Forecast: 27% of holiday buys could be 'lost' to abandoned carts

According to data out from the National Retail Federation 2014 holiday sales are expected to push $616 billion; just over $100 billion of that number is expected to come from online sales. IBM forecasts that at least 20% of online sales will be credited to mobile. The problem? Experts believe between 40% and 70% of mobile carts are abandoned by shoppers; for holiday retailers that could result in a loss of $8 billion in sales.

"We know that consumers abandon mobile shopping carts for a variety of reasons, from slow network speeds to high shipping costs, but the most significant among them is entirely under a retailer's control - simplifying checkout processes," said Marc Barach, Chief Marketing Officer, Jumio. "While mobile apps have transformed the ecommerce shopping experience, checkout processes have not kept pace with mobile technology. Retailers need to implement solutions that seamlessly usher shoppers through the checkout experience to stem the tide of shopping cart abandonment and billions lost in potential sales, both at the holidays and throughout the year."

Jumio's BAM Checkout simplifies purchases by allowing consumers to tap the 'scan info' button on a purchase page and then hold their credit card and then driver license to their smartphone camera; the camera scans the cards to complete the purchase in seconds. No images of the cards are kept on the phone.

"Shopping cart abandonment accounts for billions of dollars of lost revenue every year, and a major portion of those losses are entirely avoidable," said Daniel Mattes, founder and CEO, Jumio. "The increasing sophistication of our mobile devices as well as rising consumer expectations of their mobile experience have both leapt ahead of the still labor-intensive checkout experience. Our applied computer vision technology closes that gap."

Image via Shutterstock

Tags: 2014 holiday trends, ecommerce, Jumio, mcommerce, mobile marketing, shopping cart abandons