Shopping Cart Abandonment: What It Is and How to Fix It

It happens all the time: Customers carefully select products online, add items to their shopping cart, and then poof! The shopper vanishes before final checkout. For businesses, shopping cart abandonment is like watching revenue and potential customer relationships slip through your fingers. Cart abandonment affects businesses in every industry, regardless of what you sell or where you sell it. But the good news? Every abandoned shopping cart is a chance to learn, optimise, and win customers back.

Here’s everything you need to know about how to reduce abandoned carts and turn a ‘maybe’ into a ‘yes.’

• What is shopping cart abandonment?
• Why do customers abandon shopping carts?
• 10 tips to reduce shopping cart abandonment
• Real-world examples of minimising cart abandonment
• How ecommerce businesses minimise cart abandonment
• Boost conversions and reduce shopping cart abandonment with Salesforce

Shopping cart abandonment occurs when a potential customer adds items to their cart but leaves your online store before they complete the purchase. When this happens, it shows customers are interested in your products, but not enough to ultimately go through the transaction. For businesses that want to reduce cart abandonment, the primary question is: Why do shoppers leave before a purchase? Cart abandonment could be the result of many things, including unexpected costs, complicated checkout processes, or last-minute hesitations. Addressing these issues is crucial to improve conversion rates.

Customers abandon their carts for various reasons, including unexpected hurdles in the checkout process or long delivery times. Most customers (73%) expect businesses to understand their unique needs and expectations. When you don’t meet your customers’ needs, they take their business elsewhere. Here are a few of the most common reasons for shopping cart abandonment:

• Unexpected extra costs: Additional costs at checkout can instantly derail a potential sale. Customers feel blindsided by hidden fees like shipping charges, taxes, or extra service fees. This erodes trust and triggers cart abandonment.
• Mandatory account creation: Customers want seamless, quick purchases, and many will abandon their carts rather than create an account. We have three words: Allow guest checkout.
• Complex checkout process: A lengthy or confusing process with too many steps or unclear instructions can overwhelm customers. The fewer pages and the more straightforward, the better.
• Long delivery times: By now, shoppers are accustomed to quick shipping. Extended delivery times can discourage customers, especially if they desire priority or express shipping.
• Security concerns: Customers are wary of providing sensitive payment information on websites they don't trust. A lack of visible security badges or a poorly designed payment page can raise red flags.
• Website crashes: Technical issues, such as website errors, long loading times, or crashes during checkout can abruptly halt a purchase and lead to frustration.
• Better prices elsewhere: Customers might compare prices and find a better deal on another site. In fact, many shoppers place items in a cart to remember them while they shop around.
• Just browsing or saving for later: Sometimes, an abandoned cart isn't indicative of an issue at all. It can simply mean that a customer uses the cart feature as a temporary storage space, intending to purchase later. They might not have an immediate intent to buy.

Think of an abandoned cart as an incomplete story. Use it as an opportunity to understand, reconnect, and convert hesitant users into committed buyers. All you need are the right strategies and tools. Check out these 10 actionable tips to reduce cart abandonment:

1. Simplify the checkout process

A streamlined checkout experience reduces cart abandonment. Minimise the number of steps for making a purchase and offer multiple payment methods. Consider offering a guest checkout option to simplify the shopping process. You can also implement clear progress indicators, visually guiding customers through each checkout stage and providing a sense of control and transparency.

2. Optimise mobile experiences

Around 62% of global users will shop on their phones by 2027. So, having a solid mobile commerce strategy is essential. Start by making your ecommerce website ‌mobile-responsive and adaptable to various screen sizes. Offer touch-friendly elements, such as large buttons and navigable forms to enhance user interaction. Prioritising fast page loading times also helps. This is all table stakes when it comes to creating a frictionless mobile shopping experience that keeps your customers engaged.

