7 Ways You Can Decrease Cart Abandonment Rate

Cart abandonment is one of the biggest challenges in the world of e-commerce today. According to the Baymard Institute, the average cart abandonment rate stands at 70.19%. This loses e-commerce stores approximately $18 billion annually in sales revenue. So, what can be done to reduce these numbers? 

Read on, to discover: 

• What is shopping cart abandonment?
• Reasons for cart abandonment.
• How to decrease cart abandonment rate.

What is shopping cart abandonment?

Imagine walking into a bustling store, filling your cart up with items, and then suddenly abandoning it at the checkout counter. This happens every single day in the world of e-commerce, and it's called "cart abandonment."

Web analytics tell you how many times a user has visited a certain product page. You might be happy to see more clicks as they imply greater interest in your product. Finally, people add their desired product to the cart, only to disappear halfway through the checkout process.

Cart abandonment is one of the most important e-commerce KPIs that every online store owner should track.

Reasons for cart abandonment.

To minimise your cart abandonment rate, you must look at the pain points of your end users. Not every cart abandonment is backed by a logical reason e.g. it could be because someone was just window shopping.

According to a study, the reason for cart abandonment of 47.8 per cent of people was “I was just browsing / not ready to purchase”. 

So what to do with shoppers who are adding to your cart abandonment stats? In the case of “window shoppers” there’s not necessarily a fix, but in other cases people may be abandoning their cart after having a negative shopping experience on your site. In this case, cart abandonment recovery is achievable.

How to decrease your cart abandonment rate

Cart abandonment (in some circumstances) is avoidable. Let’s walk through some effective ways to make that happen.

1. Enable guest checkout. 

Businesses go for mandatory account creation to retarget customers. However, customers don’t always see the point in creating an account, especially if they’re going for a one-time purchase. It’s always wise to add a guest check-out option.

Once a customer completes the purchase, you can ask for account creation for additional promotions. So, it's a win-win strategy. Besides valuing your customers, enabling a guest option also helps increase the speed of your checkout process.

Endless Gain ran a test to assess how a guest check-out process can satisfy customers. They reported a significant improvement in sales by using this simple strategy. In addition, Layer0 reported that an average online shopper is willing to spend 1.2 times more if the site has a guest mode instead of mandatory account creation.

2. Establish trust at the payment page. 

Some online retailers consider the payment page as a mere formality. It would be like, “They’ve bought into our product, so why wouldn’t they just now add their card details?”

The payment page is as essential as any other part of the checkout process. Customers deserve to feel secure when handing over their hard-earned money. Pay close attention to your payment page - add trust signals like security logos and make sure they are commonplace and recognisable. 

According to a study by Shopify, 61 percent of online shoppers did not make an online purchase because the trust logo was missing. So, make sure to include trust signals to help decrease your cart abandonment rate.

3. Include the thumbnail of products throughout the checkout process.

It’s not that people forget what they are purchasing, but you should eliminate the guesswork by adding thumbnails of the product throughout the purchase phase. By doing so you eliminate the distraction of them going back to check they’ve added everything they need or double checking what they’re about to buy. 

A review by Baymard Institute shows that 86 per cent of the top 100 online stores have started showing thumbnails. They did a study on Macy's to certify the role of thumbnails in boosting the user experience on-site.

4. Offer multiple payment options. 

Online shoppers have different preferences when it comes to payment methods. A single payment option will not serve a variety of customers. Many online shops like to keep things simple by only offering standard card payments, but in doing so they’re disappointing a lot of online shoppers, leading to frequent cart abandonment. 

11 percent of people said that they abandoned their cart due to a lack of payment options. This means you can decrease cart abandonment, simply by adding multiple payment options in the checkout phase.

Some of the most popular payment options are;

• Google Pay
• Apple Pay
• PayPal
• Klarna

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Want to know some great alternatives to Stripe? Learn about the best online payment processing solutions in 2023. Read here >

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You can also onboard a payment provider, such as Judopay, to streamline your transactions. By adding multiple payment methods, your customers will develop trust in you and make payments via an option they are accustomed to.

5. Simplify your checkout process. 

How much time does a shopper take to complete a purchase on your site? Have you asked yourself this question before? If not test it now, because complex and time-consuming checkout processes are a major deterrent in any online purchase.

Simplify your checkout process as much as you can. Optimise your checkout page, and use A/B plugins to determine what works best for your e-commerce store. 

According to a case study, a single-page checkout instead of a multi-page checkout yields better results. So, if you want to reduce cart abandonment, shifting to a single-page checkout flow could be effective. 

Most importantly, your e-commerce site should be mobile-friendly. It’s estimated that 187.5 million people will shop using their smartphones. At the same time, the mobile cart abandonment rate is higher (85.65%) than any other channel.

6. Include a clear call to action on checkout pages. 

Your checkout page must also contain a clear call-to-action (CTA) for shoppers to complete their purchase. While a CTA will tell them what to expect, the wording of the CTA is also equally important. Your CTA should be consistent throughout the checkout phase. 

In addition, the CTA should be clear and transparent. For instance, the next step after “Add to Cart” should be “Buy Now” instead of an ambiguous word, such as “Continue”. Also, users must be given a chance to thoroughly review their details before hitting the final “Confirm” button.

7. Offer free shipping. 

Shipping charges have some psychological impact on online shoppers. They would agree to spend £50 on a product, but a £2 shipping fee would seem a lot. Around 66 per cent of online shoppers expect free shipping on their orders. 

If you can’t offer free shipping on all orders, you can set a minimum amount of purchase, after which the free shipping will be enabled. For instance, “free shipping on a minimum of £90”.

You should also be transparent about your shipping policy and clearly state what your customers should do to become eligible for free shipping. KURU footwear has increased its conversion rate by 21.5 per cent by clearly stating its shipping and return policy.

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Wrapping up. 

Cart abandonment can be a frustrating challenge for online retailers, but it's not insurmountable. You can significantly decrease cart abandonment by optimising your website, providing a hassle-free shopping experience, and adding multiple payment options to your checkout page. Incorporating these strategies into your e-commerce business can help reduce cart abandonment rates and ultimately increase conversions. 

Remember that ongoing monitoring and adaptation to evolving customer preferences and market trends are key to maintaining a successful cart abandonment recovery strategy.

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Reduce your cart abandonment rate when you launch a secure, swift, and seamless checkout. Redefine your payments with Judopay. Get in touch.