Yahoo! Stores Unprecedented Opportunity! (Part 2)

Continuing our discussion regarding the new customizable Yahoo! cart:

We want to make sure that you are aware that this feature addition will have the greatest, positive impact on your cart abandonment rate than anything Yahoo! has added in the past! Carrying your brand over to the cart and configuring it to cater to your particular customer demographic is a must-do upgrade that makes perfect sense.

Lowering your cart abandonment rate (when a customer puts something in the cart but leaves without buying it) has been one of the biggest ongoing headaches for store owners.

Abandonment rates are affected by many factors:

• Customers fear moving from a branded cart to a non-branded checkout process. They are not sure if they may be giving their Credit Card information to the right party.
• Customers lack of understanding of what is needed from them to complete their transaction. In some cases the customer demographic dictates that a shorter checkout process is needed because the customer wants ease of use. In other cases, a longer process is needed to create trust.
• Customers need additional information to make the buying decision. If that information—such as a shipping rate estimation or return policies—is not easily found at the beginning of the process, they may leave without completing the transaction.

There are many more factors, of course, than just the three listed above, but most of them deal with trust and making information easy to find. The new checkout process finally allows all of that.

With the holidays just around the corner, this is a perfect opportunity to make it a stellar season! Remember, the keys to making an effective change will be to analyze who you sell to and what you sell. This will then allow you to make a decision on how many pages the check out process should take (less is not always better), which pieces of the store branding you will carry over (links to product pages at checkout is not smart – keep the customer focused on the buy), and how they need to be directed through the process to finalize the order.

Ydesigns.com offers a comprehensive evaluation and cart upgrade package that will help raise the bar for you customers. If you would like for us to help and get your cart ready for the big season, please call: 888-770-8883 x7303 and ask for Leta Miller . She is fantastic and will be able to answer all of your questions regarding our options.

Every Success, 

C. Keith Enloe
VP, Technical Director
Ydesigns.com Inc.