Listen…Your Money is Falling on the Floor!

Have you ever heard the sound of spare change falling out of your pocket or handbag?

What did you do?

Did you stop your busy journey, search for the source of the sound and then pick up the spare change?

Or, did you just ignore it with the hope that it wasn’t worth more than the deal or goal you’re currently chasing?

Most of us just ignore it because we believe it is not worth as much as the true goal we’re pursuing.

This is a story about how picking up the nickels, dimes and quarters can accelerate your goals and even, possibly, make you rich.

Fair warning though, this story may make you mad. I’m going to show you where you’re losing real sales revenue and you’re not doing anything about it. Yet…

Your E-comm Store Leaks

Your eCommerce store leaks – you know that already.

Statistics say 69% of shoppers abandon their carts – you know your SCA rate, too. This isn’t the leak.

The SCA is higher for luxury or impulse items – if you have those, you know that, too. This isn’t the leak either.

The SCA is even higher for mobile users – you’ve seen this one (and done it) yourself!  And, this isn’t the leak either, but we’re getting real close.

The statistics also say the 22% of the SCA are due to web errors – and these are entirely preventable.

This Is The Leak!

These are not the 404, server crash, “slashdotted” (remember that one??) situations that you may think they are. Almost everyone has their server sizing, scaling and response problems solved already.

These web errors are almost always UI/UX rendering errors.

Like this, while you’re browsing an eComm store on a mobile phone ….

And, to add insult to injury, mobile usage is growing rapidly.  Very rapidly!

Did you ever wonder about the details on Why shoppers abandon?

Or, did you just make the following assumption?

But, that’s just how they shop!

In all fairness, 58% of shoppers say they’ve shop-abandoned a cart in the last three months.

They just left it there with no intention of buying anything.

My wife does that…makes her feel good sometimes…she’s actually hoping for a coupon….

So, let’s reduce the 22% Error Rate on SCA by a little more than half to a more conservative 10% of shoppers who experience an error and abandon.

You’re doing everything you know to do.

– cart emails

– personalization

– Omni-channel (what a great buzzword!)

– maybe some discounting?

And, it’s working!

Your SCA is lower than before, and your remediation efforts are generating additional sales from your “lost opportunities”.

Good job!

And yet, you’re still losing anywhere between 10% and 20% of your SCA due to web errors.

That is the sound of coins falling out of your pocket.

Are you doing anything about these abandons?

Yeah, We Have Omni Channel!

You probably pay quite a bit for your omnichannel personalization capabilities.

And you’re getting maybe 5-7% recovery on abandoned carts?

Sounds expensive, have you calculated the overall return and unit economics on an item basis?

I think we can beat that and here’s how you might be able to make a 1:4 or 1:5 return for every dollar you spend – maybe even more over time.

Is this little corner of the SCA Problem even worth fixing?

Here is some simple math to see if this problem is even worth your time to continue reading.

Are You Losing Pennies or Quarters (or Dollar Bills)?

Let’s do the math and see if there’s any benefit to you. You’ll have to plug in your own numbers.

Feel free to use whatever reporting period works best for you.

Assume you have 10,000 carts @ $100/cart = $1,000,000 Potential Revenue

Then, 6,900 abandon which leaves 3,100 left @ $100/cart = $310,000 Actual Revenue on 10,000 carts.

6,900 carts abandoned and 10% (1/2 the real abandon rate due to shopper specific abandonments) = 690 carts abandoned due to web errors.

690 carts @ $100/cart = $69,000 additional revenue missing due to web errors.

$69,000 is a 22% increase on your current $310,000 revenue.

Is a 22% Revenue Increase Worth Your Time?

Sounds interesting but……

Abandoned carts are not lost revenue, they are lost opportunities.

You don’t even know where those 690 are in the 6,900 total abandoned carts. Or, how to even find them!

And, you can’t get those 690 carts back and can’t prevent them in the future

So, why bother?????

Resignation and Incremental Improvements

This is where resignation sets in.

