The seven deadly sins of shopping carts

June 4, 2008

Chamuquito Playmobil
Creative Commons License photo credit: Omar Omar

A PayPal survey of online shoppers reveals the reasons that buyers abandon their shopping carts. Nearly half blamed too-high shipping costs, whereas - unsurprisingly in a survey commissioned by PayPal - a fifth said that their preferred method of payment wasn’t available and they couldn’t be bothered to go and find a card to pay.

With more and more eBay sellers every day starting up their own websites, it’s essential to get your shopping cart right. Estimates are that two-thirds of shoppers abandon their carts with goods in them but unpaid for; more cheeringly, one third of shoppers may return to complete the transaction later. Here are some things to avoid if you want your customers to have a heavenly checkout experience.

1. Greed : “I’ll charge what I like for postage”

According to PayPal, 43% of abandoned carts are due to shipping charges being too high. 36% of those surveyed said that the total cost was too high, so we might guess that shipping charges played a part in this too. I’m very surprised not to see “no postage fees specified” on PayPal’s list too, because for me, having to go look elsewhere to find what shipping is going to cost me, is my number one reason for abandoning my own carts.

So be upfront about your shipping. If you have a complicated tariff and lots of international customers, consider at least putting in a link to shipping prices from the cart. Better still, show UK shipping by default and allow customers to alter that to their own country, so that they can see as they shop what extras they’re going to be charged.

2. Sloth : “it’ll be delivered when I feel like it”

We all know if you’re buying from the internet, you should allow plenty of time for delivery. We all know that doesn’t happen. Offering next day or other super-quick shipping, with details of how (courier, Special Delivery, etc.) and when (”order in the next 30 minutes for delivery tomorrow”) delivery will take place can clinch you those desperate last-minute orders. Displaying this as part of the shopping cart encourages buyers to check out sooner rather than later.

3. Wrath : “I hate PayPal!”

As merchants, some of us don’t like it, but PayPal’s reach into the ecommerce world grows ever longer and stronger. Your buyers like PayPal: they’ve been sold on the security aspect, but more importantly, they like not having to get off their bottoms and find their credit card. You like that too: PayPal keeps them at the computer, paying you, instead of wandering off and getting distracted. Other shoppers, of course, don’t or won’t have a PayPal account. Offer both PayPal and a direct credit card payment options; that way, you keep everyone happy.

4. Lust : “I want your email address”

Though you might have good reasons for it, don’t force your shoppers to create an account before they can check out. The more steps you introduce into your checkout flow, the more chance your shoppers have to quit. Don’t take them out of that flow to create an account. Worse still, don’t create an account for them, and then require them to remember the details next time they shop: 14% of PayPal’s survey respondants stopped shopping because they couldn’t remember their user names and passwords on the merchant’s site.

5. Gluttony : “my shopping cart ate your shopping”

French clothing site La Redoute is the worst sinner I know here; if you’re not signed into your account, their shopping cart forgets its contents within the hour. When I go shopping, I’m not thinking about signing into my account; I’m thinking about shoes. So have your shopping cart remember what’s put into it. With a third of shoppers returning hours or even days later to complete their purchase, it pays to allow shoppers to leave items in their carts.

6. Envy : “I’ll keep my information to myself”

According to PayPal, 16% of shoppers abandoned their shopping because they couldn’t contact customer support. Be reassuring. Your shopping cart page should have links to FAQs, shipping details (tariffs and details of services used) and most importantly, how to contact you in case of a question: a phone number as well as email contact could make all the difference here.

7. Pride : sometimes, you have to let it go

A couple of wholesalers I use have an annoying new feature on their shopping carts: they email you if you’ve abandoned them. If that isn’t bad enough, I once had a phonecall, from India, “did you know you haven’t paid for what’s in your shopping cart?” Er, yes, and I doubt I will do now. Make it easy for your customers to pay, but for goodness’ sake, don’t try and annoy them into buying.

What have you done with the shopping cart on your website to make sure your customers complete their purchase? Leave us a comment.

