The average recorded cart abandonment rate across the world is about 69%. If you get the math right, that’s more than half of your sales gone right before you were about to get them. With the rising internet users and e-commerce businesses, cart abandonment has become a common phenomenon. We’re here to share some of the latest fixes to give you a competitive edge and more sales.
Imagine a person walking into your physical store, trying out different sizes of clothes, getting them to the billing counter, and then leaving it all right there – yes, cart abandonment is as bad as that. Here are a few reasons that cart abandonment happens:
The only good thing about having an e-commerce store is that you will recover these abandoned sales if you have the right set of tools and the right strategy. Unlike in physical stores, you can’t run after a customer and drag him back to complete the purchase.
The Latest Cart Abandonment Strategies To Recover Your Sales
Cart Recovery and Reminder Emails
While the first and the foremost tactic may not look new to you, emails will continue to be the most effective communication channel throughout the next year as well. That’s precisely why cart recovery and reminder emails work perfectly.
Using emails, you can alert the prospect who was ‘almost a customer’ that you’re still holding back the items he showed interest in. While reaching out, you can create a bit of sense of urgency by letting him know when the discount on it is ending or how the product is fast going out of stock.
Take these emails as your one chance to grab their attention back and drive them to complete the transaction. But ensure one thing, your email takes them directly to the cart where they can move on to the payment process instead of having to build the order right from scratch.
Optimizing your checkout process is as important!
For instance, Fab here sends over the items a shopper left behind along with its details and a picture that is bound to stimulate his interest again.
And here’s one from Doggyloot that isn’t just a reminder to the shopper of what he has left behind but also instills the fear of missing out on good products at a good deal.
One to One Customer-tailored Emails
Continuing on the point above to reinforce the importance of emails, businesses and marketers need to understand that using the same old emailing tactics is no longer effective. If you want emails to work for you, you need to dig deeper into customer insights and use the data to tailor them. Yes, we’re talking about high-level personalization.
Wigzo enables dynamically generated emails that take into account what the shopper has previously interacted with, added to his cart, or purchased from your store. Based on this data, it auto-populates emails that are sent to your subscribers and customers.
This tactic will ensure cart recovery and increase the transactional value your store generates when strategized well.
Leverage WhatsApp & SMS for Abandoned Cart Recovery
Many e-commerce brands don’t realize it, but WhatsApp is a critical communication channel to engage customers personally in real-time. With over 1.5 billion users across the globe, a significant chunk of your customers likely uses this popular messaging app. Brands can send personalized offers, order updates, and cart-recovery nudge messages to push more sales.
But how?
Recovering abandoned carts is pretty easy now, to be honest, with AI-based marketing automation tools like Wigzo. For instance, Wigzo’s WhatsApp cart recovery capability can send automated cart recovery messages o customers who added products to their carts but left without purchasing them. They receive a custom personalized message with a link. Upon clicking the link, the customer is taken straight to the checkout page with their original products and pricing still intact in the digital cart.
This powerful feature has helped numerous e-commerce brands recover more than 60% of lost sales in this manner.
Harness the Power of SMS
Think beyond just an internet connection to engage your customers. SMS is still relevant to a large and young population – and for all the good reasons. It is a proven channel to acquire new customers at scale, send personalized offers, recover abandoned shopping carts, and boost sales.
- SMSes have an open rate of more than 96 percent
- Users can be engaged offline
- Their text-only structure is non-complicated and straightforward.
This is why the trend of recovering abandoned digital carts via SMS is catching up with e-commerce players. E.g., SMS automation technology allows customers to recover their abandoned shopping carts with a single click included in the SMS. E-commerce SMS marketing is a vast subject in itself for mastering – so here is a complete guide to growing your e-tail brand via SMS.
Leverage Price Alerts
The one thing that drives online shoppers to purchase is a good deal that they might not get on another store. That’s precisely the tactic one needs to leverage to recover abandoned carts.
Using push notifications on the web and mobile, along with emails, you can reach out to your audience with price alerts on products they have previously shown interest in. A copy that stimulates action and complements the deal is sure to get you a sale.
The only thing you need to remember is that you’re reaching out to them at the right time, with the right message, and are catering to their interests only.
Promote New Arrivals
There is a high chance that a shopper who has abandoned some items has purchased them from another store. This makes it pointless to reach out to them with the same product over and over again. After the initial cart reminders and cart recovery emails, marketers need to use their customer data to create campaigns that promote new arrivals or related products, as per the shopper’s interests.
For instance, the shopper could have been planning to buy a luxury pen from your store. But he abandons it and purchases it from the next store. Your campaign could focus on promoting the latest cells in the same category, notebooks that he could use, or other functional products like refills that would add value to his purchase.
Using this tactic, you won’t just be recovering your abandoned cart but also giving more exposure to the latest ranges that your shoppers might not have discovered yet.
Up-sell and Cross-sell Products
The best way to recover an abandoned cart is to make the shopper feel like he is bagging a great deal. Instead of just offering discounts on the items he has chosen, you could use this as an opportunity to up-sell or cross-sell other products.
For instance, if a shopper has left without purchasing the shirt he has just shown interest in, you could bring him back by offering a deal in the email that clubs the shirt with pants from the same range.
Retarget Them on Social Media
One of the most common and most effective tactics to recover abandoned carts is to retarget shoppers on social media. Since these advertisements only show the shopper products he has previously shown interest in, they are highly contextual and have higher conversion rates.
Target Them before They Leave
Retargeting once they have left your store is one thing, but why not take the opportunity to retarget them on-site? You can create on-site campaigns targeted at converting the shopper ‘before they leave the website using exit-intent technology.’
For instance, if the shopper leaves the checkout process, you could retarget him with a campaign that gives him a special discount on the cart total – but only if he completes the purchase ‘today.’ Or maybe just free shipping!
The idea behind exit intent campaigns is to catch the shopper’s attention again and convert him with personalized campaigns before he leaves the website and explores other options.
Real-time Purchase Proof
You could be selling the best products in your industry, but the only proof you have is stored back in numbers and names in your data log. Why not use the popularity to reduce your cart abandonment rates instead?
Having social proof like ratings and reviews of products on your website is a great way to let the shopper know how much people trust you. But what nudges him to complete the purchase is knowing that while he is browsing the store, others are purchasing the products already.
The fear of missing out on a good deal and a good product is sure to drive the shopper to complete the purchase.
Over to you
With so many businesses taking their products and services online, it is crucial to understand that every online shopper has way too many options to choose from. A competitor could be offering a better deal, a better shipping option, or even a better variation of the product the shopper is interested in!
Cart abandonment can only be reduced when you can effectively turn your online store visitors into customers while you still have their attention. It is essential not to give them too much time off your brand to explore other options and stay consistently in touch with them.
Get all of this right, and more with Wigzo!
