Does Your Shopping Cart Have a Squeaky Wheel?
Have you ever gone grocery shopping just before a holiday? The aisles are packed with people pushing carts, shelves need restocked, all the checkout lanes have long lines...not a fun experience.
Just like in-person shopping, making online shopping easy and painless is key to getting customers to purchase from your store.
Advertisement
Let's examine the internet shopping process from start to finish exposing some places in the process that your store may have a squeaky cart.
Make the Product Easy to Find
Offer a search capability if your store has a large number of products. Most buyers don't have the patience to wade through 20 pages of products to find what they want.
Share Availability Early On
Now that the customer has found the product, let them know that it is in stock and ready to ship. Right on the product page or when they place it in their shopping cart let the customer know their purchase can be on its way soon. Don't wait until after they've placed the order to tell them it will be another 6-8 weeks.
Streamline the Order Form
Limit your order form to the basics. Shipping information, credit card or payment information, and the quantity and order number are all it takes. This isn't the place to conduct market research or ask for loads of information. Keep the order form short and simple. For future purchases, keep the customer's data on file so they can fly through the ordering even faster next time.
Handling Your Shipping (and Handling)
One big reason many people don't shop on the internet is that they have to pay for shipping. Offer a variety of shipping options to the customer so that she can decide how quickly she needs the item and what she is willing to pay to have the product delivered. Resist the temptation to add large handling fees to the shipping costs. What looked like a great online deal at $19.95 isn't nearly as attractive when shipping + handling brings the total cost to $29.95.
Keeping your online order process simple and straightforward will enhance your customer's satisfaction and the likelihood that they will visit your store again.
About The Author
Megan Corwin is an internet marketing coach who helps work at home professionals grow their businesses. Send an email to megancorwin@wahwoman.com to schedule a complimentary 30 minute coaching session. For more articles and advice about online marketing strategy and solutions, become a member of Megan's online community for work at home women: http://www.wahwoman.com/membership.html
Latest News
![]() Los Angeles Times | Report: eCommerce Sales Up On Cyber Monday socalTech.com, CA - According to the firm, Cyber Monday online spending totaled $846 million, up 15 percent from last year, as consumers flocked to ecommerce sites for their ... Video: Online Retailers See Monday As Black Friday 15 per cent Cyber Monday revenue increase for ecommerce websites Ecommerce loses immunity to economy woes |
Excalibur Cutlery Experiences Huge Sales Boost Using e-Commerce ... The Open Press (press release) - Jersey City, NJ (OPENPRESS) December 5, 2008 -- Comodo's eCommerce Accelerator Kit has helped Excalibur Cutlery reach new peaks in online sales. ... |
Acumium Acquires Search-Friendly GravityMarket Ecommerce Platform MarketWatch - "We are happy to add GravityMarket to our suite of ecommerce and content management solutions," said Costello. "GravityMarket complements our own expertise ... Acumium to Unveil Latest CMS Platform at Gilbane Conference |
On-Demand Service helps eCommerce-enable trading partners. ThomasNet Industrial News Room, NY - Frequently, less than 20 percent of companies participating in trading partner networks are B2B e-commerce-enabled, while the remaining 80 percent use a ... |
Ritz Interactive Named to Internet Retailer's 2009 Hot 100 Best ... MarketWatch - Ritz Interactive is an award-winning, specialty online retailer and e-commerce service provider that operates a network of websites offering high quality, ... |
Majestic Consulting Announces CRM 'E-Commerce' Product TMCnet - By David Sims, TMCnet Contributing Editor Majestic Consulting Group has announced an e-commerce product described that is customizable to accommodate simple ... |
Twittering Ecommerce Holiday-Shopping Glitches AuctionBytes Blog, MA - StorefrontBacktalk.com is monitoring ecommerce sites and offering consumers real-time updates via Twitter on which retail sites are up this holiday season, ... |
Infopia Announces Record Cyber Monday for Merchants MarketWatch - Infopia, the leading SaaS eCommerce platform provider, announced today that its year over year Cyber Monday revenues for SMB merchants using the new ... |
![]() Practical Ecommerce (subscription) | Cart of the Week: Volusion Practical Ecommerce (subscription), Grand Junction - Practical eCommerce counts over 300 different shopping cart platforms. In this, our “Cart Of The Week” feature, we’ll profile—but not evaluate—a specific ... |
eCommerce Merchants Announces Strategic Partnership with ... PR-CANADA.net (press release), Montenegro - Cresta Pillsbury, Managing Partner for eCommerce Merchants says, "You just can't help but get excited about WatchCount's service. We are happy to have Watch ... |
Resources
-
Cheap Reseller hosting cpanel paypal budget web hosting website hosting web site domain business per
search cheap hosting php mysql web frontpage budget web hosting website hosting web site business personal hobby Ecommerce web design web domain adsl image web host reseller hosting cheap website hosting email hosting
-
1MerchantCart - The All-in-One Merchant Shopping Cart and Affiliate Processing Software - Ecommerce
The All-in-One Merchant Shopping Cart and Affiliate Processing Software.
-
aWeb Online Advertising and Webmaster Tools
All internet promotion, website marketing, Ecommerce and webmaster

