In the world of e-commerce, every brand works extremely hard to improve conversion rates. The best efforts conversion rate optimization focuses on split testing and refining engagement strategies. You want better conversion rates. According to the most recent VMO ecommerce survey, statistics are indicating that 5 major conversion require attention and improvement across the e-commerce industry. Changing these onsite marketing and engagement tactics will yield better conversion rates and an overall positive shift in revenue. Based on these statistics, here's how to increase the conversion rates of any e-commerce business. (more…)...

68%!! That's the number of visitors to online businesses who don't bother checking out even after spending all the time clicking through. That's a terrifying number. Of all the e-commerce statistics that exist, 68% is probably the most important to keep in mind at all times. With that shocking number ingrained in the minds of any e-commerce site, what are the best solutions to bring that down?   Natural Selection Of the 68% of visitors that actually do shop and drop, there will always be a group of consumers who hesitate before checking out. Accept that as a natural part of any business. Any shopper both online and in-store will peruse, pick and then make a last-minute decision to wait. It's just part of the game. The most common cause of checkout failures occur when online businesses require customers to fill out insanely long forms. In today's day and age, e-commerce checkouts should be seamless not frustrating. Here are 6 avoidable checkout errors to bring the whopping 68% down! Fabulous Forms We've discussed the forms issue recently. It's the probably the main reason customers drop out during the checkout process. Every additional form field means higher potential of mistakes. More mistakes means getting closer to the big 68%. Keep the form fields to the bare minimum and offer guided or responsive fields when possible. Integrate a guided assistant that responds to consumer behaviors and initiates conversation for the fields that yield the biggest challenges. Shipping Secrets? An extremely common checkout error is keeping the shipping costs a secret to consumers until the last possible minute! Really? That kind of information should be obvious and positioned clearly at all times. Forced Accounts Continuing with the form issue is the common problem that e-commerce businesses force potential customers to create an account. Forcing consumers to create an account means unnecessary forms and fields. Forms translates into frustration. Coupon Clipping An extremely frustrating checkout challenge is making customers search for coupon codes. If companies want to reduce that elusive 68%, then focus on the checkout not on the search for the coupon code. Perfecting Payment Many e-commerce sites limit the payment options to the bare minimum. That's probably the most frustrating for a customer. Broadening the horizons of payment options will bring more customers. Engaging Customers As holiday shopping is well underway, the most common challenge is for companies to focus their efforts from a brand perspective and not from the point of view of the customer. Re-imagine every aspect of the site to focus on engaging the customer while minimizing the distractions. Seamless checkouts means more bottom line revenues. Remember 68% is the target metric that can easily be reduced with some simple tweaks and fixes.  ...

  When reviewing the navigation experience on any e-commerce site, the checkout process is arguably the most important section. The checkout page is where most of the money is made. Unfortunately, it is also the place where the most money is lost. In fact, according to Salecycle in Q2 of 2013,alone, sale abandonment rates reached a whopping 75.5%! How can checkout abandonment be improved? There are many methods of improving the checkout process. Integrating an enclosed checkout window can increase customer focus and engage them through the sales funnel. Enclosed checkout means that the page is designed in a manner that takes over the entire site and eliminates the other distractions.  By creating a unique checkout page that is devoid of distractions, customers will pay closer attention to the change of design and will have no alternative option to divert them from completing their purchase. In most enclosed checkout pages, the only way out of actually paying is to click on the logo of the company that takes you back to the homepage. The checkout page is designed to clearly display the items in the cart, payment methods, shipping instructions and a link to continue shopping, offering consumers an opportunity to add more items to their cart. Obviously, once they're in the mindset of buying, that is the ideal moment to promote and offer more products. Look at e-commerce giant Amazon, they offer customers a few items that are re-targeted to encourage consumers to add more products to their carts. Other links that can and should appear on the checkout page are the various policy links (return and shipping policies) contact information, and FAQ's. WHY ENCLOSE THE CHECKOUT? Eliminating alternative links or content, keeps the customer focused on completing the purchase. Removing the distractions allows consumers to concentrate on seeking out the most relevant information during the online purchase. Enclosing the checkout, removes all irrelevant onsite navigation options. A simple design enables the consumer to easily identify what steps remain to complete the purchase. Simplifying the checkout design, increases conversion rate by minimizing consumer options. House of Fraser gets understands the value of a simple enclosed checkout design. Interestingly, they also have added a critical feature on their checkout page. They've added a live chat feature to respond to any last minute concerns. Alternatively, a virtual agent would have also served as a great tool to integrate as a final consumer engagement option. While either customer service related option does offer value, it could be argued that they may be a distraction that could detract from the conversion. Another idea is to incorporate policies to open in a lightbox. This allows the customer to view the desired information without leaving the checkout section. The solution of enclosed checkout is one that has been tested and proven to increase conversions. As with every edit and new addition to an e-commerce site, regular testing and analysis is mandatory. ...