Conversion Rates for eCommerce sites – Industry Stats

What is the eCommerce conversion rate for your site?

Maybe you know the answer. Maybe you think your ecommerce site’s conversion rate is good enough. Or, just maybe, the term conversion rate makes you want to duck and run because you don’t really know what it means or how to make it better.

Before we get into ecommerce industry stats for conversion rates, let’s define the term:

People who convert on your website have taken an action. They’ve purchased something (your #1 goal!), signed up for your email newsletter, created an account, downloaded something or contacted you through your website’s contact form. You find your conversion rate by dividing the total number of conversions by the number of site visitors.

In a previous post (maybe a bit of a rant), we talked about average ecommerce site conversion rates. We explained that the average conversion rate for ecommerce sites is about 2-3%. We also told you that average isn’t your goal.

Your site’s goal is to convert more than the average amount of customers. Your very success depends on it.

We’re going to expand on the statistic mentioned above and highlight some important stats on conversion and ecommerce sites and give you a few tips on how you as an ecommerce site owner or manager can increase your conversions.

Mobile Conversion Stats

Increasingly, your customers are viewing and shopping your website via their mobile phones. It’s important to look at your mobile and desktop conversions separately.

According to Internet Retailer, companies who adopted a mobile-centric philosophy in selling to consumers on the web have reaped great results: 80% sales growth in 2014 or $84 billion in collective sales.

As you can see, it’s vital to pay attention to your mobile growth. The stats on mobile conversions are interesting and varied throughout various markets.

Yet, mobile conversions rates are relatively low compared to average desktop conversions, averaging just around 1% even with mobile-optimized sites. Why? One study suggests that 90% of shoppers switch between devices to complete their shopping experience.

Many of your site’s visitors begin their search on their smartphones, only to later complete the transaction on their desktop, laptop or tablet.

This tells us that lower smartphone conversion rates are perhaps something we shouldn’t worry so much about given that your customers are device hopping to complete their purchase and/or conversion.

Why are conversion rates lower on mobile? Here are a few reasons:

• The purchasing experience on mobile isn’t as user-friendly as on a larger screen because let’s face it, it’s hard to shop on a phone. It’s easier to comparison shop, view reviews and details on a larger screen.
• Network speed makes for a slow shopping experience. As a whole, we don’t have a lot of patience when it comes to load times. Sometimes it’s just faster to use a tablet or desktop to shop.

What can you do to increase mobile conversions? Don’t give up. Mobile traffic is growing every day. Invest the time to find out how your visitors use mobile and how you can create a better user experience for them.

The take-away here, is that yes indeed, your mobile optimized sites are important to your customer’s overall journey to a purchase. If your site isn’t responsive, and your calls to action aren’t prominent on every device, you’ll lose the overall conversion.

Shopping Cart Abandonment Stats

Shopping cart abandonment reaps havoc on your ecommerce site’s conversion statistics. Cart abandonment is when shoppers fill their online shopping carts with your items but then leave before completing their purchase.

According to the Baymard Institute, shopping cart abandonment statistics average 68.54%. One source explains that nearly $4 trillion will be abandoned in shopping carts this year and that more than 60% of it is recoverable by clever retailers.

These are pretty frightening conversion rate stats, but ones that can be overcome with some savvy marketing. You can increase your conversions by streamlining your checkout process.

Think about those mobile users who start shopping only to finish later on a bigger screen. Don’t miss an opportunity when they’re on your mobile site. Encourage them to sign up for an account and make sure your systems allow for saved shopping carts.

Retarget your customers who abandon shopping carts. Send an email shortly after they abandon their cart, and you’ll see an increase in the number of reclaimed carts.

Lastly, make sure you’re using technology to collect and leverage online shopping cart data so you can continue to retarget customers.

Personalized Recommendation Stats

The last ecommerce industry stat we’re going to discuss is the conversion rate for customers who received a personal recommendation encouraging them to complete their purchase.

A study published by Barilliance states that up to 31% of ecommerce site revenues were generated from personalized product recommendations during the last quarter of 2014.

Their study went on to show that visitors who clicked on product recommendations converted at a rate 5.5 times higher than the conversion rate on non-clicking customers. They also found that recommendations above the fold were 1.7 times higher than recommendations found below the fold.

Customers love the personal touch. When you use personalized recommendations on your ecommerce site and place them at various stops in your customers’ online journey, you give them multiple touchpoints leading to a natural bump in your conversion rates.

Take Amazon’s personalized recommendations. They are quite effective. You can follow their lead and use your customers’ behavior to make intelligent calculations about what your future customers might like to purchase.

If we haven’t convinced you to take on product recommendations, consider this staggering statistic…

According to a MyBuys study of more than 100 top Internet retailers, recommending products in the shopping cart based on a user’s purchasing or browsing behavior resulted in a 915% increase in conversion rate.

Conclusion

There are many ecommerce industry stats for conversion rates. It’s important to look deeply into your conversion rates. While looking at the overall rate, take a look at each page of your website or each call to action. Evaluate successes and weaknesses and make a plan to go one step higher.

Conversion Rates Stat Recap

• Average eCommerce conversion rates are 2-3%
• Mobile-centric online retailers overall saw 80% growth in 2014
• Mobile conversion rates are 1% potentially because consumers switch to desktop to finalize purchases (or maybe because of poor mobile experiences on a number of sites)
• 68.54% of shoppers abandon carts
• 60% of $4 trillion in abandoned cart dollars are retrieved by proactive eCommerce companies
• 31% of ecommerce site revenues were generated from personalized product recommendations during the last quarter of 2014
• Visitors that click on product recommendations converted at a rate 5.5 times higher

If you’re ready for some help with your site’s conversion rates, you can count on us. We’ll squeeze more profit out of your website and help you utterly dominate your competition. What’s more, we guarantee results.

Contact us today to increase your conversion rate!

Image: Maria Elena