Online merchants are under increasing pressure to Reduce Shipping and Fulfillment Costs.
This sometimes can lead into inefficiencies and wastage .
We want to show how some Shipping Gimmicks have failed–
(1) Shipping Cost is Too high!!
Did you know that about 55% of the Online Shoppers have Dropped a Shopping Cart after seeing the Shipping Costs??
This is because the overall price of the product plus shipping was Too high for them.
Therefore, if the price of some of your products is quite low, offering to ship it via UPS or FedEx only is not the smartest move!
If your customer has to pay more to get the product delivered than the actual price of the product itself, a high amount of cart abandonment should be expected!
If you are going to restrict the customers just because you provide only two Shipping and Delivery Methods, you are in for loosing out on a major chunk of revenue.
(2) The Order Value to Qualify for Free Shipping Was too High!!
A whopping 51% Customers abandoned carts because their purchase did not qualify for Free Shipping costs.
The optimum purchase price is around $50 for most E-commerce sites.
Secondly, this is where there’s a high chance of miscommunication i.e.if the total amount needed to qualify for free shipping is not clearly demonstrated to the customers before putting products into the cart, you should expect some of them leaving your store just before making the purchase.
Hence,Whatever value you set to qualify for Free Shipping , you should clearly communicate it to your customers before they actually have to pay.
(3) Shipping Costs listed too late!!
About 40% of online shoppers surveyed by comScore, left their carts when they proceeded to checkout and only then learned that they’ll have to pay the same price for shipping as they’re paying for the products!
Tricking your customers doesn’t work !
If you clearly list all the shipping options and costs before the actual shopping process, your customers will be much more satisfied.
This could also bring you some additional sales, because if the customers already knows that he has to pay a specific amount to qualify for a free delivery, he might want to make it his money’s worth by adding some additional products to the cart.
(4) Date of Delivery is not Clearly mentioned!
Most eCommerce sites do not leave you either surprised by delivering some products very soon or take ages. If this is the case with your store too, the nearly a Quarter of the Customers will choose your competitors over you. Some of them might even risk it and order a few products from your site, but most others are savvy shoppers and wont buy in the fluff.
Conclusion:
If you have recently changed a Shipping Program and see your abandonment rates increase then adjust your policies. A good Shipping Policy for your E-commerce site requires a good amount of homework and monitoring of the site analytics.
Kalpana.Dogra
Digital Marketing & Communications for Avactis
