Seventy-three percent of UK shoppers have abandoned carts due to inadequate shipping options, a new report has found.
The BigCommerce report also found that 47% of retailers didn’t know what their cart abandonment rate was.
Meanwhile, 35% had stopped shopping with an online retailer because of a bad shipping experience.
However, it also indicated that good shipping options were a powerful motivator of spending; 87% of consumers had added items to their cart in order to receive free shipping. 44% of online shoppers avoid retailers which don’t offer free shipping while 80% have made a purchase from a retailer purely because they offer free shipping.
The report found 12% of retailers offer free shipping for returns while another 5% plan to offer it within the next year.
Mark Adams, vice president and general manager of Europe at BigCommerce, said: “Retailers need to treat shipping as a critical piece of their business – or risk being left behind.
“A brand’s shipping experience can carry as much weight as the marketing or products themselves. Spending the time and money getting to know customers’ shipping expectations might not be at the top of the priority list, but our research shows it holds the potential to deliver repeat shoppers and increased sales.”
The research surveyed 283 online shoppers in the UK and 776 merchants using the BigCommerce platform from the UK, US and Australia.
