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Online Shoppers Aren't Impulsive
Rollie Hawk writes "When it comes to online shoppers, conventional wisdom has long been divided. Some have argued that the instant nature of shopping from home over the Internet leads to quick purchases while others have contended that easy price comparisons on the Web allow buyers to do more research first. For now, it looks like the latter camp is closer to the truth.
According to a press release by ScanAlert, online shoppers are more frugal than many retailers previously thought. According to their testing, 35% take more than 12 hours to make a purchase, 21% take more than three days, and 14% take more than a week. On the average, online shoppers take 19 hours to make a purchase after the initial visit.
This has some important marketing ramifications according to ScanAlert CEO Ken Leonard. "The implication to merchants is that the shopping cart is not just a convenience factor. It must be a comfort zone to shoppers. These results were not expected."
In the press release, Leonard advised online sellers that "consumers abandon shopping carts with an ease that frustrates and often confuses online retailers. Retailers must understand, however, that almost half of all online purchases are from shoppers who leave a site after the first visit, and return -- even days later -- to buy.""
Where can I buy all the press releases from ScanAlert?
Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.
If you're going to wait 3-6 days to get what you ordered then you're not an impusle buyer.
"consumers abandon shopping carts with an ease that frustrates and often confuses online retailers"
Given that online purchases involve a potential purchaser having to evaluate a virtual product, rather than something tangible, how can they be surprised? I'm dumbfounded that online sellers compare an eCart to a real shopping trolley. Are they off theirs?
The reason shoppers take their time buying items online is because they know that a better deal is just a click away! It takes no effort to hop onto a competitor's site or a deal site to see if the same item can be found cheaper. On the other hand buying at a real shop has a lower pain threshold. It becomes very easy to say "why waste gas, time, etc I'll just buy this". Not to mention that its much harder to comparision shop, or read up on what other people think, etc.
The exception here is definetly eBay. By placing time restrictions on when people are able to buy items, particularly hard to find items, sellers are able to trick many buyers into believing they have to buy something.
With other vendors however, there are so many options for where you can buy things that often you have to spend weeks just comparing prices.
to admit that all those online shopping carts aren't being cashed out because they're being used by online hoboes.
my friend in Nigeria, Dr NMBAGO DSUSU assures me i should always proceed quickly with any transactions i make online, the more money the quicker i should proceed.
this article is just FUD to put me off collecting my 25 MILLION DOLLARS
I'm still trying to decide which 3dfx card to get.
I must say, I use the shopping cart at thinkgeek to make it from paycheck to paycheck... I don't have enough money to buy anything, but I pile all sorts of stuff in my shopping cart... then come payday, I purchase everything that I've accumulated over the month, then am flat broke again until next payday... but I made sure to get everything I wanted... now if only they sold food...
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Programming is like sex... Make one mistake and support it the rest of your life.
This makes sense. When I worked at a phone answering job where I took orders, a lot of people would call up ask for information then hang up to order it on line. People use the Internet to order at their convenience rather than at the convenience of the seller.
The reson the shoppers abandon easily is probably because of some popular techniques the online retailers use:
- They force you to add item to cart to see the price.
- After you add item to the cart, they tell you that you have to pay sales tax
- After you add item to cart, you are told that there is a $20 shipping and handling fee, and finally...
- The item is back oredered.
Duh!The impulse buy is this thought process:
"Wow, look at that great deal! Hmm.. I'm here and its a great price, just buy it, save a trip." or "Hmm.. I'm at the store.. what else can I buy that will save me a trip?"
While online, its more like this:
"Wow, look at that great deal! Hmm.. Let me think about it, I can always come back with little effort." <Bookmark URL> <Check deal every 30-60 minutes> "Hmm.. ok I'll buy it."
Online there is no barrier of inconvience to return back to the store, therefore less of an urge to get it NOW!
The study does not seem to address drunken online shopping...
The owls are not what they seem
I find that buying online is less impulsive because you have mountains of research to rely on.
