What’s The Real Cost of Abandoned Carts?

You are shopping online at work for a pair of running shoes. You find the exact pair you have been thinking about buying for a couple of weeks. Deep in thought about the excellent price, you reach for your credit card, failing to notice your boss walking towards your desk. You look up, and in a panic to “X” out of the window, nearly toss your wallet at her. 

As she asks you about the monthly report, you close the fifteen tabs you have open with all of the different running shoes displayed. You’ve just abandoned your cart. (Also, your boss is now worried you’re looking for another job.)

As an e-commerce store every day, you lose sales from cart abandonment. In 2019, the average cart abandonment rate stood at 77.13% globally. Yes, you read that right: 3 out of 4 of your website visitors strongly consider giving you their hard-earned cash before suddenly ghosting you.

Just imagine if you could turn even a small percentage of those abandoned carts into actual customers? Think of all the extra revenue…

Everyone in the e-commerce space knows that abandoned carts are a serious issue, but they are also nothing new. And over time, it’s easy to start to minimize the magnitude of such a constant and ubiquitous challenge. It’s like eating healthy: You know you need to do it, but how bad can that one maple bacon donut be?

We are here to tell you that the associated costs are too big to ignore. To do this, we examine the cost of abandoned carts, why people abandon their shopping carts, cart recovery statistics, and finish by presenting text messages as one weapon in the fight against cart abandonment.

1. The Cost of Abandoned Cart Statistics
2. Why Do People Abandon Shopping Carts?
3. Abandoned Cart Recovery Statistics
4. Recovering Abandoned Carts With SMS

The Cost of Abandoned Cart Statistics

Taking the average abandonment rate of 75%, if you have 6,000 average monthly site visitors, a 4.31% conversion rate, and an average product price of $20, then you are losing out on an estimated $20,688 in monthly revenue. 

If math isn’t your thing, just take a look at these statistics on the cost of abandoned carts:

• Globally, e-commerce merchants lose $4.6 trillion worth of merchandise to abandoned carts.
• British shoppers abandoned online baskets worth almost £30 a month, resulting in more than £18bn in lost sales every year.

Given the staggering numbers, e-commerce cart retention should be a priority for you.

Why Do People Abandon Shopping Carts?

Now that you know just how costly abandoned carts are, you’re likely gearing up to do everything you can to recoup some of that lost revenue. Easy, Tiger! The devil is in the details. First, let’s take a quick look at why people abandon their shopping carts.

Source: SaleCycle

What is clear from the data above is that people are abandoning online purchases due to not being fully ready to purchase (34%) as well as dissatisfaction with shipping costs and options (23%). It’s unavoidable that some shoppers won’t be ready to buy. The buyer’s journey is no longer a linear process, but the key is to provide relevant information and to do what you can to keep your brand top of mind.

In the case of the latter––shipping costs and options––customers are looking for a mixture of speed, convenience, and price. Some shoppers are willing to wait if delivery is free or much cheaper than your competitors.

The two main reasons for cart abandonment are something that we’ll revisit when we get to how to recover abandoned carts.

Abandoned Cart Recovery Statistics

There have been hundreds of studies on cart abandonment. A lot of these studies focus on abandonment rates and the opportunity cost of not transforming these abandoned carts into recovered ones. 

While these studies are useful, you want more information on how to recover shopping carts and make more money. So, let’s see how the data can inform your approach.

1. Timing is Everything

It appears that there is an optimal window when customers are particularly open to receiving abandon cart reminders. Sending a notification 20 to 30 minutes after a website visitor abandons seems to be too soon. Conversely, waiting a day has a devastating impact on conversion rates. 

This study from Rejoiner found that 1 hour appears to be the sweet spot.

Source: Rejoiner

2. Include a Discount For Maximum Impact

According to the data, abandoned cart emails that included a coupon code had an above-average open rate (44.37%) and click-through rate (10.85%). 

3. Reveal How Far Along They Are in the Process

According to a study from UPS, 1 in 5 people said their main reason for basket abandonment was that the checkout process was too long and confusing. (Sometimes it can feel like you’re in the checkout line for quite some time.)

You can fix this by including a progress indicator as people can eventually see the end goal and know what is involved in getting there.

Recover Abandoned Carts With SMS

Text messages are a great way to recover abandoned carts. Especially given that the majority of abandoned carts occur on mobile devices. (We wrote recently that text messaging impacts your mobile sales significantly.)

Source: OptinMonster

Beyond the fact that the majority of e-commerce purchases now happen on cellphones, text messages have a 98% open rate and are usually read within minutes of receiving them. Plus, links and images are easy to include, increasing engagement. Finally, texts are far less likely to get lost or ignored among overcrowded email inboxes. 

You can automate the process of sending cart abandonment texts by connecting your e-commerce store and SimpleTexting. The process is straightforward.

1. A customer abandons their cart
2. You send them a reminder text 1 hour later
3. In the text, you offer a 10% coupon or free shipping, remind them where they are in the checkout process, and gently coax them towards completing the purchase

You can learn more about rescuing abandoned carts using SMS without bugging your customers in this article.

A Problem That Is Too Big to Ignore

With the average abandonment rate at 75%, it’s too big a problem to ignore. Given that the conversion rate for abandoned cart reminders is over 10%, using the example above, you could recoup an extra $2,068 in sales every month. 

Given that you can start sending text messages for as little as $29 a month, we only have one question left: What are you waiting for?