Laura’s website data shows that visitors place items in their shopping carts but fail to complete the purchase. What should Laura do first to up her conversion rate?
Correct Answer
Make sure her checkout page is live and that purchases can be completed.
Key takeaways
Rule out a broken or failing checkout before anything else.
Basket abandonment concentrated at the final step points at mechanics, not motivation.
Discounts and remarketing treat the symptom and cost money if the cause is technical.
Why is this the correct answer?
When people reach the basket and then stop, the first thing to rule out is that they cannot complete the purchase at all. A checkout page that is broken, erroring, or failing on mobile produces exactly this pattern, and no amount of discounting or rebranding will fix a payment step that does not work. Check the mechanics first, because the cheapest explanation is also the most common one, and only move on to incentives and remarketing once you know the path actually functions.
Why are the other options wrong?
Test a new brand identity and color scheme.
Rebranding is a large, slow change aimed at perception. It does not address a drop-off concentrated at the final step.
Offer discounts to keep consumers from making their purchases elsewhere.
Discounting may lift conversions, but offering money off a checkout that does not work simply loses margin as well as sales. It is not the first thing to try.
Ask for an email address from visitors so she can reach out with additional marketing.
Collecting emails for follow-up is a reasonable recovery tactic for genuine abandonment, but it treats the symptom and assumes the checkout works.
Frequently asked questions about this topic
How do I check whether my checkout is the problem?
Complete a real purchase yourself on both desktop and a phone, including a payment method customers actually use. Then look at the funnel in your analytics for the step where the drop happens, and check for JavaScript errors or declined payments concentrated on particular devices or browsers.
How much basket abandonment is normal?
A substantial share of baskets are abandoned on any retail site, because people use the basket to compare and save items. The signal to act on is a sudden change in your own rate, or a drop concentrated on one device or one step, rather than the absolute number.
Topics in this question
About the Shopping Ads Certification
The Shopping Ads Certification checks that you can run retail campaigns end to end: product data in Merchant Center, linking it to Google Ads, and choosing between Standard Shopping and Performance Max to drive sales and value.
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