You are doing something right when your customer clicks Add to Cart. This means you have a product your customer needs or is excited about. You have something they want, something they will pay money for.
That is, until they actually go through your cart. Three dozen useless steps later, they decide it is not worth the trouble and just close the tab or window.
Think of an abandoned shopping cart, in a dusty parking lot, its wheels turning uselessly in the wind. That is what will happen to your ecommerce business if you make the check out process too complicated for your customer. And this is a grievous mistake a lot of websites commit, mainly because they are thinking more about the potential sale than the potential happiness of the customer.
Minimizing your steps makes it easier for your customer to buy your products online. That is the plain and simple reason why you should pare down 10 steps to 3, or 15 to 5. It is all about how fast and how simply they can do it.
Customers are impatient.
They are. It only takes about half a second to make a decision to leave – and in cyberspace it only takes a second to leave, depending on how fast the Internet connection is. Unlike a real store, there is no salesperson ready and willing to run after your customer to reinforce the sale. In essence, your shopping cart is like a salesperson too – a multi-step one is that lady who is more interested in gossiping with co-workers about the latest Hollywood scandal instead of assisting your customer outright.
Customers get annoyed.
The convenience of shopping online is really that – convenience. Many customers like not having to wait in line. They like that they can just add products to their cart and decide later, without having a cashier breathing down their neck.
They like that they can get it shipped for free or that they can pay a little extra to have it sent overnight. They do not like that it takes forever to get to the checkout. They are done shopping, they want to pay now. For some reason, the website is making hard for them to pay.
Customers are smart and cyber-savvy.
Many customers are technologically adept. Some customers have been using computers all their lives. Even customers who have never really used a computer can be taught to, if the stops are easy enough. Multi-step shopping cart checkouts treat your customers are is they are stupid, or frustrate them because they know it is so much easier somewhere else.
Many customers who shop online know what they are doing and have been shopping online long know to witness the evolution of the shopping cart.
More Steps = More Chances To Lose the Sale.
This should be self-explanatory but here is an example. The customer decides to buy a rare toy for $13.45. He considers it a steal. He starts by adding it to his cart. He then gets directed to a page where the website offers him all these other rare toys he can buy. He is not really interested, so he clicks no.
He gets redirected to a page where the website encourages him to sign up or register for an account. He clicks no. He gets redirected ...then at the very last page, it tells him that shipping to his state is considered specialty shipping and an additional $10 is required. This, combined with the previous unnecessary rage, causes him to cancel the purchase.
If It's Hard, People Will Not Do It.
The harder something is, the less people want to do it. It is a fact of life. It is a fact of advertising, of marketing and of the Internet. People do not like slow loading pages and complicated fussy processes when it comes to going online. People do not like having to retype their name at every step or online forms that require 15 minutes to fill out.
Keeping your shopping cart experience as simple and as customer friendly as possible will accomplish the goals you want for your company – it will boost sales. It is all about the experience. If it is easy for them to do once, chances are they will keep doing it again and again.
