Imagine a customer who came across a marketing piece. Maybe you took a flyer at an in-person event. Maybe you saw an ad on Instagram. Either way, you decide to go ahead and make a purchase from a business. But somewhere along the line, you don’t go ahead with it. Not because you no longer want the products, but because something got in the way. The business that would have made a sale from you has now lost it.
We don’t have to imagine this because it’s happened to virtually everyone who has ever engaged with businesses, especially online. But when you have put time, effort and money into crypto marketing, you don’t want to experience this phenomenon known as checkout friction.
What is Checkout Friction in Crypto Marketing?
So what exactly is checkout friction? Checkout friction refers to the various elements and instances that make it harder or more inconvenient for a customer to check out. When customers find it cumbersome to purchase a product, they might change their minds and not go ahead, which leads to what we call cart abandonment. We all have carts on various websites filled with items we gave up trying to buy, whether we plan to come back later or give up entirely.
This is a major issue for businesses because, as we know, getting a customer’s attention is not necessarily the win. We’re aiming to get them to the finish line: making a purchase. So, we want to avoid checkout friction and cart abandonment as much as possible.
What Causes Checkout Friction?
Before you can prevent checkout friction, identify some common causes.
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Extra Cost
Few things ruin a customer experience like realizing through the checkout process that the item is more expensive than you have planned for. You might think the item costs $100, but once you add shipping, taxes, and other fees, it could be closer to $200. Perhaps the advertisement said the item was $100, but it actually meant the cheapest, smallest option, which almost no one will want to buy.
In reality, what you actually want to buy starts at $250. For some of us, we simply don’t have the money to complete the purchase. In other cases, the annoyance of not getting the full information leads us to abandon our carts.
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Additional Account Creation
If you regularly shop online, you likely have accounts with dozens, if not hundreds, of different businesses. From e-commerce platforms like Amazon that we use regularly to that one shop you bought from one time. For some of us, creating a new account is a cumbersome process we would rather avoid. This gets even more frustrating when a business requires an account before you can buy. Creating an account with a business doesn’t take much time, but most of us find it so annoying we will abandon the product rather than do it.
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Too Many Checkout Steps
A major cause of friction for many customers is having too many checkout steps. Ideally, we want to click on the item, make a payment and have it shipped out to us. But if you have to put the item in a cart, navigate to the cart, go through pages before reaching the payment section, navigate to pages to confirm payment, and then navigate another three pages to confirm the address, we will typically get frustrated. Cart abandonment is common because customers have their card in hand, ready to pay, but cannot bear to take yet another step.
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Poor UX
A poor user experience completely ruins the relationship between a business and the customer and is a leading cause of checkout friction and cart abandonment. If the page keeps glitching, takes too long to load, is too clunky to navigate, especially on mobile, and so on, many of us will choose to return later, sometimes never come out to make the purchase.
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Lack of Flexible Payment Methods
Unless your product is extremely high in demand, cannot be gotten elsewhere, or is an essential item, few customers will be willing to set up a whole new payment method just to buy it. Most customers have a suite of payment methods they are used to, such as their debit/credit card, their digital wallet, and so on. If your site doesn’t accept major payment options, many customers would rather look for the product elsewhere than deal with the hassle.
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Failed Discounts and Promotions
If a customer was looking to buy your product because of an ongoing discount or promotion, not being able to take advantage of it will ruin their enjoyment. Maybe your discount code isn’t working as planned, maybe the discount is actually smaller than you advertised, maybe fees stack up, making the discount negligible. Just like with additional costs, customers can get so annoyed at losing the discount or promotion that they abandon the cart entirely.
How to Avoid Checkout Friction and Cart Abandonment with Crypto Marketing
As you can imagine, billions of dollars are lost globally to cart abandonment caused by checkout friction. Your crypto marketing efforts could reach 100 people interested in buying, and 25 of them might abandon their carts because your process is frustrating. To avoid this loss of potential income, take the following steps:
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Allow For Guest Checkout
Make sure your website is optimized to allow for guest checkout. This means customers can purchase your product without setting up an account. Instead of pushing them to set up an account immediately, give them a great experience that makes them want to shop with you more and eventually create an account.
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Simplify the Process
Before your campaigns go live, do a quick run-through of the purchase process. Ideally, it should take no more than three to four steps for a customer to pay. If possible, allow instant purchase so they don’t change their mind at any point.
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Improve UX
Crypto marketing efforts or not, your UX should be top-notch. Have professionals go through your website and make sure the checkout process is as intuitive as possible. This will reduce cart abandonment and also add you more potential customers.
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Be Careful of Technical Flaws
It goes without saying, but don’t begin promoting a discount code if you haven’t tested it on the back end and you are sure it works. You could sign up on user testing sites or have volunteers within the organization go through the checkout process and make sure that there are no glitches or issues that would turn the customer away. Remember, most customers won’t tell you there is an issue; they will simply not purchase.
Conclusion
Your business has an amazing product or service it wants to share with the world, and your crypto marketing efforts are top-notch. Checkout friction shouldn’t derail that, because it can lead to cart abandonment. We’ve highlighted common reasons customers experience checkout friction and abandon their carts, along with how you can avoid it. If you’d want a full audit of your business practices and how they might need improvement, contact us here at Proleo.io.