3. Offer multiple payment options

76% of customers expect flexible payment options, and payment preferences vary notably across age demographics. Offer multiple online payment options like credit cards, PayPal, Apple Pay, digital wallets, and buy now pay later (BNPL) to help customers complete their purchases using their preferred method. Use trusted and secure payment gateways to protect sensitive information. This contributes to a trustworthy checkout experience and increases average order value (AOV).

4. Provide clear and transparent pricing

Your pricing strategy can make or break your revenue. You should be transparent and clearly display all costs upfront, including shipping charges and taxes. The customer’s total — including all taxes and shipping fees — should be visible before they click the Buy button to make a purchase. You can also offer price comparison tools to help customers see how your offerings stack up against competitors. Encourage prompt purchases by highlighting exclusive product bundles, discounts, and promotions. This also creates a sense of urgency. Use artificial intelligence (AI) to adjust real-time pricing based on market demands, seasonal trends, and inventory.

5. Implement targeted marketing for abandoned carts

Targeted marketing, like personalised messages or email campaigns, can bring customers back to their abandoned carts. You can send reminders to ‌customers about the items they’ve left behind. Include incentives like exclusive discounts or free shipping to encourage immediate purchase completion. This also creates a sense of individual attention. Cart recovery is a time-sensitive art: Send a targeted first reminder within an hour, then follow up with a more compelling offer a day later.

Pro tip? Use AI to decode customer behaviour and predict the most attractive incentives and timings for each customer. This personalises product recommendations and improves the chances of recovery. Agentforce, autonomous AI agents can run end-to-end marketing campaigns and deliver personalised product recommendations to your customers over their preferred communication channel.

6. Improve website speed and performance

What happens when customers must wait more than a few seconds for a page to load? They lose patience and interest. Website speed and reliability are crucial for preventing cart abandonment. Speed up your site by compressing images and minimising HTTP requests. A content delivery network (CDN) enhances performance by distributing content globally, ensuring faster delivery for all users.

Take proactive measures to prevent site outages. Unexpected downtime can abruptly halt checkout, leading to immediate abandonment. In fact, about 66% of site outages result in a substantial revenue loss. Invest in solid hosting and monitoring to offer your customers reliable ecommerce experiences.

7. Enhance trust and security

About 49% of customers say they don’t trust businesses. It’s your responsibility to foster trust and declare your data protection policies, ethical AI usage, and privacy policies upfront on your ecommerce website. The following tips can help you build a trustworthy shopping experience:

• Show security badges: Display trust seals and security badges from recognised security providers to reassure customers that their sensitive information is safe.
• Flaunt your customer testimonials: Showcase your customer stories and testimonials to demonstrate that other shoppers have had positive experiences with your store. This is especially important for small ecommerce businesses.
• Be transparent about policies: A clearly stated privacy policy and transparent data protection measures address customer concerns about data security. It creates a safe and secure environment that encourages them to complete their purchases.
• State your ethical AI practices: Ethical AI practices, like transparent data usage and fair algorithms, build trust. Your customers will know that their data is respected and decisions are unbiased. Besides, this fosters a sense of security and loyalty, encouraging repeat purchases and positive brand perception.

8. Offer self-service for FAQs

If a customer has a question about a product prior to checkout, reducing cart abandonment can hinge on how quickly they can find the answers on your site. AI can help you anticipate potential roadblocks during ‌checkout and provide timely assistance. You can also implement AI chatbots to offer 24/7 support across the world.

Looking for options that can deliver more contextual and personalised support? Generative AI-powered tools like Agentforce can help. Agents are always up and running. From handling marketing campaigns and discovering cross-selling and upselling opportunities to personal shopping assistance and order management — Agentforce can do it all.

9. Create a seamless user experience

45% of users say easy navigation contributes to a positive digital experience. Your storefront should be user-friendly, allowing customers to search and discover products seamlessly. Offer intuitive design elements, such as clear call-to-action (CTA) buttons and straightforward forms, to guide customers through the checkout process effortlessly.

