Frictionless payments: easy checkouts are essential in the digital era

It’s 2022—a day and age where we can purchase anything we want from our cell phones (from anywhere in the world), where we expect our deliveries to arrive in less than two days, and where we simply cannot be bothered with having to pull out our wallet in order to type in our 16 digit credit card number (thank you, autofill).

In a world where we expect shopping to be faster and easier than ever before, retailers are rushing to meet their customers with an experience as frictionless as possible. Because, quite frankly, a quick, easy, and safe checkout experience could be the difference between making or losing a sale.

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Let’s talk about abandoned carts

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According to Baymard Institute, 70% of online shopping carts are abandoned. On mobile, this number jumps even higher to an average shopping cart abandonment rate of 86%. Forrester Research estimates that this alone results in a whopping $18B of lost revenue every year. Whew. 

So why is everyone abandoning their cart?

In the study, 24% of US adults said they abandoned their cart because the website wanted them to create an account and 17% said the checkout process was too long or too complicated. 

PayPal research also found that 44% of consumers who are falsely declined never return to that merchant, nor recommend the merchant to others.

This data tells us that friction at checkout is one of the main factors that lead to cart abandonment. It also shows the major impact on whether a first-time customer will become a repeat customer–and whether they’ll recommend a brand to friends.

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What are retailers doing to combat this?

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Mobile Wallets: Digital payments like Apple Pay and Google Pay allow customers to make a payment even if they forgot to bring their wallet.

Browser Autofill: Customers can input their payment details one time into a browser like Google Chrome, then use the autofill feature when checking out online.

Apps: Some retailers store your card details in the app so repeat purchasers can easily buy again.

Buy Now, Pay Later: Allows customers to pay over a set number of installments instead of all at once.

Trusted Payment Integrations: Many retailers offer payment methods that store payment information, like Paypal Checkout and Shop Pay.

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Less friction = more purchases

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Wondering if these implementations are actually improving conversion rates? Well, the proof is in the pudding:

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• Merchants implementing PayPal Checkout are seeing a 28% increase in conversion. 
• According to Klarna, Buy Now, Pay Later increases conversions by 44%.
• PayKickstart found that auto-filling customer’s addresses can boost conversions by as much as 30%

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The magic of Wizard

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If you want to provide a frictionless shopping experience for your customers, look no further than Wizard. Our full-service text commerce solution drives conversion rates 10x higher than web-based e-commerce.

Not only does Wizard take place entirely over SMS—which reduces the immediate friction of having to create an account or download an app—it safely secures customer payment information so they’ll be ready to purchase the moment their cart is full. 

Our platform lets customers skip the web entirely and shop, discover new products, and checkout, all via text. All it takes to complete a purchase is a “YES.”

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