Do you know why online shoppers abandon carts?

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In their ‘VWO eCommerce Survey 2014: Trends and Insights to Find and Convert Buyers’, 1,000 people were surveyed to ascertain the top drivers of purchases and also deterrents.

Perhaps the biggest take-out from the survey was the importance of retargeting to shoppers who have not completed shopping cart transactions. More than half (54%) of shoppers said they would purchase items left in an abandoned shopping cart if they were offered those items at a slightly discounted price. That number rises to a whopping 72% among Millennials.

And, when it comes to abandoned shopping carts, Wingify were able to identify key reasons for this phenomenon. Those being:

– Unexpected shipping costs (28%);

– The requirement to create a user account (23%);

– Consumers simply conducting research or price comparisons (16%);

– Payment security concerns (13%);

– Long and confusing checkout processes (12%);

– Could not find coupon codes (8%).

“In the highly competitive eCommerce marketplace, even a slight marketing misstep can be costly. When armed with consumer intelligence, marketers can insure that they’re optimizing their websites and winning the conversion game,” said Paras Chopra, CEO and founder, Visual Website Optimizer (VWO).

Last month, ecommerce payment firm Skrill revealed several reasons why shoppers abandon their carts and, as per VWO’s findings, many (38%) cited being forced to create a user account as a major turn-off. Furthermore, many (28%) abandoned purchases if their preferred payment method was not offered, rising to 32% among younger shoppers.

“Our data shows while businesses are investing huge sums getting customers to the point of making a purchasing decision, they risk not completing the sale if they only accept card payments,” says Chantal Willis, VP eCommerce at Skrill.

“They must ensure they have systems in place to cater for the half of the population who prefer alternative payment methods. Given online stores attract customers from anywhere in the world, the need to offer a wide range of payment options is absolutely crucial.”

The surveyed revealed that the most popular methods of payment are:

– Credit/debit card (57%)

– Digital wallet (29%)

– Bank transfer (2%)

– Text payments (1%)

– Virtual currency (1%)

However, as Marc Barach, chief marketing officer at online and mobile payments identity verification company Jumio advises, the most significant thing a retailer can do to minimize shopping cart abandonment is to simplify the checkout process.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Kristina Knight-1
Kristina Knight, Journalist , BA
Content Writer & Editor
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Kristina Knight is a freelance writer with more than 15 years of experience writing on varied topics. Kristina’s focus for the past 10 years has been the small business, online marketing, and banking sectors, however, she keeps things interesting by writing about her experiences as an adoptive mom, parenting, and education issues. Kristina’s work has appeared with BizReport.com, NBC News, Soaps.com, DisasterNewsNetwork, and many more publications.