Brands Must Ensure a Seamless Online Customer Experience

Customers have so many shopping options at their disposal and, when it comes to online purchases, brands must ensure a seamless customer experience, according to a new study from Monetate.

According to the Monetate Ecommerce Quarterly report, it’s even more crucial now for brands to stay on top of the online customer shopping experience.

“Only 42% of purchases in the first quarter occurred within the first hour of a shopper’s browsing session,” said Lucinda Duncalfe, President and CEO, Monetate. “This is incredibly important for brands to understand. More than half of shoppers are spending a lot of time in a lot of different places on a lot of different devices before they come back and buy what originally caught their eye. It’s critical then that brands ensure a customer’s shopping experience picks up where it left off, no matter the time or device.”

The report examines traditional ecommerce KPIs such as add-to-cart rate, bounce rate, and conversions, but also delves into two other key areas: Time to Purchase and Device Type.

Having purchase time data for customers can help inform a brand’s retargeting and re-engagement strategies. What’s more, well-timed ad placements, email sends, and push notifications can increase the likelihood of customer engagement.

Monetate offered a breakdown of the key timeframes leading up to purchase, according to data collected in Q1 2016:

Hours 1–7: 9% of all purchases happen in the six hours immediately following a shopper's first visit.
Hours 19–25: 16% of all purchases happen roughly one day after a shopper first visited a site.
Hours 42–48: 5% of all purchases happen nearly two days after a shopper first visited a site.

In reviewing devices used to complete purchases, 90% began their path to purchase on a desktop and 91% completed their purchase on a desktop computer.

Although 75% of all page views occurred on a desktop, the report reveals that the height of the desktop’s popularity comes during work hours (8am–4pm). Outside those hours, desktop remains strong, but mobile devices and tablets account for roughly 40%–45% of page views during commuting hours, early mornings, and late nights.

“The big news here is how differently customers behave when using more than one device to complete a purchase,” Duncalfe added. “There’s a good reason to pay attention to these device figures, especially the first device used in a purchase process. That’s because the first device used is, more often than not, also the device that gets used to complete the purchase. When you understand the broader customer behavior trends including purchase duration, time of day, and device type, you can optimize the shopping experience for each of your customers.”

Monetate’s ecommerce quarterly report analyzes a random sample of more than 7 billion online shopping experiences using same-store data across each calendar quarter.

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