Five Ways to Reduce Abandoned Carts This Raya

Picture this: a customer discovers an online store selling baju kurungs. After browsing through the catalogue, she settles on one she loves and adds it to cart. Upon proceeding to checkout, however, due to a complicated payment process with confusing hidden fees, limited payment options and multiple site crashes, she ultimately gives up and decides to visit a different website.

This scenario—which is more common than you think—results in not just lost sales, but also a loss in confidence. A customer who abandons their cart is less likely to return to make a purchase from your store in the future.

So, how can you avoid this?

We’ve put together a list of five solutions that address fundamental pain points for your customers. By implementing these changes, you’re sure to see a decrease in abandoned carts and a boost in sales!

1. Display transparent pricing throughout the payment process.

2. Provide multiple payment options for greater flexibility.

3. Simplify and speed up the transaction process.

4. Guarantee site security by protecting sensitive information.

5. Optimise site performance for a smoother experience.

1. Display transparent pricing throughout the payment process.

As consumers, we like to make informed decisions on our purchases. Thus, having fees, taxes or hidden costs pop up after proceeding to checkout will leave customers with a bad taste in their mouths. In fact, one study shows nearly 50% of abandoned carts are due to extra costs being too high.

To fix this, any prices you display should already include as many costs as possible, including SST, approximate shipping fees, and any other potential charges. Additionally, providing discounts or subsidised shipping for certain order limits can also lower the final price displayed on the checkout page, encouraging larger purchases from your customers!

2. Provide multiple payment options for greater flexibility.

No matter how attractive the price on your baju melayu is, it wouldn’t matter if the customer cannot pay for it the way they want to. This is especially true for social sellers who primarily take payments through bank transfers or QR payments.

With a payment gateway solution that allows you to provide payment methods like credit or debit cards, e-wallets, or buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) payments, you drastically increase the chances of customers proceeding with their purchases. You can also take orders from buyers quickly and efficiently with payment forms, allowing them to make payments conveniently from anywhere.

3. Simplify and speed up the transaction process.

According to the same research above, the second highest contributing factor to customers abandoning carts—at 26%—is that the site needed them to create an account to checkout. Along the same tangent, 22% of customers also complained of a checkout process that was too long or complicated.

There are two steps you can take to address this. First, allowing guest checkouts means customers no longer have to create an account to make a purchase. Second, only requiring mandatory fields like shipping and payment information would shorten the payment process. These two changes can streamline the customer's payment experience, taking them from checkout to payment in as little time as possible.

4. Guarantee site security by protecting sensitive information.

Understandably, with online scams and hackers becoming more frequent, many people take their financial security seriously. As such, if they feel that their information might be compromised through a purchase from your website, they may not go through with their order.

Your customers would feel more at ease if their financial and personal data was secured through tokenisation and globally-recognised security certifications. Financial bodies such as Visa, Mastercard, Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM), and PayNet facilitate payment providers with stringent criteria to ensure sensitive financial and personal information is kept secure.

Thus, selecting a payment provider with certifications from these organisations would make your customers feel much more confident with putting their money down for the kain samping that they're buying.

5. Optimise site performance for a smoother experience.

They say that first impressions are the most important. That's why when someone encounters multiple errors, bugs and crashes on your website, they are less likely to want to make a purchase from you.

Frequent testing of your website is crucial in maintaining a bug-free experience for your customers. Depending on your hosting platform, there may already be built-in tools designed to catch and address these errors. If not, there are plenty of free or paid optimisation options as well. Be sure to also update your website's SEO tags, keywords and meta descriptions regularly to ensure customers can search for your website in the first place.

Another often neglected aspect of website management is load speeds. Compressing images, reducing redirects and caching web pages lead to faster load speeds, reducing the time a customer spends waiting and more time for them to browse your Raya collection.

This isn't an exhaustive list of what you can do to improve your online sales. However, by implementing these changes, you will see a noticeable reduction in abandoned carts.

With a reasonable pricing display, seamless payment process and clean website layout, not only will you attract more customers, but those customers will also be more likely to recommend your website—and subsequently, your products—to their friends and family.

By choosing senangPay as your payment gateway provider, we promise a speedy integration for you to capitalise on the final Raya sales rush, leading to a prosperous Raya for your customers and you! Get in touch with us to cash in on this peak period now.