Pro tip? Maintain consistent branding throughout the journey — from product browsing to final purchase — for brand cohesion and familiarity. You can also prioritise a smooth and fast shopping experience with a one-click checkout process. This encourages customers to complete their transactions.

10. Analyse and optimise

Measuring what matters helps you derive the best outcomes. Track key ecommerce metrics using analytics tools to identify patterns and areas where customers are dropping off. Implement A/B testing to optimise multiple elements of the checkout process, such as button placement, form fields, and page layouts. This helps determine which variations yield the highest conversion rates. Put AI to use for various tasks, including collecting customer feedback, data analysis, and pricing insights. AI can also provide actionable tips on refining your checkout process.

Defining your goals and roadblocks will help you choose the right automation tools. Do you want to fulfil customer orders more quickly? Does your customer communication need a facelift? Do you want to simplify supply chain and inventory management with minimal staff involvement? Identify your biggest operational challenges and desired features to decide which tool works the best for you. Here are the tools and features to look for:

• A complete, integrated ecommerce platform: Ecommerce isn’t an island; it should be connected to other parts of your business. This makes it easier to implement automation and increases its impact. For example, a unified commerce platform actively syncs customer and business data across all systems. When ecommerce, marketing, sales, and service data informs your automation strategy, you can create more personalised customer experiences. This approach allows you to automate email campaigns, social media posts, product recommendations, customer segmentation, and retargeting ads based on shared data like customer behaviour and purchase history.
• Customer relationship management (CRM): A CRM forms the backbone of ecommerce automation, unifying customer data to drive personalised experiences and automated follow-ups.
• Real-time inventory management: This is key to ecommerce success — this is the system that synchronises inventory levels across all your sales channels to prevent overselling and optimise fulfilment based on real-time demand.
• Distributed order management: When order management systems come with built-in automation capabilities, you can speed up fulfilment and shipping processes, and increase customer satisfaction.
• AI agents for commerce: Customers often have questions while browsing or finalising a purchase. AI in ecommerce, such as chatbots or agents, can respond to common questions 24/7 or direct more complex questions to your support team. You can reap many benefits using tools like Agentforce — AI agents that you can customise based on your business needs and demands. You can automate everything from order and shipment management tasks, upselling, tech support, and any assistance with services, pricing or bookings.
• Intuitive analytics and reporting: Leveraging AI-powered ecommerce analytics improves visibility into your business, revealing buying trends, customer behaviour, and backend operations. These insights and reports help you track progress and identify opportunities to improve various aspects of your ecommerce business.
• Workflow flexibility and customisation: You can automate reorders, low inventory stock management, and alerts when something requires attention. You can customise such workflows to meet your business needs and uninterrupted business flow.
• Scalability: You should invest in scalable tools that can handle your growth. So, look for solutions to manage complex workflows, higher transaction volumes and integrate seamlessly with new channels. Commerce Cloud offers solutions, including digital storefronts, order management, point of sale (POS), social commerce, and more. In short, we’ve got everything you need for your ecommerce business to scale.

A unified view of your customers, business, and operations can help you deal with cart abandonment effectively. With the right ecommerce platform, you can spot potential issues, track customer conversions, and understand what’s helping or hurting your sales. Here are a few real-world examples of how ecommerce businesses use CRM to reduce cart abandonment:

How YETI increased mobile conversions 63% year-over-year (YOY)

Page speed. Immersive online shopping experiences. Customer-first design. YETI leaves no stone unturned to ensure shoppers have everything they need to make a choice and follow through on a purchase. After implementing a composable storefront that enabled unique scrolling features and a new website experience, YETI increased mobile conversion rates 63% year over year.

Now that you’ve learnt all the best practices for navigating cart abandonment, it’s time to reclaim those lost sales. Commerce Cloud makes it easy to reclaim lost sales and reduce cart abandonment with out-of-the-box tools that help you personalise every step of the customer journey. Send smart email reminders, craft targeted offers, and get insights to understand and remove barriers to buying. But don’t just take our word for it — explore the possibilities using our guided tour.