David Pope, European Director of Marketing for Jumio, reveals how to convert mobile channel consumers who abandon their shopping carts into full paying customers.

Nineteen years after the first online retail transaction back in 1994, the growth curve still shows no sign of slowing down. Looking forward, the next wave of growth is being fuelled by the rise of web savvy, mobile consumers glued to their smartphones and tablets. So online retailers have got it made right?

Not quite….

The Jumio Mobile Consumer Insight Study, published earlier this year, revealed that 66 per cent of mobile visitors are abandoning their shopping carts before giving retailers that all important sale. I know I‘m not alone in wanting to avoid a lost sales opportunity.

The Good News…

”¢ The global online retail market is now worth €825 billion/$1,064 billion

Ӣ 20% annual growth is being seen Y-o-Y

”¢ Average individual consumer spend is €1,050/$1,354 a year

And…

The latest stats show that mobile (smartphones & tablets) is responsible for;

Ӣ 23% of traffic
Ӣ 15% of sales
Ӣ With 39% growth expected next year (double that of e-commerce)

The Bad News…

Ӣ 66% of consumers are abandoning their mobile transaction. Ӣ Retailers are missing out on custom.

If the same thing was to happen in store, with 7 out of 10 customers with a filled basket dropping it and running out, retailers would do something about it – so why accept the same thing via your mobile channel?

The big question is why?

Let‘s start with some stats based on consumer feedback ;

”¢ 51% don‘t feel comfortable inputting their credit card details

Ӣ 47% said the checkout process is too long

Ӣ 41% stated the checkout was too difficult on the device

Ӣ 23% said their purchase would not go through

These are all true but I don‘t think it paints the whole picture of m-commerce.

”¢ Perhaps mobile consumers are feeling guilty about the cash they‘re about to splash?

Ӣ Maybe lunch hour is over?

Ӣ Do we think we can perhaps get it cheaper elsewhere?

Ӣ Distracted by the television?

Ӣ Time to pick up the kids?

”¢ Worried about the merchant‘s returns policy?

”¢ Conscious that it‘s time to get that report done for the boss

In truth, some abandonment factors are out of the control of even the most talented mobile channel developers but we need to make it as simple and easy as possible for customers to spend and at the same time make them feel secure in what they‘re doing.

We all (me included) regularly abandon our virtual baskets but as a retailer there are some relatively easy things retailers can employ to combat this. You just have to think mobile.

My top five tactics to tackle mobile shopping cart abandonment for retailers:

  1. Reduce Payment Friction Make entering payment details as easy as possible and make sure you let people pay the way they want to; credit, debit, paypal or mobile wallets. Jumio is of course just one way to reduce payment friction by using its mobile device as a card scanner so that customers can scan their payment card rather than ask them to type it all out on a fiddly mobile user interface.

  2. Design For Mobile First Mobile is more than just e-commerce on the small screen, it is all about the user experience and to take advantage you need to design specifically for mobile.

  3. Hold My Basket For Me Don‘t delete the basket, if they‘ve come back, remind customers what they were thinking of buying – they may have returned to buy it!

  4. Know Your Customer If they‘re a regular customer find out more about them. Maybe invite them to join your loyalty programme offering discounts, if it‘s a casual customer make the checkout process fast and get the purchase.

  5. Calm Customer Fear