5 Reasons Behind the Shopping Cart Abandonment and Tips on Preventing Them

5 Reasons Behind the Shopping Cart Abandonment and Tips on Preventing Them

Shopping cart abandonment is becoming all too common in the electronic commerce (eCommerce) industry. 

A Today report reveals a whopping 94.4% abandonment rate in the pandemic era. The effects of shopping cart abandonment can signal a flawed sales funnel and poor user experience, which ultimately leads to lost revenues.

Business Insider also reports that retailers lose up to $4.6 trillion worth of revenues due to abandoned shopping carts. Thus, business owners should know the prevailing reasons behind shopping cart abandonment to make the necessary adjustments and improve their conversion rates. On that note, here are essential ecommerce cart abandonment tips and reasons to take into account to reduce friction in the checkout process and enhance user experience. 

1. Hidden Costs

Hidden cost is the main challenge B2B companies face when implementing eCommerce. The shock of unexpected costs happens after a shopper has entered their shipping details only to find out they’ve incurred additional charges. These unexpected costs can include automatic cross-sells, unanticipated processing fees or taxes, and higher-than-expected shipping costs. 

While there isn’t much you can do to reduce sales tax, being transparent with other costs is key in preventing abandonment and increasing the customer’s willingness to buy. You can start by showing shipping rates in real-time or having a delivery calculator on your site. Increasing cost transparency also helps businesses engage more openly with customers, thus, strengthening relationships and enhancing overall trust. 

2. Forced Checkout Registration

Forced checkout registration is a marketing tactic that is relatively common in the online retail industry. While this can help stores gather essential customer data to help adjust their marketing and sales techniques, it may deter users away from your store. This is because mandatory account creation is often associated with getting promotional emails or unwanted newsletters. 

Requiring customers to create an account to complete the purchase also slows down the order completion flow. Although eliminating the registration process altogether might not be a smart business move, making account creation optional and highlighting the benefits that come with it is key in preventing abandonment. This way, you simplify the buying process and invite users to register when they want to rather than forcing unwanted sign-ups. 

3. Lack of Payment Options

Lack of payment options is another problem that generates continuous shopping cart abandonment. Your customers want to complete their purchases using payment methods that are convenient to them. While some customers may be willing to accept default options, your inability to accommodate their preferred method is grounds for them to leave your store altogether. Flexible payment options are among the essential features of a B2B eCommerce store that could help you stand out over competitors in a fierce industry.

Therefore, you must use an ecommerce shopping cart platform that offers several payment methods and accepts multiple currencies to increase revenues. The benefits of having an ecommerce shopping cart software with multiple payment options range from retaining existing customers and raising cash flow to attracting new customers and decreasing overhead expenses. It can also help you scale-up your conversion by a significant margin and enhance overall customer satisfaction. 

4. Slow Page Load Times

Slow page load times on your eCommerce site can result in shoppers losing confidence in your checkout process and ultimately leaving the store. If that’s not worse enough, the online shopping cart abandonment negative effects of slower load times can result in a quarter of your potential visitors to visit a competitor site instead. Often, unstable and buggy eCommerce sites may discourage customers from entering their payment details out of the fear of being double-charged for the product. 

An excellent way to help prevent all of these is to avoid embedding huge files into your web pages and using a content delivery network. You can also compress data and specify photo dimensions to make it easier for browsers to create placeholders and load the page and images simultaneously. Either way, improving your site and reducing page load times can be a baseline to optimize your conversion and preventing consumers from abandoning your cart. 

5. Security Concerns

Payment security is another reason why consumers are not going through with a purchase. With the increasing number of cyberattacks, online consumers are now leaning towards eCommerce businesses that can process payments securely. Therefore, complying with Payment Card Industry-Data Security Standards (PCI-DSS) is necessary to eliminate those security concerns and keep customers at peace. 

Securing your site with a comprehensive SSL protocol also increases the trustworthiness of your eCommerce business. This ensures that all shoppers’ information is encrypted and protected. Using an eCommerce software platform with fraud detection capabilities can also help identify and avoid malicious activities that could cripple your bottom line.

Reducing Shopping Cart Abandonment

The eCommerce industry is growing at an unprecedented rate so is the number of abandoned shopping carts. Therefore, knowing why is shopping cart abandonment a problem is vital in staying competitive with the changes in the B2B industry. One way to remain dynamic in this cutthroat industry and improve sales conversion on a B2B site is to use B2BWoo, an all-in-one ecommerce platform for manufacturers, distributors, and wholesalers who own WooCommerce B2B store.

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A writer by profession, Maria Ilyas is an eCommerce and digital marketing enthusiast and is always digging into the latest marketing trends, best practices, and growth strategies.