Lets say I see (hmmm we're on Slashdot so I'll use the computer hardware example) a new component for my rig that I absolutely must have. I'll go through many reviews first to make sure it functions, is compatible, is priced correctly, and will be a good buy.
Now lets say I'm at the supermarket deciding between the S&S brand and a gourmet brand of food. No external input for consumption, so its more likely I'll buy the gourmet on the spot.
I'd say from initial liking to final purchase takes me nearly 36 hours.
I know that whenever I hit Amazon, I have something very specific in mind that I'm looking for that I couldn't find at a brick-and-morter. In fact, any time a BM tells me they have to special order it, I hit Amazon. I think a lot of people shop this way.
Its the same for other web. People who search for products on the web are usually looking for something specific. This is, in my opinion, one reason why click through ads don't work. Most clicks I find totally irrelevant. Actually, in 10 years I've never voluntarily followed a banner ad.
Seems I turn to the web more and more these days to find specialty items I know the warehouse BMs won't carry. I buy classical musically exclusively through Amazon because most of the smaller specialty retailers in my city have been put out of business by the WalMart/Costco style mega stores.
A few years back, there were 3 classical music CD shops around. A big megachain opened, and they dedicated an entire floor to classical and lowballed all prices trying to get the volume sale. These 3 independants went under, and shortly after that, the megachain closed down/vented their classical section.
Prolly off topic but it still bugs me.
/\/\icro/\/\uncher
Amazon.com makes it so easy to order stuff that it's dangerous to your credit card. Every once in a while I'll get on there and splurge. No filling out name, address, or credit card details. No logging in at all. They have a nice system.
I did 90% of my Christmas shopping there last year. Take that, parking lots! Take that, crowds of shoppers!
I've abandoned tech book sellers and other smaller online retilers for this very reason. I will put things in my cart on Amazon, and leave them there for weeks or months. I don't always have the discretionary cash to buy all the books and videos that I want, but I like keeping my cart around.
Amazon does this well. If you put a used book in your cart, if that allotment of books goes away, it comes out of your cart. If an item is sold out or discontinued, it comes out of your cart. I would like even more customization, such as email notifications when things get removed from my cart, but it doesn't have that.
This type of E-commerce sophistication should be called the Ebayzinization of the world. We want auctions, we want resale markets, and we want them organized. Companies like Amazon who do this well can create monopolization effects, such as the resale book market. A lot of book sellers hate Amazon, hate the way that they get a bite of a book transaction, on damaged or used books, and don't give them (the sellers) any concession for postage, etc. When you buy a used book from somebody on Amazon, they have nothing to do with it, except to perform a middleman and something of an indemification of the transaction. i.e. if the reseller takes your money and runs, Amazon will work with you to help you get your book.
The key to all of this, is shopping cart power. I want to make wish lists on things I see - and rank them according to what things I would rather have. I can't remember all the things I see that I might like, my brain is not going to remember this, and I don't want to write it down. I want to walk up to a kiosk at a store at Christmas and pull my, and any of my trusted friends shopping carts up, much like wedding registries work. I want to buy a pal something he wants for Christmas, keep who it was anonymous, and be assured that it gets checked off and nobody else gets him the same thing.
This study should serve as a catalyst for even more customization options for major E-retailers. Places like Amazon can market capture places like Crate & Barrel (just picking one from thin air), as the cost and complexity of maintaining that kind of system begins to spiral upward, these type s of places don't want to do it for themselves anymore.
I started out impulsive. Over time I learned more and more, found more resources, found more ways to compare and for me ultimately shopping on-line has become anything BUT impulsive.
There are too many things to consider to allow impulsive buying to dominate:
I suspect the frustration for vendors is akin to the neurosis around "closing the deal", much like a car dealer: "Ken!, That's a Great name....! What do I gotta do to get you to drive off the lot in this car today?" But, that's just not the way it works, or should work for informed buyers. And vendors who get that, win.
