Understanding the Connection Between Payment Experience and Customer Retention
Want your customers to keep coming back to your store?
Businesses focus on acquiring new customers. All day, every day. But… the payment experience you provide at checkout is critical to whether your customers ever return.
And yet almost every business ignores it.
If your checkout process is annoying or confusing, your customers will leave. Doesn't matter how good your products are or how much money you throw at advertising. A bad payment experience kills customer retention.
The good news is that improving your payment experience is one of the easiest improvements you can make to increase customer retention. Particularly if you operate a business that needs high risk credit card processing, partnering with a dependable company like Limitless Payment Solutions means your customers can enjoy a fast and secure transaction every time they shop.
Read on to find out why.
Checkout & See What You'll Learn:
- Why Payment Experience Directly Correlates To Retention
- How Bad Checkout Processes Ruin Customer Loyalty
- 5x Tips To Immediately Improve Your Payment Experience
- How Trust Influences Repeat Purchases
Your Payment Experience Directly Correlates to Customer Retention
Think back to the last time you had a bad checkout experience online.
Did you go back to that store afterwards? No chance. And neither will your customers. Your payment experience is the last thing a customer sees before finalizing their purchase. It's your chance to build trust and secure the sale.
American Express found that 33% of customers said they would switch to a competitor after just one bad experience.
One. Imagine that you lost a third of your customers tomorrow because they got angry at how your website worked.
Odds are, they'll never come back.
Customers don't care that you had a bad day. They don't care that your website isn't 100% seamless. When things don't work how they expect them to at checkout, customers will lose trust in your brand.
And when trust is broken… it's incredibly hard to earn back.
If your checkout process is complicated, stressful or feels insecure… your customers won't just abandon their order. They'll abandon you.
How Bad Checkout Processes Ruin Customer Loyalty
When a customer has a bad checkout experience, you lose far more than a single sale. You lose a customer for life.
Here are some examples of how bad checkout experiences cause shoppers to run, never to return.
Transaction Failures
It's incredible how many customers are turned away by failed transactions. Whether it's a declined card, a glitch in your payment processor or something as simple as a timeout error… your customers need to feel like they can complete a transaction with you.
Sure they'll try again. But if it happens twice? They're gone forever.
Limited Payment Options
Think your store accepts all forms of payment? Think again.
33% of shoppers were turned away from completing their purchase because their preferred payment method wasn't accepted.
That's right. Over a quarter of customers walked away from your business simply because you were unable to accept their payment method of choice.
Security
Entering your card information into a website is second nature for most people. But your customers need to feel secure doing it on your website.
If your checkout looks old and dated, or lacks security badges and other trust signals… your customers will hesitate. When shoppers hesitate at checkout, they usually abandon their cart.
5x Tips To Immediately Improve Your Payment Experience
Ok, so how do you improve things? What can you do to keep this from happening to your online store?
Here are five simple tips to help you improve your checkout process and keep your customers coming back for more.
Provide More Payment Options
Want to know what's frustrating about buying something from a store only to reach checkout and discover they don't accept your preferred form of payment?
Having to start all over at another store.
Give your customers options. Accept all major credit cards and debit cards. Let folks check out with Apple Pay, Google Pay and PayPal. And if you can, offer "buy now, pay later" services like Afterpay and Zip.
The more payment options you offer, the fewer customers you'll turn away.
Simplify Checkout
Each additional step is another chance to lose a customer. Keep your checkout process as short as possible.
Ideally, your checkout process will take no more than two-three steps. Eliminate any unnecessary form fields. Allow form field auto-complete. And pre-populate returning customers' info so they can checkout in seconds.
Use Trust Signals
Adding trust signals like SSL security badges and payment provider logos isn't just for show. When placed near your payment fields, they help to build trust with your customers. Understanding security protocols is an important part of getting this right.
Make sure you're displaying these on your checkout:
- Payment provider logos (Visa, Mastercard, PayPal)
- SSL security badge
- Money-back guarantee badge
- Your return/refund policy
Reduce checkout friction wherever possible.
Optimize For Mobile
50% of ecommerce transactions come from mobile phones. If your checkout isn't mobile friendly, you are driving customers away.
Buttons should be large enough to easily tap with a finger. Forms should be simple to fill out on a touchscreen. And it better load quickly.
Anything that doesn't work well on mobile is slowly pushing away your customers.
Invest In Solid Payment Processing
If your payment provider is slow, doesn't offer high approval rates or fails to accept the payment methods your customers want… you could be killing your own retention numbers.
Don't fool yourself into thinking your fancy new checkout design will make up for poor payment processing.
How Trust Influences Repeat Purchases
Before wrapping up, let's talk about trust.
Trust is the foundation upon which customer retention is built. Every experience your customer has with you either strengthens that trust or weakens it.
The payment experience is one of the most powerful trust influencers in your customer's journey.
Think about it. When a customer reaches checkout and inputs their card details, they are literally putting their trust in you to handle their financial information.
Give shoppers one ounce of hesitation during this process and you lose their trust. Without trust, you don't get repeat customers.
Smooth. Secure. Fast.
When your checkout meets these three criteria, you are telling your customers that your business is:
- Professional
- Reliable
- Cares about their payment experience
That'll be the feeling they have as they leave your store. A feeling that comes back to you each time they consider where to shop next.
Happy, loyal customers are 5x more likely to make a repeat purchase. And they're 4x more likely to recommend your store to friends. Building brand trust is everything when it comes to keeping shoppers around.
That's retention.
Payment Experience Teaches Your Customers Whether Or Not They Can Trust You
The takeaway here is simple: Your payment experience plays a huge role in whether your customers decide to keep coming back to your store.
Here's the summary:
- How your customers experience payment directly affects their trust in you
- Slow, failed transactions and unexpected limitations cause customers to question your brand
- Streamline your checkout process and accept all forms of payment
- Display security badges and trust signals during checkout
- Don't cheap out on payment processing
Improving your payment experience starts with awareness and is completed with action. The businesses who care about their customers' payment experience will always out retain the ones that don't.
It's really that easy.
