Every ecommerce business knows the pitfalls of the industry — cart abandonment and not having the right data and product features to maximize sales. Cart abandonment refers to the common practice where shoppers put products into their cart, but close the window before the sale is complete.
There are modern platforms like LimeLight which are specifically designed for subscription-based online stores, helping to reduce cart abandonment and drive sales. They also help to direct customers to complementary products that make them happy and value their total purchase.
Continue reading to learn more about what the right ecommerce platform can do for your online business.
Reducing Cart Abandonment Rates
To begin, it’s impossible to eliminate cart abandonment entirely — a study conducted by the Baymard Institute determined that many consumers only use e-commerce websites to compare prices. This kind of shopper was never intent on buying from the store in the first place, so addressing this kind of cart abandonment is a waste of time.
But given that the actual rate of cart abandonment is 70%, the problem needs to be tackled head on. Reasons for abandoned carts often include a checkout process that is too long or complicated. For many online sellers, they’ve been able to resolve this by offering a subscription-based model to make it easier for customers to get the same products monthly without all the work.
The ecommerce platform you use should also be flexible, offering you features to attract new customers and keep existing customers engaged. When you offer a billing model that works best for them, such as subscriptions, one-time purchases, and discounts, it’s much easier to meet the purchasing needs of your customers. Configuring trial periods, setup fees and shopping costs should be easy, so your company can quickly get products into the hands of your target customers.
Cross-Selling and Up-Selling
The attentive retail employee with finely-honed sales instincts is to the brick and mortar store what intelligently leveraging customer data is to the digitally native vertical business. Merely showing your customers different products they may like isn’t enough — for exponential growth, you need to show them products they will like!
Industry leading ecommerce platforms have the best features, tools, and data insights, so your customers see product options for upgrades and complementary products that they truly are likely to buy. Another great feature in an ecommerce platform is to allow for bundling options, so customers can purchase products the way it truly suits them best.
Knowledge is power in business, so expect your ecommerce platform to put all the most important business data at your fingertips with high-level dashboards which work with advanced cohorting and segmentation logic. Such information is vital to help you understand subscriber trends, such as Recurring and Churn Rate.
Visualizations should be powerful but also easy to understand, so you can leverage the data for future subscriber purchasing behavior. Once you know who your customer is and what they want, it’s much easier to give it to them — this is the essence of online sales, and the right platform makes it easy.
A subscription-based business is a perfect way for customers to receive what they need efficiently and inexpensively, and for the company to get reliable sales. Just be careful that your company has the best tools possible to avoid the common pitfalls, like cart abandonment and algorithms that allow you to cross-sell and up-sell to maximize revenue.
