70% of shoppers abandon their carts. Learn the technical and marketing strategies to recover those lost sales.
The average e-commerce cart abandonment rate hovers around 70%. That means for every 10 people who add an item to their cart, 7 leave without paying. If you can recover even a small fraction of those abandoned carts, your top-line revenue will skyrocket.
Why Do Users Abandon Carts?
Before we can fix the problem, we must understand it. The top reasons for abandonment are:
- Unexpected shipping costs added at checkout.
- Forced account creation.
- Complex or lengthy checkout forms.
- Window shopping / saving items for later.
1. Upfront Shipping Transparency
Nothing kills a conversion faster than a user expecting to pay $50, only to reach the final step and see $15 in unexpected shipping and handling fees. The Fix: Offer a shipping calculator on the cart page before checkout, or better yet, bake the shipping cost into the product price and offer universal “Free Shipping.”
2. The Automated Email Flow
When a user enters their email but fails to complete the purchase, you must have an automated Klaviyo or Mailchimp flow ready.
- Email 1 (1 Hour Later): A gentle reminder. “Did you forget something? Your cart is saved.”
- Email 2 (24 Hours Later): Urgency. “Your items are selling out fast.”
- Email 3 (48 Hours Later): The incentive. Offer a 10% discount code to push hesitant buyers over the edge.
3. SMS and Push Notifications
Emails get lost in spam folders. SMS has a 98% open rate. By capturing a phone number early in the checkout process, you can send highly effective, personalized text messages to recover the cart.
4. Retargeting Pixels
For users who abandon before entering an email, pixel tracking is your only hope. Ensure your Meta (Facebook) and Google Ads pixels are firing correctly on the “Add to Cart” event. You can then serve dynamic ads showing the exact product they abandoned as they scroll through Instagram.
