I'd like to share ideas on shopping cart conversion. I am curious to see what is the 'norm'.

1. What is your typical abandonment rate of your cart? (Out of the people who put simething in teh cart, how many people leave without finishing the purchase?)

2. What have you done to combat this? What works? What doesn't?

I have one cart that has a 70% abandonment rate and another that has around a 50% abandonment rate.

As far as how we combat it, on one site, we place a cookie so when someone comes back to the site, they are offered a pop up window that tells the person they have something in their cart, and if they finish the purchase, they get 10% off their cart. That has worked well, we have a 13% conversion rate from that pop up alone. I think that could go up if we switch to dhtml to get around the pop up blockers out there.

Free shipping works to lower abandonment rates if people don't have to do anything to get it. If people have to type in a code, we have had less successful results.

I have one cart that has a 70% abandonment rate and another that has around a 50% abandonment rate.

As far as how we combat it, on one site, we place a cookie so when someone comes back to the site, they are offered a pop up window that tells the person they have something in their cart, and if they finish the purchase, they get 10% off their cart. That has worked well, we have a 13% conversion rate from that pop up alone. I think that could go up if we switch to dhtml to get around the pop up blockers out there.

Free shipping works to lower abandonment rates if people don't have to do anything to get it. If people have to type in a code, we have had less successful results.
great insights... also your numbers seem about the norm - 50% abandonment is oft quoted - and as you have very smartly implemented everything that can be done to win them back helps improve that number.

OK...So. I guess this is a topic nobody gives a d*mn about. I was hoping to get some more insight about this.

OK...So. I guess this is a topic nobody gives a d*mn about. I was hoping to get some more insight about this. Try this article
http://www.clickz.com/experts/crm/traffic/article.php/2245891

http://www.websurveyor.com/images/quickfact/shopcartabandon/img_01.gif
http://www.websurveyor.com/images/quickfact/shopcartabandon/img_02.gif
Online marketers stand to lose as much as $63 billion due to shopping cart abandonment in 2004.

http://www.websurveyor.com/images/sp.gif http://www.websurveyor.com/images/quickfact/shopcartabandon/img_04.gif On average, 75% of online shoppers abandon their shopping carts.

http://www.websurveyor.com/images/sp.gif http://www.websurveyor.com/images/quickfact/shopcartabandon/img_08.gif 47% of ebusinesses do not know their shopping cart abandonment rate.

Placing a thumbnail image of the product increases conversions by as much as 10 percent.

That is something I didn't know and never would have thought of...although I haven't ever seen a cart with that.

big one NO hidden cost if the product say £9.99 when they go to checkout make sure that the price does not go up... transport £5.99 + vat 17.5% etc

They hate that !!

DaveN

Gotta agree with Dave here - personally I get soo pissed if the cart suddenly adds additional costs to the final check out page.

Yep - If i have to enter name address etc. before i've even been told how much postage/shipping will be then i'll just bail. And if I am told and don't like the cost, away I'll go.

Oscommerce has modules which can track this -- give browsers the option of registering (for 10% off their purchase) or not registering. If they register, and do not complete the purchase they automatically receive an email which asks if there is a problem, how can I help etc. etc. Some people do respond.

Maybe one third to half my sales come from following up and keeping in touch.

eZeB,

I have thought about implementing your idea before and tried it a few times as a test. But many people that go through the cart and input their email, yet don't fiinish, don't want to be contacted if they haven't given you permission.

Have you had any negetive responses like, "why are you emailing me?" or "i didn't opt-in?"

The auto-responder follow up is a good idea, but how do you do it tactfully?

My terms of service contain a little note about this. In addition, when people register there is a checkbox (default is selected) for our newsletter and 'other' announcements or something to that effect. Most people appreciate it and reply with kind notes.

I also give the option of not registering so I don't get their email unless they complete the purchase and have no way of tracking abandoned carts from these browsers.

The email has an unsubscribe link at the bottom. I do it quite regularly and haven't run into any problems.

A number of quite large online companies who also have automatic followup scripts and I don't recall agreeing.

Follow ups are a great tool, even after sales (the old adage it is easier to upsell a customer than find a new one holds true).

I also have sued OSCommerce and it is a great open source product with a great support community.

some simple things that people forget :

provide :

a remove item button for each item
go back to shopping
give customers a choice of shipping options
give customers a choice of payment options
allow customers to purchase without registering first
offer one click shopping with registration after the first sale is COMPLETED
offer Toll free Number to place order Via the phone
make links clear to things like security, privacy etc
the proffesional internet buyers use the ENTER key, handle that keypress properly
offer delivery addresses ..

DaveN