concept as using SEO keywords to boost your ranking in Google search engines.
Amazon has its own search algorithm that matches the phrases shoppers are typing into the search bar to find relevant products. Having those relevant keywords and phrases in your product descriptions promotes your listings in Amazon’s search results.
You want to add those keywords throughout different sections of your listing. That should include:
• Product title
• Product description
• Bullet points
• Back-end search terms
Amazon listing optimization is critical to your success as an Amazon seller. To ensure your shop is fully optimized, it’s important to conduct keyword research to identify the most relevant search terms for your products. That’s also going to help you create a strong product title using those keywords.
The product descriptions should be compelling and emphasize the benefits of using your products, how they solve problems the customer is facing, and what special features they offer.
Product photos should be very high-quality and instantly eye-catching, and it’s also important to review what competitors are charging for their products and price your SKUs accordingly.
You should also consider devoting a significant amount of your advertising budget to:
• Brand awareness
• PPC ads
• Content marketing
• Social media marketing
• and influencer campaigns
In addition, ensure your checkout procedure is very convenient and provides multiple payment options to customers.
There’s nothing more frustrating for an Amazon shop seller than getting customers to visit your store and add products to their cart, and then abandon it. Optimizing the checkout process will put you on a path toward preventing abandoned sales.
Here are some good reasons for optimizing the checkout process.
Recognizing that not every customer will complete the checkout process, getting it right will boost your sales. Optimizing the checkout process also allows you to slow down or even prevent lost sales while improving your brand recognition and customer loyalty.
First, consider some of the reasons why customers are known to abandon the checkout process. Be concerned if:
• You don’t allow customers to do a guest checkout
• Your products have no reviews
• You’re not upfront about shipping fees or unexpected costs
• You have a multi-step checkout
• You don’t provide any free shipping options
• Your website isn’t user friendly
It’s been estimated that the top cause of checkout abandonment is shipping costs. If the customers discover at the last minute that your shipping costs are too high or there may be additional fees to pay, they often instantly decide to look elsewhere. Be certain what you charge for shipping is competitive with what similar businesses are offering.
Remember to optimize for mobile devices, since mobile commerce is a rapidly growing part of online sales. That means making 100% certain your website is mobile-optimized.
Be certain to allow guest checkouts. Not everyone wants to create a new account every time they shop with a new brand. Requiring every customer to have an account with you may look time-consuming and unnecessary to some shoppers. Instead, given them the option of a guest checkout that enables them to create an account once the sale has been made.
It’s also smart to get the customer’s email address or phone number for text messaging. If the customer abandons their cart, you can always email or text them a friendly reminder.
Estimates are that abandoned carts cost eCommerce shops a whopping $18 billion in lost revenue. That’s a massive amount, but there are strategies to mitigate those losses.
Retargeting is a popular digital marketing tool for managing cart abandonment. This tactic involves creating ads tailored to prospective customers after reviewing data about how they engaged with your website. The idea is to use the ad to get the customer to re-engage the sale.
The ads are often most effective at reminding the customer about the value of your products and services, using cookies to display ads to visitors as they continue browsing your online store. If done correctly, these ads have been successful in increasing conversions.
Retargeting has a clear goal: keeping your products on the minds of your customers. Retargeting has been a powerful tool for:
• Engaging customers
• Boosting sales
• Reducing abandoned carts
• Recapturing sales
Retargeting works through a JavaScript retargeting pixel that uses cookies data to store information about users who visited your website or an ad on it. That cookie data is used to create ads that remind customers of what they wanted to buy. Relevant retargeted ads can boost your company’s brand awareness and increase conversions, and can be used through multiple means, including:
• Email newsletters
• SMS text messaging
• Display ads on your website
• and ads on your social media platforms
The prices you set on products and how you manage shipping can also have a significant impact on your cart abandonment rate. Addressing pricing and cost concerns is a key strategy.
There are different pricing strategies to consider for ensuring you remain competitive, including by offering:
• Transparent pricing
• Price matching guarantees
• Price beating guarantees
• Free shipping on some items
• Free returns.
These tactics focus on building trust which is a smart move for reducing cart abandonment. Another key tool is optimizing shipping costs to enhance website performance. Like pricing, this strategy addresses specific pain points in the customer journey and are designed to address the main reasons customers leave items in their carts.
Frequently cited reasons can include:
• High shipping costs
• Concerns about delivery times
• Cumbersome checkout process.
A shipping and checkout process that is smooth and efficient becomes a more enticing shopping experience. That could become the incentive needed to inspire customers to complete their purchases.
Optimizing shipping costs also works. High shipping costs are a major deterrent to completing a checkout. One way to combat that is by providing free shipping on larger orders over a certain amount, thereby encouraging shoppers to make larger purchases
Flat rate shipping also works, by giving your customers straightforward and predictable costs for getting products shipped to them. Another option is a membership program that your customers can subscribe to that offers free or discounted shipping.
Other businesses have offered a shipping calculator, which lets customers estimate their shipping costs before they decide to make a purchase.
It’s also crucial to address delivery speed by providing offers for multiple shipping speeds, such as economy, express, etc., and letting customers decide.
If you’re operating an Amazon store, eCommerce is aware of how cart abandonment can negatively impact its third-party sellers. One tool that is available is Amazon Pay, a simple checkout experience that benefits both shoppers and the sellers. Instead of creating a new account, shoppers can use their existing Amazon account to make a purchase from a third-party seller. Since customers trust Amazon Pay with shipping and with credit card information, and they’re comfortable with the familiar flow of checkout.
The sellers who offer Amazon Pay as an option benefit from Amazon’s strong brand recognition and the superior fraud detection methods the platform has.
PYMNTS.com’s 2022 Buy Button report estimates that Amazon Pay is nearly 50% faster than traditional payment methods, and customers know it can save them time compared to opening new accounts on the websites of third-party sellers.
This is a smart tool for combating cart abandonment. It’s easy to integrate Amazon Pay across third-party sellers’ shops and mobile applications. This facilitates a faster checkout experience across numerous platforms, including:
• Mobile devices
• Desktops
• Laptops
• and tablet devices
This is a good way to reduce their rate of cart abandonment and improve their Repeat Customer Rate, and it’s no surprise today that tens of thousands of online shops are now offering Amazon Pay to online shoppers.
It truly takes an active and strategic approach to reduce cart abandonment. If you’re eager to learn how to reduce cart abandonment, testing and optimization will play a strategic role in your ability to enhance customer satisfaction and encourage completed purchases.
You can reduce shopping cart abandonment by continuously testing and optimizing your website and checkout process to identify any issues that are contributing to abandonment. Customer satisfaction levels increase thanks to high levels of service and personalization that builds loyalty.
If you’re eager to learn how to reduce shopping cart abandonment, be aware of how customers respond to the shopping process you set up. Reduce any stress your customers may experience shopping on your site, and be sure to provide a seamless experience across all your sales channels, including mobile and desktop.
Simplifying the checkout process is a proven method for reducing high cart abandonment rates. This can reduce the friction that hurts the customer’s journey.
You also want to improve the trustworthiness of your website. That can include:
• Responding fast to customer feedback
• Enhancing security measures
• Addressing concerns about your website’s reliability
SSl certificates and trust badges on your website can prove you’ve made a commitment to security and reliability.