Seeing that a customer has added items to their shopping basket and then abandoned their purchase can be incredibly frustrating. If this is happening on a regular basis, you need to get to the bottom of where you’re going wrong.

Below, we are going to take a look at some of the most common reasons for high shopping cart abandonment rates, as well as provide you with some tips on what to do about it. 

Concerns about payment security

The best place to begin is with payment security. Consumers today are skeptical about the websites they make purchases on, and rightly so. After all, it seems that data breaches are happening on a daily basis.

It is up to you to put your consumers’ minds at ease. There are a number of ways you can do this, from SSL certificates to secure payment gateways. You also need to make sure your website’s design is up-to-date and if you’ve not switched to HTTPS yet, you need to do so.

You should also make sure that you are easy to contact. Your contact details should be evident, and there should be numerous ways for customers to get in touch with you. Merely offering an online contact form is going to cause a lot of customers to be anxious about the legitimacy of your service.

Usability issues

If your website is difficult to use, customers may get frustrated and leave your website. Navigation should be intuitive. Users should not have to think twice about the next step.

You will need to use a website builder that enables you to optimize your website for mobile use too so that the checkout process is simple on a smaller device.

UKWebHostReview has reviewed website builders to help you get a better understanding of the different options out there if usability is a problem for your site.

You also need to make sure you conduct regular A/B testing. This is the most effective way to measure the impact of UX changes and to drive smart decisions that are driven using data. It is the only way to keep improving your website design and checkout process.

Lack of payment options

Another reason why you may have a high shopping cart abandonment rate is because you have not given people enough payment options. Nowadays, website users expect to have various payment options at their disposal, ranging from all major credit and debit cards to online wallets like PayPal.

If you only have one payment option available, you are restricting your customers. They may look elsewhere in order to purchase from a business that enables them to make the payment in a manner that is most convenient for them.

Having to create a new account

Online shopping is supposed to be about convenience. There is nothing convenient about having to fill in several forms before you are able to complete a purchase.

Giving customers the option to check out as a guest is a must. Yes, you want to convert website viewers into members, but is it worth losing a potential customer?

Unexpected shipping cost

There is no denying that this is one of the main reasons for shopping cart abandonment. According to a study by Baymard Institute, 60 percent of respondents abandon a shopping cart when extra costs are too high. This not only includes shipping but any other fees and taxes too.

Transparency is highly valued by digital shoppers today. Being honest about your shipping costs from the offset is the only way to go. You may also want to consider offering special offers, for example, ‘free shipping for orders over X amount.’

Unpredictable checkout flow

An unpredictable checkout process often results in an abandoned shopping cart. This is because it makes the shopper too anxious, especially if he or she is on the go.

If you split the checkout process up into small, simple steps, it will make the whole process less overwhelming. Each step should be labelled too, for example, “shipping method” and “billing.”

A lack of customer service

On top of the points that have been mentioned, shopping cart abandonment rates can also suffer when there is a lack of support.

Customers expect convenience and service. LivePerson conducted a study that found that 83 percent of online shoppers want assistance while they are shopping on a website. Moreover, 51 percent stated that they would be more likely to buy something if they have live chat or a similar form of customer support during the session.

Express shipping is not available

The convenience of the internet has meant that consumers expect the items they purchase almost immediately. If you do not offer a next day shipping service, it could cause the consumer to abandon their shopping cart.

No coupon codes

Another reason why a lot of people abandon checkouts today is that they have not been able to find a deal. Research shows that if customers cannot find promotional codes or coupons, they will look elsewhere. This is something that eight percent of customers cited as the primary reasoning for abandoning their cart (as per Statista).

It may be a good idea to auto-apply coupons, rather than requesting people to manually fill this in when they go through the checkout process. The latter can create a feeling of missing out if no special deals are available.

Final words

As you can see, there are many different reasons why customers abandon the checkout process on e-stores today. Hopefully, the different reasons above have helped to give you some indication regarding why people have been failing to complete their purchases on your website. Use this information so that you can create a better shopping experience for website viewers in the future.

This guest post is by Kerry Harrison, an experienced content writer with a First Class Honors Degree in Multimedia Journalism. She currently works for UK Web Host Review, providing content on SEO, web hosting, web performance, UX, web security, web design, and much more.