Resources/Blog

Why ecommerce brands need a complete checkout experience solution

Learn about the pre-purchase and post-purchase technologies you need to streamline your customer experience.

Plenty of brands can impress customers with a clever ad or a compelling social campaign. But the question is, can you keep their attention through the entire pre- and post-purchase journey?

Today’s consumers demand more than dazzling campaigns – they require a streamlined experience during the checkout process and beyond. By delivering enhanced visibility, confidence, and convenience at the point of checkout (and beyond), your brand will be poised to build a base of repeat customers who’ll remain loyal for years to come.

Modern ecommerce technology empowers brands to build highly engaging experiences for their customers that can enhance efficiency, retain more revenue, and enhance the customer experience. Let’s take a look at the technologies you need to deliver a complete checkout experience.

What is a complete checkout experience?

A complete checkout experience encompasses all of the features that can streamline and enhance a customer's journey – both before and after they’ve checked out their shopping cart.

It’s important to deliver a transparent, seamless, and consistent experience across every channel you use to engage with your customers when they’re considering, or completing, a purchase. To that end, key points in the customer journey include:

Estimated delivery dates: Shoppers often change their mind about products if they aren’t confident that they’ll arrive by the time they need them. To that end, Loop merchants can now boost confidence in their brand by featuring a “Delivery Promise” for each product they stock – an accurate estimate of when the product will arrive at the shopper’s door. The Delivery Promise is customized based on the specific product (and where it’s stocked) and the shopper’s zip code, ensuring that the shopper has real-time visibility around when the order would likely arrive, before they even put the item in their shopping cart. Offering this level of transparency makes it easier for shoppers to thoughtfully consider their options, and reduces the risk of cart abandonment.
Checkout+: Remember back in 2021, when every brand around offered free return shipping? Well, shipping costs have since skyrocketed, and so that practice has gone the way of the skinny jean: Today, 81% of retailers charge return fees for at least some kinds of returns. Shoppers may not be thrilled to pony up when sending back an unwanted product, but you can take some of their pain away by offering a premium return shipping solution. Loop’s Checkout+ is an optional add-on during the checkout process, offering shoppers the chance to pay a low upfront fee in exchange for access to a free return later on. The policy buys peace of mind for the shopper, while helping your brand generate revenue that you can use to cover the costs of your return shipping and software fees – often, with an extra cash buffer. The best part? We've seen Checkout+ boost conversion rates, decrease cart abandonment, and increase average order value!
A streamlined checkout experience: Don’t force your shoppers to fill out tons of forms when they’re trying to make a purchase, or they’re likely to bounce away in irritation. Instead, keep your checkout form as simple and streamlined as possible: Shopify Checkout integrates with Shop Pay, PayPal, and ApplePay, enabling shoppers to instantly use stored payment methods without having to reach for a credit card. By setting up a simple, branded checkout experience that’s flawless on both mobile and desktop, you can boost conversion rates by up to 91%.
Branded order tracking: Once your shopper has checked out, they’ll be anxious to keep tabs on their order in progress. Instill confidence in your customers with a branded order tracking system that delivers real-time order status updates across both email and SMS. They should receive notifications (at minimum) when the order’s been confirmed, when it’s en route, when it’s out for delivery, and after it’s arrived. If there’s an issue with the delivery, and it gets delayed or lost, your brand should send a proactive update to let your customer know the new delivery date. By ensuring transparent, timely communications through the entire shipping process, you’ll be able to boost confidence in your brand and reduce “where’s my order?” customer support inquiries.
Seamless returns and exchanges:Sometimes, a purchase doesn’t work out – in fact, it happens up to 30% of the time in ecommerce. Don’t make the returns process difficult for your customers, or they’ll never come back. Instead, provide streamlined self-service returns and exchanges through Loop’s returns management portal. Using Loop, shoppers can initiate their own returns on all eligible items, choosing whether they’d like a refund, a variant exchange, or store credit. If they’d like an exchange – whether a different version of the same item or a completely new product – they can immediately apply their return credit without waiting for your brand to process the return, ensuring that they can get their replacement quickly and hassle-free.

How a complete checkout experience sets your brand apart

Building a cohesive and streamlined experience for your customers through every touchpoint in their journey is a crucial strategy for setting your brand apart from its competitors.

Today’s shoppers are more value-conscious than ever: They’re constantly looking for the best deals on products, and may switch brand loyalty at a moment’s notice based on price tag alone. But by competing on customer experience, rather than price, you can win them over.

Embracing ecommerce tools like Delivery Promise, Checkout+, and self-service returns can boost confidence in the customer journey: Your shoppers understand your commitment to their experience from the outset, with transparent communications that give them peace of mind every step of the way. Customers will value your proactive approach to customer service, with clear delivery estimates and shipping costs, a seamless checkout experience, and seamless returns and exchanges.

By building a streamlined customer experience, you’ll be able to boost your customer loyalty rates and recover more revenue. Empowering self-service returns and exchanges helps your brand retain up to 40% of revenue from returns, and hold on to customers you otherwise may have lost for good.

Brands that earn their customers’ trust are the ones most likely to stand the test of time. By building a best-in-class complete checkout experience, you’ll be set up for sustainable success.

Want to see what these features look like in action? Check out our interactive demo!