We talk a lot about the e-commerce funnel at Liftopia, and how the most critical driver of e-commerce revenue in that funnel is conversion. Increasing your e-commerce conversion rate means you can spend your marketing dollars more efficiently, since a larger percentage of customers who enter your e-commerce environment result in a transaction/purchase.

While there are different factors that influence conversion rate, there are a few simple issues you can check for in your e-commerce flow to make sure that customers don’t abandon their purchase, ultimately increasing conversion rate.

Let’s take a look at examples of some of the top reasons that customers might abandon their purchase and what to avoid¹:

#1 “The site wanted me to create an account”

Requiring a customer to create an account to checkout can be a hassle and blocker to complete a purchase. Particularly if a customer is shopping on mobile, the extra-steps (not to mention, typing) may cause a customer to give up on their intended purchase because more steps and required fields can be frustrating. Allowing customers to checkout as a guest if they’d like will increase the likelihood of a completed purchase and conversion rate.

Here are two screenshots of e-commerce stores that require you to log-in and/or create an account:

#2 “Too long / complicated check-out process”

Have you ever been in the middle of a checkout process and wondered how many more steps you had left to go? Lengthy check-out processes are another top reason that customers may abandon their purchase in the middle of checkout.

The real example below takes about 12 steps to progress from product selection to purchase. Not only is the checkout process way too long, customers are also required to log-in to their account.

#3 “Website had errors / crashed”

This might seem obvious, but broken links, lack of “HTTPS”, or website errors lead to customer distrust of your site. Sites lacking “HTTPS” can be a big red flag for customers as sites without HTTPS lack the security to protect customer information while browsing, logging in, and making purchases.

So what now? We’d recommend going through your own e-commerce experience and evaluating where customers might drop out, and how to address those issues. Let us know if you have questions at partners@liftopia.com.

¹baymard.com/checkout-usability