Like the article points out, I've many times shelved an item in a shopping cart to come back to it later after more research and a self-confidence in my final decision to buy (Circuit City, et. al., take note: don't cut me off on some arbitrary limit of shopping cart items... it hurts your chances (actually cost you one sale) of the final sale).
Additionally, I've found the on-line info has made me a less impulsive Brick and Mortar shopper. There are some items I refuse (still) to purchase on-line, but that doesn't stop me from using the internet to find out as much as I can about a product before going to the store. And, I've found myself now seeing an interesting item in a Brick and Mortar, and making note of the product name/manufacture and waiting until I've researched it on the internet before buying.
I think in some ways multiple factors are in force. One, shoppers just plain old want to be more informed about their purchase (I know, not ALL shoppers, but more and more). Two, vendors have done little to earn trust (ever try purchasing a tv lately? I couldn't believe the definitions I got from sales people when trying to explain to me: hdtv vs edtv; hdtv 720 vs 1080; hdtv i vs p; sacd vs cd; et. al.). So customers now armed with research capabilities hedge their bets and verify info from multiple sources before entering CC information.
1. Website is broken
2. They just won't tell me shipping costs until it's too late
3. Website hangs, freezes, or something doesn't work with Firefox, or my privacy/security settings.
4. I change my mind.
5. I get scared
6. I lose interest
7. The checkout process just takes way too long
8. They want to "verify" my credit card by calling me.
9. I have to sign an agreement.
10. They need too much personal information.
This is where sites like Amazon that have a "save for later" feature for shopping carts are trumping other sites that only have minimal e-commerce functionality. If a customer isn't ready to buy, but can save an interesting item for easy access later, they will be more likely to come back to that merchant and make the purchase if the price is reasonable. In addition, the convenience of not having to root through the site to find the item again will improve the standing of the site in the eyes of the consumer, causing them to come back the next time they're interested in buying something.
Honestly, it surprises me that online merchants are surprised with how consumers ditch their shopping cart contents so often, in light of the fact that Amazon has had "save for later" functionality for years now, a feature that was probably added when they realized that their customers didn't always place an order right away.
On a side note, I like to keep one or two paperback books in my saved cart on Amazon so that when I order a DVD that's under $25, I can add the book and get free shipping.
Why?
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:)
Because frequently, it's the only way to find out how much something costs! A lot of sites are pretty idiotic about their placement (or not)of their prices, though that's not new or limited to web sites
A second reason is becuse you frequently have to go 90% of the way through the ordering process befiore you can find out what shipping options the company has and what they charge. That'll make or break a lot of deals.
So as long as sites purposely or ignorantly hide the details of their pricing and shipping, I'm sure there will be thousands of people like me that abandon their shopping carts for that particular reason.
I guess a lot of people might think twice when they see the total after shipping and (tax) and decide not to buy as well, It's nice to see a total before you are committed to buying
But for me it's always because of a necessary and annoying fact finding mission that I am forced to go on on a large number of sites.
Contrary to popular belief, coding is not all free blow-jobs and beer. Those things cost MONEY!
How do these numbers compare to in store purchasing habits?
Setting aside the difficulty of measuring these kinds of things, this study doesn't say anything about whether or not online purchasers are more impulsive than brick-mortar purchasers unless there's some sort of actual, quantitative comparison.
That said, anecdotally, I don't doubt that people are less impulsive online. When I go shopping in a physical store, I generally know what I want already and I've already done my research, but I'm much more tempted to buy something on display on a whim. Worse, because of the physical labor involved, I generally don't walk around the mall comparing prices. Online, on the other hand, I'll take weeks making a purchase in order to get the best deal and even though it's really easy to put other things in my basket, I don't find it to be nearly as tempting.
The exception to this is iTunes. There, I'm much more impulsive. "OOoh, 80's song I haven't heard in 20 years... (click)"
Humorless sig goes here.
If I pulled a hundred things off the shelf, but get too frustrated with the lines, I'm going to abandon the cart.
