I am a frequent builder and user of online carts. The fact is, the more questions you ask, the more likely you are to lose your potential customer before they click the “submit order” button. I have listed items that are surely going to bring down your shopping cart conversion rate and up your abandonment rate:

1. Asking “what Country are you in” (especially those carts that do not offer international shipping)
2. List credit card type (um, simple programming: starts with a 3=Amex 4=Visa 5=Mastercard 6=discover)
3. Having more than 4 steps. Limit them, get them in and out of your cart as quickly as possible!
4. Having a “clear cart” button - why would you want to put this idea in your head
5. Offering too many up-sells - online shoppers are easily distracted (phone ringing, boss asking what they are doing) so don’t confuse them with up-sells until AFTER they submit their previously intended order.
6. Newsletter Options - Don’t freak them out by making them think you are going to spam them, ask this question on the confirmation page
7. Shipping Options - List shipping cost BEFORE the person enters their credit card. Customers want to know the absolute total before they feel comfortable enough to pull out their credit card.
8. Let them know how many steps are left. If on step 3, they don’t know how much longer the process will go, you may lose their attention. Let them know that they are almost done.
9. So long as you have a decent return policy, remind them what the basics are next to each of the submit buttons. Sometimes they just need a little reassurance.
10. Let them know (in big and bold) that your website is as secure as it gets and they have nothing to worry about. I even think going as far as a hacker guarantee is a good move. At the end of the day, your customer is protected by the credit card company, so you wont be holding the bag for much if your site gets hacked.

I could go on and on but I think these 10 are the basics. Always think of your customer as having ADD and paranoid. Solve these two problems and you should have a lower than average shopping card abandonment rate.

It is my belief that all business will take a hit over the next 2 years, but it is in this time that the internet has a unique advantage to accelerate its already predicted growth to take a bigger chunk of market share from traditional business. My top 10 reasons:

1. Gas: ecommerce companies offering free shipping married to people who don’t want to use their precious gas will drive more online sales.
2. Price Comparisons: People are going to take advantage of the ease of use of comparing 50 stores online in minutes versus taking a weekend driving around the city.
3. Advertising Efficiency: Although there will always be a huge place for traditional advertising, with online advertising and a good analytics program, you can see exactly where every dollar goes. This is much more attractive to businesses in a down economy.
4. Less Big Brand Advertisers: Big advertisers will start cutting budgets, leaving plenty of open ad space for a flurry of little guys to come online. Its the little businesses that make up the internet, bring them on!
5. Previous Brand Reluctance: believe it or not, there were many manufacturers that were reluctant to let retailers sell their product online. I would imagine this restriction will dissolve as they are scrambling to find anyway to sell their products. If more retailers can sell more unique brands online, more buyers will come.
6. TV Shows: As brands slow ad spending dollars in the TV DVR world, Television shows will start to become more aggressive in showing their shows online, which opens up all sorts of online ad dollars. Online TV is protected from DVR’s as the site can decide to put controls on. More people watching shows equals more money for ads on those shows.
7. Investment Dollars: As more people go online, more money is made online. As more money is made online, more investment dollars will be thrown at it. The more investment dollars thrown online, the bigger online businesses get. The bigger they get….ah, you know where this is going…
8. Lower overhead: most online retailers’ overhead is significantly lower than traditional brick and mortar retailers. Because of this, prices are lower. If prices are lower, people can buy more things, and spread their dollars over a couple of businesses versus just one. Consumers saving money is a great way for them to spend more. Not only does this point help online, it helps the economy as a whole.
9. Less Taxes: Currently, if you purchase outside your own state, you save your state sales tax. In my case, this is 7.75%. That is a huge savings and enough of a reason for me to go online versus offline. In poor economic times, people will look for anything to save upwards of 7%.
10. Virtual Services: With people wanting to find the best prices on services, they are more likely to find more boutique service with lower overhead online and use that service virtually, versus in person. This will save them a lot of money and get the same talented person. (lawyers, accountants, consultants).