Fixing your ecommerce checkout UX to improve peak season performance

You’ve loaded up on your most popular inventory, set up your ad and email campaigns, and made sure your PDPs look perfect in anticipation of Peak Season demand.

But the true test of your Peak Season success will happen when your customers make it to the checkout page. Will they make it through the purchase process, or bounce away, never to be seen again?

The stakes are high when it comes to the checkout process. In fact, more than 70% of customers end up abandoning their shopping carts, even after they’ve picked out the products they want. What’s keeping them from completing a purchase, and how can you convince them to convert?

In this article, we’ll study the challenges that retailers face with the pre-purchase experience during Peak Season – and help you identify solutions that will encourage customers to convert and drive more revenue for your brand.

Common pre-purchase CX challenges

When shoppers are considering a purchase, they first need to think about what they want to buy – but by the time they get to the checkout page, that process is complete. They’ve decided on a specific pair of shoes or a new sweater, and they’re ready to buy it. So what’s stopping them?

If they’re hesitating at this point in the process, there are a number of factors that could be coming into play. Some of the most likely issues they may face include:

• They’re not happy with your returns policy: Eighty-two percent of shoppers check out a brand’s returns policy before committing to make a purchase – and if they don’t like what they see, they’re very likely to cancel the transaction at that stage. If your returns policy isn’t easy to understand, or is overly rigid, shoppers are more likely to look elsewhere.
• They don’t know if the order would arrive on time: Especially during Peak Season, customers are concerned about getting their orders in time for their upcoming holiday festivities. If a product is on back-order, or the delivery date isn’t guaranteed by the time they need the product, they’re likely to cancel the purchase or buy the product from a competitor with faster shipping.
• The shipping cost is too high: Shoppers also pay close attention to the total cost of the product, which includes shipping and delivery fees. If they get sticker-shock over the cost of their order, they may not go through the transaction. The same goes for reverse shipping, as many purchases end in a return.
• You don’t offer the right payment options: Customers often use a variety of payment options when purchasing gifts around the holidays, which may include debit cards, credit cards, Venmo, PayPal, and Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) options like Klarna or Affirm. If you don’t provide the option they’re looking for – or, if they’re not able to access stored payment details easily – they may abandon their shopping cart.

Whether just one of these, or multiple issues, are at play, you’re likely to see significant drop-off from the checkout page to the purchase complete page.

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Pre-purchase optimization strategies

The good news is, you can use some simple pre-purchase optimization strategies to stop the bleeding and boost your conversion rates. Here’s how to address each issue:

• When they’re not happy with your returns policy…
  • Simple: Make it better. Build a flexible returns policy with a minimum 30-day window when customers can choose to return an item for any reason, and get a full refund or exchange. Lay out your policies clearly on each product page – they should be easy enough to cover in a sentence or two. If you need to set up different policies for different product categories (i.e., intimates must be in original packaging), you can easily do that with customized Workflows in Loop.
• When they don’t know if the order would arrive on time…
  • Vague delivery estimates make shoppers anxious, since they don’t know if their order will arrive by their target deadline. To give them confidence in your holiday shipping and delivery process, you can use tools like Loop’s Delivery Promise, which calculates an accurate delivery date based on the product type, shipping option, and the customer’s zip code, before they even get to the checkout page. That means by the time the shopper arrives at the checkout page, they’ll already know the package will arrive on time and be prepared to close the deal. And with Delivery Promises’ new Advanced Rules Management, you can leverage rules management for regional specific EDDs (ex. shipping to Hawaii) or to account for delayed from either your brand or the carrier (ex. holiday delivery delays, strikes, pre-orders or sold out items with longer restocking timelines, etc.).
• When the shipping cost is too high…
  • Shipping costs are one of the most common reasons for cart abandonments, with 48% of shoppers who abandon carts doing so because of unexpected fees. While offering free shipping isn’t feasible for all retailers, consider offering free shipping above certain purchase thresholds – which may have the added effect of generating upsell revenue from shoppers trying to hit the minimum. If your brand has brick-and-mortar stores, you can also offer free In-Store Pickup as an alternative. WIth Ship by Loop, you can access Loop negotiated rates with 70+ carriers across North America, UK, EU, and Australia - while providing a better customer experience with printerless options. You can also provide a solution for shoppers worried about high return shipping fees by offering Checkout+ during the checkout process. With Checkout+, shoppers are invited to pay a small fee upfront in exchange for a free return later – giving them peace of mind around the returns process.
• When you don’t offer the right payment options…
  • Expand your payment options with an ecommerce payment gateway that supports multiple payment types, including debit card, credit card, BNPL, and electronic payment methods. Some customers may also have a gift card or store credit, so it’s important that your store makes it easy to access and use that credit when they wish to make a purchase. Shop Pay is also a great option that provides accelerated checkout experience for Shopify brands. By using Shop Pay, you can see as much as 50% better conversion compared to guest checkout.

The benefits of pre-purchase optimization

By improving the pre-purchase experience for your customers, you’ll be able to guide more of them through the journey from the checkout screen to a confirmed order. In addition to a higher conversion rate, you’ll see:

• Higher AOV: Using tactics such as a minimum threshold for free shipping can help you bump up your shoppers’ average order value, encouraging them to purchase extra products to meet the minimum spend requirements.
• Fewer customer support inquiries: By building key information into your PDPs and checkout pages, you’ll be able to answer your customers’ questions upfront – eliminating the need for shoppers to reach out to your support team for assistance around delivery times, return policies, and other common questions. As a result, you’ll be able to save your CX resources for shoppers with high-touch needs.
• More recurring revenue: Building a better pre-purchase customer experience helps you ensure customer satisfaction – and if your shoppers are happy, they’re far more likely to come back and buy more from your brand. Improving your brand and customer experience together can lead to a 3.5x increase in revenue growth.

Leveraging Loop for Peak Season success

By using Loop’s tools to improve the pre-purchase customer experience, you’ll be able to build your shoppers’ confidence in your brand’s ability to execute, and give them the flexibility they’re looking for when it comes to payment and shipping options. Peak Season can make or break your brand, and by providing a seamless experience throughout the checkout process – and beyond – you’ll be able to earn more revenue from customers, both during Peak Season and all through the year to come. Dig into all of our Peak Season resources to learn how to build an optimal experience from start to finish.

Ready to optimize your Peak Season experience with Loop? Book a demo.