Analysis of the Checkout Issues in Online Surfing Store
Internet business is very demanding in terms of visibility and time that it takes to navigate the website and finalize the purchase. The focus of this analysis is an online surfing store that is trying to understand the reasons why larger percentage of its customers abandons the purchase at the checkout. To have better insight in possible drivers behind customers´ behavior it is important to outline core characteristics of online sales of such product as surf board. The question that I am trying to discuss here is not only what the actual reasons are, but how these issues can be addressed by the company and turned into advantage (Shy and Murthy, 2003, pp.186-190).
What is the difference between online and physical sales locations? The answer lies on the surface – tangibility and visibility of the product. Surfing is very personal sport that often, according to its practitioners, creates special relationships between an individual and the board. With that, one could imagine the complexity of the purchase habits that some of the customers may have. The advantage of the physical store is the possibility to test the quality and “measure” the product before buying it. This immediate contact is often, critical to the customers. Advantage of an online surfing store is always the price and often product range, as online stores have more flexibility in terms of product storage.
With the above in mind, what makes customers give up, once they went through the main stages of the online shopping experience? There are numbers of reasons for that can cause incomplete purchase. First of all, not user-friendly store layout on the checkout results in bugs and slow response. Secondly, checkout is always about the decision on the payment options and customers that cannot find the mode of payment that is usual and easy for them will give up the purchase at this point. Third, but not the least important, is the security of the payment and information privacy. If the website does not explicitly promote security settings and options, customers become more reluctant to finalize the purchase. All the above reasons become more obvious, when an online store offers significant price advantage over the physical location. One could wonder why? The answer to this question is in the price-sensitive consumer´s mentality that makes website visitors more risk-adverse, when they see an offer that is “too good to be true”. Often this risk-adverse behavior prevents them from the final stage, where personal financial information has to be provided.
Finally, the question that we have to ask ourselves is what has actually changed over the last days or weeks when the incomplete on checkout purchase statistics started to worsen? It is important to understand that actions and changes that the company could have potentially implemented to the website layout or procedures could be the direct cause of the issue. Based on this route-cause analysis it would be possible to establish more probably reasons for the negative trend and take necessary actions for recovery (Gay et al, 2007).
Thinking about the possible solutions to the existing issue, it is possible to recommend a number of measures. All of them, should, however, be a part of the solution that will benefit the customers. With this in mind action plan to resolve the problem could be a three-step approach. First of all, send out a survey to the online store mailing list with brief survey targeting the answers for the existing issues. Secondly, analyze the responses and link them to the website operations. Third and final step – implement the solutions and communicate the changes to the customers. Such actions are always interesting to be transparent for the customers. In other terms, every change made to improve the service could promote the website and increase its reliability in the customers’ eyes (Schneiderjans and Qing, 2002, pp.9-14). With that in mind, the online surfing store could benefit from sending updates about the changes made and benefits that it brings to the users in a form of a newsletter or sms, should this service be available through the website.
References
Shy, N. and Murthy V.K. (2003) ‘Architectural issues of Web-enabled electronic business’, Hershey: Idea Group. Print.
Schneiderjans, M. and Qing, C. (2002). ‘E-commerce Operations Management.’ London: World Scientific Publishing Co. Print.
Gay, R., Charlesworth, A., and Esen, R. (2007). ‘Online Marketing. A Customer-led Approach.’ Oxford: Oxford University Press.Print.