You’re right.

They are lost opportunities and not lost sales.

I’m not sure I agree with that rationalization. But, if you could do something about them, why wouldn’t you?

After all, the prospects made an effort to come to your site and look at your offerings – they just didn’t buy for some reason – and 10 to 20% of them didn’t buy because they had a preventable web error.

Sounds, to me, like they probably wanted to BUY something.

You’d fix that if you knew what was wrong, right?

But, Why Bother Fixing Them if They’re Gone Already?

Fixing your E-comm web errors ensures you’ll never have that item abandoned again due to a web error!

The real value isn’t the cart recovery – although that can certainly happen. The real value is eliminating that item from web error abandonment in the future.

Systemically improving your eCommerce system to produce higher sales and lower abandonment!

For every item that has a web error, you add a 10-20% lifetime reduction in its abandonment rate!

Lastly, this is a tiny part of a larger problem and you probably can’t even find them if you knew where to look.

Here’s our “Secret Sauce” – you can even try this yourself if you have the time & talent.

Can You Even Find Them?

Web errors aren’t cart abandons, they are item ordering frustrations.

Your customer can’t tell you if they were frustrated or just shopping. You want to help them but don’t know how….

But, you might be able to….

If you knew which items were most prevalent in SCA.

And you knew which items were most profitable.

And you knew which browser your shopper used.

Then, you could quickly pinpoint your most likely culprits!

From those “Most Likely Culprits” you can quickly browser test that item on the same browser your customer used and find your web error abandoned items.

Sounds Good, Doesn’t Work

“You can’t find them like that.”

“I’d still have to fix them, and that’s a problem.”

“How will we know if it even works?”

“Sounds like a small problem and I’ve got more important things to do…”

“Sounds like a bad bet to me.”

And yet, it does work if you have a good strategy.

The Strategy

The Detailed Math

The cost to find SCA web errors is $600/day/Engineer.

An Engineer can evaluate up to 140 items/day so the cost is about $4.25 per item evaluated.

According to the example above, we need to evaluate 690 carts, but only about 50% are from mobile devices, so we actually have 375 carts to evaluate.

Assume these 345 carts have 1 or possibly two items because mobile device users tend to be single item buyers rather than multiple item shoppers.

So, roughly 3 days total to review 345 mobile abandoned carts would cost $1,800.

If statistics hold, 10% web error rate on 345 mobile carts, we should find about 35 items with web errors.

The value of the 35 items with an average cart of $100 results in $3,500 potential revenue. Some may even be recoverable!

Almost guaranteed those items won’t be abandoned in the future due to web errors, so each item’s abandonment rate is reduced by 10-20% for all future months!

You spend $1,800 now, and I’ll give you back $3,500 every month into the future…..

*But Jeff, You Forgot About Fixing The Errors!

You’re right, well, almost.

I didn’t forget, but you’re right that the web errors will need fixing.

But first, it’s worthwhile to know the most common types of errors you might see from our work.

There are other types of errors, but these items make up almost 90% of the errors we typically see.

You have four choices to fix the errors.

At any rate, it shouldn’t cost you much, if anything, out of pocket to fix these errors are most are relatively simple fixes.

Is It Worth It to You?

When you hear coins fall out of your pocket, you don’t know how much it was or if it’s worth it to stop, search, bend over, pick them up and put them in your pocket.

But, you won’t know until you look.

You’ll have to be the judge and plug in your own numbers. But, if you’re even close to the returns I pointed out above, it’s worth it to find out for sure.

Where else are you going to get the opportunity to pay $1,800 one time and get as much as $3,500/month in the future?

Sounds Too Good To Be True

You’re right. It does.

But, you have the advantage of testing it out, continuing it if it works or stop it if it doesn’t.

You’ve made it this far, so I’ll even offer you a money back guarantee.

Here’s how it works.

So, no risk and significant upside.

Are you ready to start picking up your nickels, dimes and quarters?

Contact me and let’s discuss your unique situation.

– Jeff