Why Visitors Abandon Ecommerce Shopping Carts
Online retailers are frequently frustrated by the rate at which potential customers abandon online shopping carts. In fact visitors click away from shopping carts more often than they make it to the checkout stand.
It is a source of bewilderment for online retailers and wholesale suppliers all over the world. But why do they do it?
Since information is king, a working knowledge of why visitors click away from retail shopping carts can help retailers reduce the loss of potential customers.
A variety of industry studies and the practical hard experience of today's online business world has taught us that shopping cart abandonment is predictable and, to a degree, preventable.
There's No Helping Some People
Customers are often simply browsers and never even entertained the notion of buying anything. They were curious about Seven for All Mankind jeans having read about it in Vogue, or somewhere and looked it up online. A retail website isn't just a place of business, it is a source of entertainment, a research tool, and an accidental encounter.
Most visitors for whom there is no hope of creating sale don't place merchandise in the cart, they just look at product pages and information pages. However, many do place things in shopping carts as part of "Window's shopping". They want to get an idea how the new monitor and speakers they are buying with fantasy lottery money look together.
In fact, smart ecommerce sites attempt to exploit this by thinking long term. The visitor for whom there is no hope to sell to now can be brought back perhaps in a more spending mood by creating a positive experience during the casual, non-buying visit. Why did the window-shopping visitor come? To be entertained and informed. If they leave entertained and informed they are likely to come back.
5 Common Shopping Cart Mistakes
Potential customers abandon many shopping carts for reasons that are within the control of the merchant operating the site. The line between a completed sale and cart ditching is often so thin that even the tiniest edge can make the difference. Below is a list of common shopping cart mistakes and why it is wise to avoid them.
1. Don't put the word buy on the button that adds products to the cart. Customers are rightfully cautious when comes to making online purchase, they want to know as much as possible before committing. The words "add to cart" are probably best. This brings us to...
2. Don't call a shopping cart anything but a shopping cart. People using the web are fairly up to speed with the terminology of the web. They expect to see a shopping cart and attempts at cleverness or even worse perky cuteness will only confuse those it does not irritate.
3. Don't make a visitor register before they can add items to the cart. While requiring registration early in the process discourages those who will never buy it also, more importantly discourages actual potential customers. For the same reason they don't like the buy button, they don't like handing out personal information before they are decided on a purchase.
4. Don't make a visitor give purchasing information before they know all the costs. Asking for credit card or other payment information before the customer has the total to be charged is the kiss of death for shopping carts. No other practice smells like a rat to the online shopper more than this one. The buyer should be shown all charges including shipping and taxes before they are required to give their payment information.
5. Don't force a shopper to do work that should be done by software. Every time a shopper is required to click a button or type something it's an opportunity to break the camel's back and send the customer running, possibly to a competing site. For example, when a customer has placed ten items in their cart but then decides they only want four if they have to reduce the quantity of the products to zero to remove them frustration mounts. If they reach the tipping point they are gone. Removing items from a cart should be a click of remove items button.
Drew Alger is an ecommerce professional working for Get That Wholesale, an online wholesale supply directory.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Drew_Alger
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