Are you losing customers just before you ship an order? We'll tell you what barriers are preventing them from completing their purchase and how to remove them.
How many users do not complete their purchase?
Every online shop - including yours - struggles with an abandoned cart. According to a recent (2023) meta-study conducted by Baymard Institute, 70.19% of all potential customers will leave an online store before completing their purchase. This means that out of a hundred possible orders, only thirty are likely to be completed; you can easily imagine the financial impact of such a situation.
The most common reasons shoppers give for abandoning their cart are:
- too high shipping costs, in the context of domestic shops we can also include expensive cash on delivery (48% of potential customers),
- the requirement to create a user account (24%),
- too slow delivery of ordered goods (22%),
- a lengthy or complicated ordering process (18%),
- insufficient information about the final purchase price (16%).
On mobile devices, the rate of order incompletion is around 80% (Zippia, 2023). This is because the most common scenario involves users checking the price and delivery speed of their order on their smartphones before placing the order on a computer from their selected store.
The key to success? Understand user behavior
Contrary to some opinions, the way to order does not start in the shopping cart, but much earlier - on the product page.
"If you clearly and promptly communicate the shipping price and delivery method to the customer before they proceed to the cart, you are on the path to success. Prior to the cart, it's essential to visually confirm the user's intended order, showing them the products, the quantity they have added to their cart, and the total cost."
Michal Mervart, founder of mime digital & UX designer
Make changes to the shopping cart itself and summarize the recommendations in the following lines. These changes are easy to implement and have the most significant impact on the e-shop's conversion rate, which is the ratio of purchases made to the number of visits. Our recommendations are based on our own experience and current best practices.
Always remember to test each change first, either through an A/B test or, if your e-shop receives fewer than a hundred orders per month, consider a B/A test (for more details, check out our e-book for e-shop owners).
What to take care of?
1. Remove all distracting elements from the cart
This is a proven strategy that has resulted in a 14.3% increase in the average turnover per visitor for the Veggietales e-shop (Optimizely, 2014) and a 3-10% increase in conversion for clients of the Baymard Institute mentioned above.
A skilled coder will quickly hide excess elements in the cart. Most importantly, remove the following:
- navigation bar and footer containing links to other pages of the e-shop,
- the product search box,
- advertisements for other products or services,
- social media icons and sharing buttons,
- pop-ups with discount offers, newsletter sign-ups, and other messages.
Additionally, customize the discount coupon field to make it less prominent.
2. Request only the essential personal information from the customer
In other words, ask for the information you genuinely require to facilitate the delivery of goods. When requesting the customer's email address and phone number, kindly specify the reasons why these details are necessary. For instance, it is adequate to state that the phone number is required for:
- sending text updates about the current status of the order,
- facilitating smoother communication with the courier during the delivery process,
- handling unforeseen situations that may arise while picking up ordered products.
3. Speed up the order-filling process
Online stores with fewer fields in the shopping cart tend to achieve higher conversion rates compared to e-stores with more fields (HubSpot, 2021).
On average, users are required to fill out 11.8 fields when navigating through an e-shop cart (Baymard Institute, 2021). However, it is possible to reduce this number, provided you include only the following essential fields:
- customer's first and last name,
- e-mail address,
- phone number,
- address (street, city, and postcode),
- space for comments.
For the majority of cases, these are the only pieces of information needed for a regular end customer. For businesses, additional data fields such as ID number and billing address can be hidden under a "buy for business" button, for example.
In addition to this, implementing real-time email and phone validation, or using smart address suggestion tools, will significantly enhance the efficiency of the order-filling process for users.
4) Offer multiple transport options
The goal is to achieve the fastest possible delivery for your order. To accomplish this, it's essential to provide a range of shipping options, including:
- delivery to a specific address (as customers often prefer having goods sent to their workplace in addition to their home),
- delivery to a drop-off point (which can be arranged through various brick-and-mortar shops, newsagents, travel agencies, etc.),
- delivery to a storage box (an advantage being its 24/7 accessibility).
Among courier companies, the most popular choice currently is Zásilkovna, with 42% of shoppers favoring their services, according to the 2023 Shoptet Czech e-commerce survey. On the other hand, Czech Post has seen a significant decline in service quality, partly due to recent branch closures and staff layoffs. It's not uncommon for some parcels to take several weeks (!) to be delivered.
5) Clearly communicate the final price of the order
The final price of each order typically includes:
- the cost of the purchased goods,
- any related services (such as extended warranties or initial setup of electronics),
- the fees associated with shipping and payment methods.
As mentioned earlier, one of the most common reasons for cart abandonment is the lack of information regarding the total cost for the user. Therefore, it is essential to transparently inform the user at each stage when the order price increases.
One effective method is to use a summary box (as shown below), where the previous total amount is automatically updated for each item.
"In the order recap box, display product images along with the price of each item. This will reassure the customer that they are indeed purchasing the items they've selected."
Michal Mervart, Founder of Mime Digital & UX Designer
Key takeaways from the article:
- Eliminate distracting elements from your cart, such as the navigation bar, product search box, ads, social icons, etc. This reduces cart abandonment and enhances the chances of completing the purchase.
- Only request necessary information from the customer to complete the order and facilitate item shipment. Fewer fields to fill out result in a quicker and smoother shopping process.
- Streamline the order process with smart address suggestions and real-time email and phone validation.
- Provide customers with the option to choose from various courier companies that offer delivery to specific addresses, drop-off locations, or storage boxes.
- Ensure that customers always have a clear view of the final order price, encompassing all fees and shipping costs. Include thumbnail photographs of each product to confirm that the chosen items will indeed be delivered.