Do you really do this? How much more time do you waste to go back and try again? Seriously if you have already invested even 15 minutes and the wait is 20 minutes (a long wait) and your drive was say 10 minutes, you have already wasted 35-40 minutes and accomplished nothing, only to leave and come back. So, you have wasted at least 80 minutes out of the two trips where if you stayed you could have only wasted 55 minutes and saved yourself nearly a half an hour of frustration.
Which makes more sense?
zosxavius photography
We decide based on the reputation of the seller and look for the lowest price. for example, when I purchased my digital rebel last year, there was some for a really good price at Broadway Photo in New York, but they have they have a Poor rating and I walked away.
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We are already seeing this type of behavior at places like priceline.com and LendingTree.com. As well as the numerous shopping engins already in on the web.
I think that retails thought of the web as the "Home shopping network on steriods" and are having trouble swallowing the idea of the internet as the "Global Mall."
JFMILLER
Strive to make your client happy, not necessarly give them what they ask for
Personally, if I can't determine the exact shipping cost before I give my name and address (and maybe even my credit card number), then I go elsewhere.
If the site sets an over priced shipping cost for each item and just adds the shipping costs together if multiple items are bought (greatly inflating prices from the actual shipping cost), I'm inclined to not buy from them at all, but certainly I will not be buying a lot.
Because buyers do shop, it is extremely helpful for both buyer and seller to have real time inventory information posted on the website and actually show the buyer how many of an item are available. More than once a vendor has lost a complete sale when I saw an item I wanted but waited until I could order some other items also, had put several items in my "cart", and then gone to add the item that I really wanted and that had induced me to buy from them, only to find that it was no longer in stock. Had I been able to see inventory numbers I might have known it was selling out and bought faster, instead I just dropped my entire combined order. Even worse are vendors who you can't tell if the item is in stock or not from an on-line website in this computer age.
The seller who charges actual shipping costs, or even actual shipping costs plus a buck or two for costs like the box, if far more likely to gey my business and repeat business than the seller who looks at shipping as a profit center.
Sellers who play games with shipping costs by greatly varying them for very similar size and weight items (you know who you are, Newegg) actually discourage a lot of sales. Why it costs $2.99 to ship some pcmcia cards, even $1.00 to ship some, but $5 to ship others that are on the same size box and of the same weight makes no sense at all (and even less sense if I want to buy 4 and the shipping jumps to %20).
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Many manufacturers put a Minimum Advertised Price (MAP) into effect. They tell you that you cannot advertise their product below a certian point, if you do, they'll quit selling to you. Well online stores can get around that by not advertising a price, and just having you add it to your cart. After all, they have to give you a price when it's in your cart. Others have a little thing to "get a quote".
Sometimes it's just the stores being stupid, but often they have no choice.
The ability to compare prices and do research quickly is the big thing that stops me from impulse buying. Plus the fact that I don't feel any emotional prodding of the "Well I drove all the way out here so I might as well buy it" sort.
My usual process is this:
1. Check major sites' descriptions and prices (i.e. REI, Amazon, etc)
2. Look up product reviews via Google and review sites (Toms Hardware, etc)
3. Check similar items, if any
4. Check prices via Froogle and Pricewatch
5. Pick some sellers and check shipping costs on their sites
6. Actually buy something
Obviously this is a lot more fussing than I'd do in a brick/mortar store. I might spend weeks or months before I actually buy something.
Pricewise shipping costs are the real killer for many online purchases. When you add in the cost of shipping the savings vs. buying it in a store frequently disappear, especially for something heavy like a monitor.
It is by the juice of the coffee bean that thoughts acquire speed, the teeth acquire stains. The stains become a warning
So you're going to spend an hour filling your cart, and abandon it because you have to wait 10 minutes,
./.
I've abandonded carts even after checkout. In one case, after I wrote the check to get about $10 back, and the clerk snipped, "Writing over is a privilege we reserve for our regular customers." (regular meant having their check cashing card.)
I replied, as I tore up the check, "Selling groceries is a privilege I reserve for stores that let me write over." She didn't quite know how to react . .
hawk