With an increasing percent of people using mobile devices to shop online, it presents new challenges and many opportunities for revenue growth. Mobile commerce (m-commerce) sales are expected to reach $626 billion by 2018. Estimated to be 50% of potential online sales. With Google ranking websites on their mobile-friendliness, merchants need to adapt their websites and checkout process to foster more conversions.
Creating a seamless and user-friendly checkout process will inspire trust at checkout and fuel growth. M-commerce has been gaining popularity, especially with Millennials, due to its convenience. Consumers can now shop where they want and when they want. But m-commerce brings on a whole new set of challenges during the checkout process from security concerns to typing errors. Merchants need to streamline the process including the payment in the simplest, fastest and most convenient way to foster conversions. Here are 4 simple adjustments that can be made to optimize your checkout process for mobile.
When simplifying your process keep 3 questions in mind:
Mobile devices have smaller screens, which impacts the design of the checkout page. By reducing the number of links on your mobile version, customers will be less likely to accidentally exit the checkout. Merchants should simplify their checkout process to only require the most vital fields, allowing the customer to complete the purchase efficiently. A simple plus sign to add items is easy to tap on a touch screen and an alternative to lengthy drop down menus or typing the number of items.
It’s important to remember to remove distractions, not content. Customers still need information regarding terms and conditions, returns or exchanges and shipping details. Instead of displaying all the information in the checkout, provide tabs or keywords customers can click on that display the information on the same page. Again, avoid buttons that open in a new screen or tab.
Mobile shopping is predominantly about convenience and making the process quick and easy. The checkout process should reflect these characteristics. Avoid making customers create or login to an account, will reduce cart abandonment. Instead allow customers to continue as a guest.
Fields that auto-populate are not only convenient but reduce the amount of potential errors that can be made from the smaller screen.
For many consumers, m-commerce has had a slower adoption rate due to security concerns. Entering sensitive information, like a credit card number, on an unsecured network is cause for anxiety.
During the checkout process, provide reminders and visual cues that your cart can be trusted for mobile devices. You can increase trust by using a third party application to verify that your checkout process is secure. SSL certificates or badges from Verisign are a few ways to give customers the confidence that your checkout process is secure.
Now that you have optimized your checkout process, you need to make sure your payment method is optimized. Even with a seamless checkout process, the task of entering credit card information can be tedious.
Alternatives such as Google Wallet, allow you to speed up the process and ease security concerns. Errors can be reduced further as many of these payment methods auto-populate shipping, billing and credit card details with information from previous transactions.
By having an optimized checkout process and payment method, customers will be able to quickly and conveniently checkout. Streamlining your checkout process will help foster conversions and increase your revenue. With the increase in mobile shoppers, merchants must adapt accordingly to tap into the growing m-commerce market.
Is your site mobile friendly? Test your site with Google’s Mobile Friendly Test.
