Why do customers abandon their shopping baskets?

By: Andrew Stockwell | December 10th, 2009

Why are we here? Who started the big bang? Why is the sky blue? Why on earth do customers abandon their shopping baskets??! There are some eternal questions people regularly ask; I’ll just focus on the last one in this blog….

Have you ever watched someone browsing around a high street shop? They bumble in after seeing the well groomed mannequin in the window, they thumb through the racks, may even try something on that is just a bit ‘too trendy for them’…well exactly the same thing happens online.

There are 4 main reasons for online shopping abandonment. Use these to tailor your behavioural email campaigns and optimise via your MVT:-

Wish List’ers
They spend hours online looking at every option and test the varieties. They may never buy from a company but they sure will fill their shopping basket up with things they wish they could. Offline they are called window shoppers. They are often the young, energetic and underfunded.

Cash Conscious
They will trawl the internet looking for the best deal. They sign up for offer voucher sites and have an iphone app to scan barcodes to compare grocery costs. These guys helped build the aggregator model and are always looking for ‘the bargain’.

Brand Lovers
They love your brand. They would like to work for your company. They respect what you do and how you do it. On their lunch hour they look at the BBC news and then browse your site for ideas.

Worriers
They love the idea of buying they just don’t like the responsibility. Every purchase must be considered and justified (potentially to friends and family). And if they do buy there’s a higher chance they will regret it soon after.

As you can see 4 distinct groups of people. I will discuss ways to target these four groups uniquely in a follow up blog.

Web habits are constantly evolving. The way we interact with websites, portals and interfaces put in front of us by companies is in constant flux, based largely on how those companies position themselves through the development of their site architecture. When one of the large ecommerce operators makes a big change to their structure, not mentioning any names (www.amazon.co.uk) it affects what good looks like to the consumer and raises expectations. As online marketers we need to be looking for new ways to aid the website to convert. There are many techniques detail in the Econsultancy and RedEye Conversion Report.

Until next time keep evolving.