Written by Sue Bailey · Filed Under Ecommerce | 9 Comments 

TameBay gets a new look

May 17, 2008

If you’re a regular visitor to TameBay you’ve probably noticed the site has just changed as our sparkly new design went live at a minute past midnight today!

We’ve listened to loads of our regular readers and what they want from the site and how they use it so you’ll notice things like featured posts which keep top stories on the front page for longer. The page is a lot shorter but you’ll still find the latest news stories in the center column, and there’s more space on the side to display you, our readers comments.

The navigation bars at the top will help you find the topics you’re interested in and of course the link to the TameBay forum.

As most of you know Sue and I jointly run TameBay, but what you may not know is that it’s Sue who does all of the techie stuff behind the scenes. It’s taken her many many hours of work to create the new site and the result speaks for itself.

Many thanks to all the readers who have let us know what you wanted from the site, but most of all a huge personal thanks from me to Sue, as she’s the one that has designed and built our fantastic new site.

Written by Chris Dawson · Filed Under Meta | 53 Comments 

Users don’t read blah blah blah blah blah

May 8, 2008

eBay sellers have long said it, and now it’s been proven: people don’t read everything that’s on a webpage. Research by usability guru Jakob Nielsen shows that users read approximately 20% of text on an average webpage. And the more words there are on a page, the smaller the percentage that people will read.

I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve heard a bewildered seller say “but I said it was used in the listing; why did they think it was new?” So now we know: they just didn’t read it. What’s a seller to do?

I’ve taken a look through my own and some other sellers’ non-positive feedback today, and it seems that around half of it is from people who didn’t read the listing “properly” in the first place, so making listings that communicate more effectively could in future be the difference between keeping your eBay account, or not. Here are half a dozen easy changes you can make to your listings that should help buyers read more of what you need to tell them.

Prioritise information
The more important information should be at the top of your listing. For most items, “most important information” includes the photograph.
Put your listings on a diet
If it can go, get rid of it. Your listing page should be about selling, not your T&Cs or the history of your trading on eBay, and certainly not “thanks for looking” and all that guff.

Keep listing page T&Cs minimal, and if you must have long lists of legalise, have that on a seperate linked page in your Shop.

Use headings for scannable listings
Buyers won’t read reams of text to find the information they want. They’ll scan through quickly to see if it’s there; so show them it is by using headings to highlight important areas.
Use bulleted lists
We’ve all seen those listings with a block of text going on for three screens with no paragraph break in sight. Few of us read them, and neither will your buyers.
• Bullets are easy to read
• Bullets can be scanned quickly
• Bullets are a great way to present product attributes
Keep formatting simple
Don’t make important information look like advertising, or something that’s seperate from the rest of the page flow. Big red text gets ignored because it looks like a banner ad, so don’t use it to communicate important information. IT SHOULD GO WITHOUT SAYING THAT WRITING ALL IN CAPITALS IS A REALLY BAD IDEA.

Bold text stands out so you should use it.

Put information in predictable places
eBay are training your buyers where information is on a page. Shipping prices are in the shipping prices box; returns policy is (or should be) in the returns policy box. Condition (used/new) should be in the item specifics box as well as in the body of the listing. Omitting information from the expected places makes life more difficult for your buyers; don’t make them need to read through your entire listing, because they won’t.
Don’t distract
Scrolling galleries of cross-promotions should never be at the top of your listings; sell em what they’re looking at before you sell em something else.

If you’ve read this far, congratulations ;-) and let me tell you, this works. I changed my own listing from
A packet of fifty beautiful Czech glass beads, 6mm diameter, in silver metallic finish

to

Size: 6mm diameter
Made of: Czech glass
Quantity in packet: 50
Finish: silver metallic

This not only cut the number of people who “bought the wrong thing”, it also slashed the number of ASQs I get. Listings that communicate effectively make life easier for everyone.

Written by Sue Bailey · Filed Under Featured, Selling Tips | 13 Comments 



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