Insights / Checklist / Conversion rate optimisation (CRO)
ChecklistTen checkout fixes to test
Small checkout changes often make a measurable difference. Here are ten fixes worth testing, from showing full costs early to offering guest checkout and cutting fields.
The checkout is where intent turns into revenue, and where it is most often lost. A visitor who has chosen products and clicked to pay has done the hard part. If they leave now, it is usually because the checkout gave them a reason to: an unexpected cost, a demand to create an account, a form that will not accept their address or a payment method they do not use.
The good news is that checkout problems are usually specific and fixable. Small changes often make a measurable difference. The list below sets out ten fixes worth testing. Not all will apply to every business, and none should be assumed to work until tested on your own customers.
Start with the three that matter most
Three issues come up so often that they deserve attention first.
Show the full cost early
Delivery charges, taxes or fees that appear only at the final step are a common cause of abandonment. Customers feel misled and leave to compare elsewhere. Show delivery costs on product pages or in the basket, or offer a delivery estimator based on postcode. If you offer free delivery above a threshold, show how far the basket is from it.
Offer guest checkout
Requiring an account before purchase puts off first-time buyers, who may never return. Let them check out as a guest and offer to create an account after the order is complete, using the details they have already entered. The account becomes a convenience rather than a barrier.
Reduce the fields
Every field is a small effort and a small chance to make a mistake. Remove anything you do not truly need to fulfil the order. Separate billing and delivery addresses only when they differ. Ask for a phone number only if the courier needs it, and say why.
The ten-point checklist
Use this list to audit your checkout on both mobile and desktop. Mark each item as in place, partly in place or missing, and turn the gaps into tests.
- Full cost, including delivery and any fees, is visible before the final step.
- Guest checkout is available, with optional account creation after purchase.
- Only essential fields are requested, and billing address defaults to delivery address.
- Address lookup by postcode is offered, with manual entry as a fallback.
- Payment methods match what customers expect, including card, digital wallets and any popular local options.
- Form errors are shown next to the field, in plain language, as soon as they occur.
- The checkout is designed for mobile first: large tap targets, correct keyboards and no sideways scrolling.
- Delivery options and dates are clear, with the cheapest and fastest options easy to compare.
- Reassurance is visible at the point of payment: returns policy, security and contact details.
- Distractions such as navigation menus and promotional banners are removed from checkout pages.
How to test properly
Change one thing at a time where you can, so you know what caused any improvement. Where traffic allows, run an A/B test, splitting visitors between the current and the changed checkout. Judge results on completed orders and revenue, not on progression through a single step, because a change can move abandonment to a later page rather than remove it.
Run tests for full weeks, to cover weekday and weekend behaviour, and for long enough to reach a reliable result. Avoid launching tests during major promotions, which change customer behaviour. Smaller sites without the traffic for formal tests can make changes one at a time and compare carefully against the same period beforehand.
Watch real customers
Before testing anything, watch five customers try to buy from you on their own phones. It takes an afternoon and almost always reveals at least one problem that analytics alone would have missed.
Where to go from here
Work through the checklist this week with someone from ecommerce and someone from technology, on a real phone. Pick the two or three gaps with the strongest evidence behind them, usually unexpected costs, forced accounts or long forms, and test those first. Keep a simple log of each test, its result and what you learned, so improvements build on each other rather than being repeated.
Source: Intelliversal analysis.
