In 2019, we saw an average of 84% of baskets being abandoned. While this sounds particularly high, it is a normal aspect of eCommerce and varies between industry, especially between websites.
The list of reasons why a potential customer will abandon their basket is extensive. Distractions are always around the corner - a phone call, someone knocking at the door… dinner is ready! Decisions such as booking a holiday or buying an expensive piece of jewellery will naturally require more time, research and consideration, leading to a natural increase in basket abandonment.
Generally speaking, the higher the cost of a product you’re selling, then the higher the abandoned rate. For example, it’s going to be a shorter time to purchase a phone case than the phone itself.
Other reasons to abandon a basket include unexpected costs (service fee, tax, delivery costs), finding a better price elsewhere (competitor websites, Amazon) or simply the process taking too long. Some customers won’t be ready to buy or prefer to buy in-store instead - they might even be on a device where they find it too tricky to make the purchase due to poor mobile optimisation.
The list goes on and on and many of these reasons are out of our control...
However, it’s important to do everything possible to reduce the number of internal distractions such as removing banners, popups and navigation links away from the checkout pages. This will help streamline the checkout flow and ensure the task of buying the product doesn’t take any longer than needed from the moment the customer decided to make the purchase.
There should also be a careful consideration to the aspects your customers value. Free delivery is often a quick way to seal the deal. Other considerations such as checkout security or even stock availability need to be clearly displayed to the customer to show that they will be receiving the goods when they expect it, without needing to worry about compromising their payment or personal details.
Here is where the beauty and simplicity of the Magento 2 checkout comes into play as a great example of how a checkout should work. It ticks all the boxes when executed correctly.
With all of this work done, there are further ways to reduce that abandoned cart rate which leads us to the heart of this guide: how to setup abandoned baskets with Mailchimp on Magento.
The main thrust of emailing customers who have not made the purchase is they often simply need a little nudge or reminder to complete the purchase. Once they’ve added their email to the checkout, you can send them an abandoned basket email giving them another opportunity to complete their order.
With Magento there are a couple of ways this can be done:
The Mailchimp extension needs installation and configuration, but once it’s all connected, all of your email communication can be managed through the Mailchimp interface. If you need support for setting this up, you can get in touch with a Magento specialist from magic42 to discuss your project in more detail.
Once contacts have been synced across Magento and Mailchimp, you can start to plan out a series of emails. Best practice usually requires sending an email after a few hours and another one after a few days if a basket has been abandoned. This provides a couple of opportunities for the customer to reconsider their decision as well as limiting the number of emails delivered.
The series of emails should be setup as an automated process.This means that an email will be automatically sent through to your potential customer based upon the rules you’ve setup. A more aggressive approach could also include coupon codes, discounts or free delivery options in order to maximise the chance of them changing their minds.
Once the campaign series has been running for a while, you should be keeping an eye on the reports, understanding if the emails are being well received, opened, clicked and ultimately a purchase being made. This is where additional tweaks and testing should take place in order to improve the experience of the customer.
Sending out abandoned basket emails is only one of many ways to help increase your overall conversion rate. We have partnered with eCommerce businesses from around the UK and helped them increase their conversions. You can see more of our clients or get in touch with us so we can discuss how to improve your eCommerce business too.
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