5 payment mistakes that prevent a seamless customer experience

With the pandemic-driven shift toward eCommerce, consumers have become accustomed to convenient, blended shopping experiences between online and offline environments. And businesses spend a lot of money trying to accommodate this shift such as investing in mobile-responsive websites, running marketing promotions, or focusing on superior customer service.

But they often forget one little but important thing: the checkout experience. Customers often struggle to complete their purchases and end up abandoning their shopping carts for one reason or another. The reality is that once customers walk away, they seldom return. In fact, recent research shows that 69.82% is the average documented online shopping cart abandonment rate.

So, what big mistakes do businesses make that lead to lost sales? Here’s how you can spot, and deal with them:

1. Your payment options are limited

Customers are used to paying using their preferred payment method and even in their own currency, no matter where you are selling from. This is why it is essential when setting up your checkout process to choose a payment gateway that can process a variety of payment methods like credit and debit cards, PayPal, cheques, Google and Apple Pay and even Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) options like Zip.

Using a service like TRU Connect, your business can accept secure payments online, in-app, and in person. Moreover, it comes with a feature called Dynamic Currency Conversion (DCC), which gives your customers the option to pay in their local currency both online and in-store.

2. Customers are getting their payment declined all the time

The decline of a credit card is one of the biggest dealbreakers as a reason for customers leaving your website. Often declines can happen because customers enter incomplete or inaccurate information, which can be avoided by simplifying your forms.

If you are offering product or service subscriptions, then card declines can easily be avoided. Mastercard and Visa offer card updater services to automatically update bank account information from credit and debit cards. They are called Visa Account Updater (VAU) and Mastercard Automatic Billing Updater (ABU), and these services ensure that customers with Mastercard and Visa cards get their payments validated quickly.

Make sure that your payments partner integrates with one or both of these providers. Our TRU Account Updater service automatically updates customers’ card details for you when they change. This way, you get paid on time, and your customers enjoy a seamless and uninterrupted service.

3. Your payment processes looks unsafe

The rise of online purchases sparked consumer concerns about fraud and security. Your payment processing needs to be secure, and you should make sure your customers are aware of this. Ensure that your website has an SSL certificate and consider adding Strong Customer Authentication services to your checkout process.

Some payment gateways have advanced risk, fraud and AML detection so that they can detect fraud, cyber threats and fraud attempts in real-time, protecting your business from unwanted guests. You should clearly display any security measures you have in place on your checkout page to give customers peace of mind.

4. Your payments page looks different

What does your checkout page look like? Does it match your website design and branding? Make sure that it does! Consumers want a seamless shopping experience, so if your shopping cart checkout pages don’t look integrated with your main website, they may abandon the transaction.

Hosted payment pages are the way forward and a quick way to fix this problem by using your own website’s look and feel. Everything from just a company logo to full customisation through CSS, HTML and JavaScript can be added to it.

5. Sustainability will be the focus of retail as consumers

By the time customers reach checkout, they have already lost most of their attention. By requiring a new customer to create an account or to sign in before the checkout process begins, you are setting yourself up for shopping cart abandonment.

Use cookies instead of redirects to allow repeat visitors to log in automatically and new visitors to finish their purchase process and have the option to set up an account afterwards.

Alternatively, many payment gateways make use of Open-Banking, which enables customers to use their bank credentials to make payments and place orders without needing to insert payment details over and over again.

Earn a reputation

Done well, a great customer payment experience can set you apart. Consumers today have a multitude of choices across every industry and every purchase decision. One of the best ways to stand out from the competition and ensure your customers keep choosing you and your product is to provide a seamless payments experience.

With all of the above features as standard, our eCommerce payments solution is perfect for your eCommerce store – get in touch with the right experts today to find out how we can help you.