Shopping cart abandonment: Lead nurturing best practices

Shopping cart abandonment is a daily ache in selling software online. It represents a lost sale, unclaimed revenue for the vendor, and an unsatisfied need for the end-user. There are numerous reasons why customers abandon their shopping carts: finding a better deal on a competitor’s website, having been offered a more attractive price, lack of funds on a credit card/bank account, or a bizarre yet frequent reason - dropped internet connection. Due to the two last-mentioned reasons, customers might forfeit the purchase altogether. According to Baymard Institute, roughly 67.75% of orders are abandoned across the e-commerce industry. This means that two out of three orders are left unfinished. A more unpleasant factor is that around 75% of the purchases are discarded for good.

However, by pairing your shopping cart with a skilled Lead Management system, you may simply turn these abandoned carts into leads and later on even recover them by using effective and successive follow-up campaigns. The quality of a follow-up becomes a crucial factor in retrieving the lost sale. So let’s go ahead and focus on the lead collection and follow-up opportunities in this article.

Get hold of your lead.

Our first step is a lead collection. In the absence of a contact address, in our case, an email address, the lead is irretrievable. When a customer arrives to your order page before a distraction occurs, which could make him drop the purchase, they must leave a valid email address. While selling software online, the e-mail address is your only way of reaching customers. That is why it should be one of the first questions asked.

The best solution is when your e-commerce provider offers advanced order page customization, where you can customize order submission fields to match your requirements and create an efficient database. Timing is also crucial; It is vital for your e-commerce provider to transfer all the data to you in real-time so that you can act accordingly and in a timely manner. Features such as IDN (Instant Drop Notification) could be very helpful in this matter.

Let’s skip this and move over to our main topic - follow-ups. After all, quality messaging is the most important element of convincing a lead to become a paying customer.

An effective follow-up email scheme

Many experts recommend a series of planned follow-up emails with about 2-3 messages sent at scheduled intervals. Here is our suggestion for follow-up messages to send on the first, second, and third day after cart abandonment:

Day #1: “Did you encounter a problem at checkout?”, “Need help?”

As mentioned in this article, one of the reasons your customer might abandon the shopping cart is simply due to technical issues. Additionally, they might have gotten confused or concerned for various reasons. You have to be there to assist them and manage their insecurities or technical issues.

Therefore, showing your lead that you provide a high-quality service alongside your worthwhile product is crucial. Show the customer he is important to you and that he is given full attention from the moment he entered your website. This will boost trust in your brand, as well as increase confidence. It will eliminate insecurities and trust issues from your customer's side. Try to arrange your message as a value adds rather than a sales pitch. Include other ways to complete the purchase or seek help, such as telephone numbers or different email addresses.

Don’t forget to send this e-mail from your Customer Care e-mail address, with a signature.

Day #2: “Shopping cart reminder.”

SaleCycle statistics show that almost half (48.1%) of cart abandoners open their “reminder” emails, and a third (33.3%) of clicks leading to purchases are made.

The first 48 hours is the best time for you to act. The longer you wait to re-involve customers, the less likely they will be able to recall the reasons for shopping. Don't forget to display the items in their shopping cart. This will serve as a reminder and may reignite their want/need. To consolidate customers’ motive to buy, an incentive, such as a discount, comes along. Do not forget to offer your assistance again and display the Support Center contact details, in case they didn't read your previous e-mail.

Besides a fast and valuable response, it’s useful to add a deadline. For example, “We have saved your cart untouched, and all of your selected products are there for you whenever you are ready to return. Please note that your cart will expire in X days. Please place your order soon.” I am sure you will find a more creative example to engage your customer :)

Day #3: Offer a better incentive.

Here comes the high point of taming your leads. Follow-up with the best offer a customer could ever get while shopping in your online store. This is a perfect opportunity to include a discount for the abandoned product. The discount will address the lack of funds problem, which causes cart abandonment and give the customer a good incentive to complete the purchase.

Notice how vital it is to bring the urgency factor, which goes along well with the value proposition, to form an efficient call-to-action. Use words such as “Limited Time Offer” or “This offer expires in X days”.

Monitor, test and optimize

Every online digital vendor must continue managing and adapting his shopping cart abandonment email campaigns. A universal recipe just doesn’t exist. The efficiency of your follow-up campaigns depends on variables such as your target audience, the type of product and its monetization scheme, and cost.

Summing up all tips and tricks mentioned in this article, the following conclusion rises: the best way to nurture leads is to constantly monitor, test, and optimize the cart abandonment campaign according to your needs. Try making small and precise arrangements to achieve the best results. Avoid making costly mistakes like failing to achieve global SaaS compliance should you wish to expand internationally. 

Usually, the above-mentioned techniques provide an open rate of 27.3% and a clickthrough rate of 7-10%

These techniques deliver an average of a 12% lift in captured revenue from our tests.

Don't forget to comment below and share your results with us :)

Be creative and stop losing customers.