4 Minutes Or Less – What Do Customers Expect During Online Check-Out?

Shopping online offers an ease and convenience coveted by many shoppers yet so many online retailers seem to complicate the checkout process, with small business in particular falling foul of creating this purchase hurdle to a degree that’s off putting.

Constant requests for usernames and passwords, when many are weary of handing over their personal information to create yet another online account can mean lost profits when consumers abandon their basket at checkout.

Findings from Capterra’s 2022 Online Shopping Survey show that efficiency is a high online shopping priority – two-thirds of shoppers expect checkout to be 4 minutes or less, and many (28%) expect it to happen in just two minutes.

Guest checkout comes out top

The survey found that guest checkout is king with 43% of consumers preferring guest checkout, and 72% of this segment still using it even if they have an existing account with the store.

Zach Capers, senior analyst at Capterra explains how small businesses can speed up the checkout process.

“They must focus on speeding customers through the checkout process by simplifying or removing time-consuming steps. Guest checkout is the most popular way to checkout online, primarily because it’s viewed as faster than creating a new account and more convenient than keeping up with another password”.

Curse of cart abandonment

The survey of over 750 frequent online shoppers found that “consumers won’t hesitate to abandon their cart” with more than half (54%) of those surveyed saying they’d abandon their shopping cart if a company asks for too much information, and 82% saying they’d leave if the account registration process is too complicated.

Capers stresses that “in 2022, your goal should be to convert a consumer into a customer as quickly as possible, even if that means sacrificing potential marketing data to make the sale. It’s best to allow customers to check out on their terms by including additional options such as guest checkout and social login”.

Burner emails

Consumers don’t want to share their primary email – interestingly most of the surveyed respondents (75%) use a burner email account for online shopping. Capers explains: “consumers are protecting their primary email when shopping online. For Gen Z specifically, the number jumps to 84%, indicating a trend that all marketers must consider in their email marketing strategies”.

The main takeaway from the report would be – moving forward, not to rely on account registrations to build email lists. Instead, build trust with customers by offering valuable content or incentives to build a list of engaged consumers who are willing to give their real email address and happy to interact with the company.

Other than that, the main task that businesses must focus on is getting their customer from browser to buyer in the fastest way possible.