10 Affordable Shopping Cart Abandonment Solutions

Shopping cart abandonment is the nemesis of any eCommerce website.

In fact, the average cart abandonment rate across industries is almost 70%.

Fortunately, when it comes to finding the best cart abandonment solutions for your business, your strategy doesn’t need to cost the earth. 

In this article, we’ll break down the most affordable ways to keep your customers on site, as well as how you can retarget customers who’ve left. 

We'll cover:

• Calculating your cart abandonment rate
• Onsite shopping cart abandonment solutions
• Offsite shopping cart abandonment solutions

Calculating your shopping cart abandonment rate

To get your shopping cart abandonment rate as a percentage, follow the process in the image below.

Whatever your percentage, it’s important to remember that your shopping cart abandonment rate will never reach zero.

In fact, around 40% of customers place items in baskets without the intention of buying them‍

Nevertheless, a lower percentage means increased conversions. See if you can lower your shopping cart abandonment rate with the following solutions.

Onsite shopping cart abandonment solutions 

First up, let’s look at the ways you can lower your abandonment rate by improving the experience for your site’s visitors.  

1. Provide a painless customer experience

Amazon’s user interface might not be as aesthetic as other sites, but their solution to shopping cart abandonment is their dedication to a painless and functional customer experience.‍

For instance, Amazon always keeps the customer’s cart visible at the top of the page, so customers never forget about their items. 

Product reviews are easily viewed too, so customers can gain easy assurance from other buyers. Amazon also offers live chat to solve customer queries in real time. 

Simple fixes like these are easy to miss if you don’t evaluate your site from the customer’s point of view. To ensure you’re offering the best experience to your customers, make sure your site is a dream to use. ‍

Optimize page load times and cater to a variety of devices.

For instance, 85% of carts are abandoned on mobile, so there’s definitely room to improve over your competitors. 

You should also use free tools like Google Analytics to examine where customers are dropping off from your site.

Chances are, there’s some customer experience issues on those very pages. 

2. Streamline the checkout sequence

With 27% of customers leaving sites due to complicated processes, simplifying your checkout sequence can be a great solution for shopping cart abandonment. ‍

A long sequence of steps can be extremely off putting for customers.

For example, while it might be tempting to try and upsell other products during the checkout stage, too many interruptions can prove very annoying.

Instead, focus on streamlining the experience.

Try including a simple progress indicator to ease customer tension. For signed in customers, a one click purchase option is another great addition.

You could even offer a one page checkout form, instead of a multi-page sequence.

Changes like these won’t cost you anything more than a little thought and consideration. 

3. Offer guest checkouts

Another hugely effective shopping cart abandonment solution is offering a guest checkout function.

In fact, installing this kind of checkout could increase your conversions by 45%.

The reason customers want guest checkouts is simple - they seek ease and convenience.

Some new customers might even be testing out your services with an initial purchase. 

Either way, always remember that prioritising simple functionality is the fastest solution to shopping cart abandonment.

These considerations won’t cost you anything more than the time to implement them, and the potential profits are considerable. 

4. Provide free delivery and banish unexpected costs 

Statistics indicate that 25% of shoppers will abandon their carts due to unexpected fees like delivery.

That's because misleading initial prices breaks customer trust in your brand.

The solution to this shopping cart abandonment issue is a simple one - give full pricing details up front.

By building trust through cost-transparency, you’re far more likely to see conversions. ‍

You should also include shipping costs in your price calculations too.

Then, you can offer seemingly free delivery while also saving your bottom line.

After all, over 60% of customers are likely to abandon their carts if free shipping isn’t included

5. Broadcast credibility with reviews and security

According to TrustPilot research, nine out of ten customers read online reviews before making a purchase.

It proves how important trust and credibility are to customers. 

Make sure you’re getting the most out of your testimonials by strategically placing them throughout your website. 

For example, they are a great addition to a sales page. Placing a testimonial on your returns policy page will also help to build trust. 

When aiming to demonstrate credibility, consider how secure your website is too.

By making the best use of secure socket layer (SSL) seals or badges, you can highlight your dedication to keeping cardholder data secure.

Considerations like these are the most affordable of shopping cart abandonment solutions.

6. Offer more delivery and payment options

With 77% of customers abandoning carts due to unsatisfactory delivery options, losing customers at the checkout stage is a very real risk.

Still, the solution to this kind of shopping cart abandonment is simple. 

By offering more delivery and payment options, customers feel a greater sense of control and convenience when converting. ‍

For example, you could offer premium shipping for customers who want their products delivered faster.

