Is Your Shopping Cart Killing Your Sales?

Imagine you are in a physical store. You've just put an item into your cart. As you do so, a store clerk comes along and grips your head with his hands and turns your head so that you are forced to stare at your cart.

"Look in your cart. See what you've bought? So far, you've bought one container of sour cream."

You murmur in agreement, amazed that this is happening.

He releases his hands from your face, takes your cart from you, wheels it to the front entrance of the store, and walks away. You are offended, but you still need to keep shopping, so you take your cart from the front of the store and go to the produce department. You put another item in your shopping cart.

Almost like magic, there's that clerk again. He grabs your hand with his hands again, forces you to look inside your cart, and says, "OK. So now you have one container of sour cream, and one cantaloupe."

Then he wrestles your cart from you - again - and wheels it to the front of the store.

Well, that's just too much. You walk right past your cart, and out of the store. Too weird. Too irritating. You get in your car and start driving to a different store.

What I've just described is common practice on the web. It's crazy! If you're doing it, it's costing you business.

Instead, what should happen on your website is exactly what should happen in a real store.

Once something goes into the cart, the shopper doesn't need to pay any attention to the cart. The shopper is allowed to simply keep shopping - until it's time to check out. Yes, the cart is right there, and the shopper can check the contents of the cart at any time ("Did I remember to get eggs? Is there anything else I need?"), but otherwise the cart is just a bit player in the shopping experience.

Today's web shoppers know where the cart resides. It's usually up in the upper right corner of the page - it says "your cart" or "shopping cart" or "shopping bag." The shopper knows she can check there any time, and she knows she can go there to check out when she is done shopping.

She doesn't need to see her cart every time she decides to buy an item! Instead, the item should go into her cart, and she should be allowed to STAY ON THE PAGE she was on, so she can decide where she wants to go next.

At the very least, perhaps she wants to buy that SAME item, only in a different color. Leaving her on that item's page will allow her to do that. It will encourage her to order more from you, in other words.

Forcing her to examine her shopping cart, then sending her back to the beginning of her buying process each time she adds an item is rude - and will literally tire out your buyer. Instead of happily staying in shopping mode and adding more and more items to her cart, she will be painfully aware of how full her cart is getting.

She will decide that buying more items is just too much work.

If you want to make more sales, fire that jerky clerk - and don't make your shopper look at her cart until she chooses to do so.