You should also offer payment options like Apple Pay and PayPal, alongside standard credit card payment. 

Shipping to other countries is another consideration. What if someone from a different country starts putting items in their cart only to find out that you don’t ship there?  

At the very least, clarifying all costs and delivery options early on is the best solution to these abandoned shopping carts.

It’ll give you more time to focus on the customers who are more likely to convert. 

7. Use a live engagement platform

Unanswered customer questions can be hugely detrimental to your conversion rate.

To ensure you’re not losing customers by leaving their problems unsolved, offer them sterling customer service through a live engagement platform.

There are many different types of platforms available. For instance, video chat allows you to engage with your customers face to face.

It means that your website visitors receive the same level of customer service that they could expect in store. ‍

For example, clothing retailers that use video chat can offer online fitting appointments and personal virtual shopping experiences.

Businesses who specialize in technical products are able to provide in depth tutorials. 

Offering video chat for customer service doesn’t cost as much as you’d think either.

It can even be installed in days, meaning this shopping cart abandonment solution could help you convert more customers by the end of the week.

8. Use exit intent overlays 

For customers navigating away from your page, exit intent overlays are a great way to get your customers to think twice.

Despite their similarity to the much dreaded pop-up, this shopping cart abandonment solution can prove extremely effective. 

There are many different types of exit intent overlays available. Each comes with their own strategy. 

Reminder overlays let customers know they still have items in their cart if they’re about to navigate off-site.

Survey overlays invite the customer to provide quick feedback. You could even offer customers a discount.

If you’d prefer not to interrupt your customers’ experience, you should at least consider using cookies to auto save your visitors’ abandoned carts.

If these customers return in the future, you’re much more likely to see a conversion. 

Offsite shopping cart abandonment solutions

Now, let’s look at the affordability of actively retargeting the customers who slip through the net.

While these tactics will bring additional costs, remarketing products to interested customers has always proved incredibly effective. ‍

Which of the following shopping cart abandonment solutions could lower your abandonment percentage? 

9. Remarketing email campaigns 

For repeat customers or newsletter subscribers, one of the best shopping cart abandonment solutions is remarketing via email. ‍

According to Moosend research, half of the recipients who click and engage with these emails end up completing their purchase. 

The most effective way to use email remarketing as a shopping cart abandonment solution is to take a respectful approach over a sequence of emails.

Even simply reminding a customer that they’ve left an item in their basket can win customers back. 

Some businesses use email to gather feedback via surveys too, often offering a discount incentive in conjunction.

This is a great customer engagement example that can help you gain a better understanding of why customers might have abandoned their carts. 

Whatever email sequence you decide on, make sure your approach is personalized and hits the right tone for your product.

By doing so, this solution to shopping cart abandonment will enable you to make the most of your hard-fought email list. 

Just remember never to remarket a product via email if an item is out of stock - this is a very quick way to frustrate your customers.

10. Retargeting advertising   

Although this is arguably the least affordable shopping cart abandonment solution, we’d be remiss not to mention retargeting ads.

After all, they're incredibly effective - the average click-through rate for retargeting ads is ten times higher than normal display advertising. ‍

Most commonly provided by Google Adwords and Facebook, a retargeting ad campaign utilizes cookies to promote products customers have previously viewed.

These ads can appear as Pay Per Click links on search results pages or image adverts on social media. 

The best way to get the most out of this shopping cart abandonment solution is to experiment as much as possible.

Use A/B testing to discover the best approach for you. 

The takeaway

The most cost effective solution for shopping cart abandonment is to consider your site from your customers’ point of view. ‍

By scrutinising the customer experience, you can streamline the digital customer journey and provide assurance when they need it most - all while keeping costs low. 

Ultimately, it’ll always be cheaper and more profitable to keep customers on site.

While retargeting efforts have been proven extremely effective, taking a dedicated approach to improving shopping cart abandonment will see more consistent conversions over time.

A key part of this approach is ensuring you offer exceptional digital customer service to your website visitors.

By doing this, your customers will be more likely to turn to your brand for support rather than abandon their purchase.

That's where Talkative comes in.

With our platform, you'll enjoy a complete suite of engagement channels that'll empower you to connect instantly, and effortlessly, with all your online customers.

As a result, you'll be fully equipped to provide next-level digital customer service that'll reduce cart abandonments and secure more conversions than ever before.

Not convinced?

Book a demo with Talkative today and discover the above benefits for yourself.