EDIT: There’s a great conversation in the comments below where Inertia CEO Paul Mabray answers many of my agruments for having a single screen cart. Be sure to check it out.
Tomorrow Next Thursday I’ll be meeting with Dan, an account manager from Inertia Beverage Group to go over their REthink Engine and Wine Trade offerings. Inertia’s ability to manage allocations, wine club, shipping and age verification all from one consistent interface, with only one technical contact if things go wrong, is immensely appealing.
However I’m also trying to convince them to design a better shopping cart for the Capozzi Winery site. They’ve just released information on a new cart that they will be rolling out in August – a 4 screen cart that is really nothing new. They claim that they analyzed the carts of the top 20 e retailers and integrated the best for their version, but as I see it, many newer industry best practices are ignored.
The Single Screen Shopping Cart
For instance, customers value getting the information they want as fast as they can. One of the most important pieces of info that a wine buyer wants to know, ASAP, is the cost of shipping. In the new Inertia cart they have to wait until page 3 to find out. This diminishes goodwill by wasting online buyers time and increases shopping cart abandonment rates.
The situation is similar with taxes. Once I’ve inputted my state information (at any time on the site) , the cart should show me my tax burden immediately. I shouldn’t have to click forward a screen to find what my total purchase cost is then click back to add more items etc.
The solution to situations like these is to create a dynamically updated single-screen cart. When I add an item to the cart, shipping costs, tax (assuming I’ve entered my state already) and total purchase amount is updated immediately. I don’t have to click through multiple pages to find the information I need. It’s no fun.
Marketing Sherpa has shown that early results with single screen carts lower shopping cart abandonment rates substantially (>20%). They call it “still in its infancy” but “very intriguing” and laud a single-screen cart’s ability to “allow shoppers to examine pricing, shipping costs, accessories, etc., all without leaving the shopping pages of a site.” All of this translates into happier shoppers and a lower cart abandonment rate.
From the 2006 Ecommerce Benchmark Guide:
The main ways in which marketers can positively affect abandonment have to do with informing the customer – about the product and the process. Any tactics that give a potential customer a better sense of the product should be coupled with easy-to-use checkout and upfront information about shipping or attendant costs.
Two of the top three reasons for cart abandonment (“The shipping cost was too high” and “I didn’t have time to complete the transaction”) are addressed with a single-screen cart. Checkout can be made quicker and there isn’t a large shipping cost surprise when they click through to the cart. I don’t know why more ecommerce folks aren’t yet using one (corporate skepticism of AJAX?), but I view the situation as a way to differentiate and build our brand. Uncertainty and risk = opportunity.
Dan has mentioned that they might use me as a test case for such a cart, and I say USE ME.
Hopefully he will have good news to report tomorrow on this and other technical fronts (like making my inventory levels syndicatable by RSS!). Cheers!
Paul Mabray
4 years ago
Thanks for the great comments – we are using AJAX and other technologies but made some very conscious efforts about our new cart and its functionality. Most of the new UI is base around 100,000′s of users and how they like to look at the cart and how they view a shopping path. To ensure we get best usability, we have really measured how they like to shop and even done focus groups and many dropped cart analysis. “Running total carts” in the wine industry pose many, many problems and in fact, can deter customers from trying to create a relationship with your winery. We have done 4 years of study and tested three beta carts as well as our running cart from the WineShopper.com days and friends at Amazon.com to get our knowledge. Also, running carts are ineffective for gifts and multiple ship to requests (example: sending wine to two members of your family in two areas of the US). Finally, the “filtration” cart method of choosing your state prior to shopping has inherent problems in presenting an accurate product selection. We will continue to add and enhance to the newest technologies while still taking cues from all of our wineries and thier customers.
As to RSS – WE LOVE IT and our whole architecture and next release completely expose your store (if you choose) to the entire internet. We love wineries broadcasting their information to the web in the most efficient and effective ways.
We very much enjoy your wine, and hope you’ll join our REthink family and if you ever have any questions – please feel free to contact me or Dan anytime.
—Paul Mabray – CEO
Inertia – Powering the Wine Revolution
Josh
4 years ago
Paul,
Thanks for the comments and for explaining your position better! I’m very happy that RSS will be an integral part of your architecture. Many cool possibilities there.
I’m curious: what problems single do screen/running total carts create, and how can they deter customers from building a relationship with the winery? That will certainly be a question I’ll be asking Dan when we meet next.
And while I appreciate that Inertia has done years of studies, single screen carts have only just recently been widely deployed, and any research or testing that doesn’t include one really doesn’t provide evidence for or against the things I argue above.
Again, thanks for the comments and I look forward to continuing the conversation.
Paul Mabray
4 years ago
Again, great comments – we actually tested single screen carts quite frequently (though they have only become mainstream, we have been testing them since our incarnation as well as our close relations with people at Amazon who do not use that technology)
The major issues for carts is false expectations mostly revolving around gifting and mulitple ship to (how can you calculate shipping or if someone can ship to by the first address?) which will be a major component of online wine sales in the next 5 years (gifting that is) and other “calculators” which need to be determined AFTER all the information for the purchase is provided. With the wine industry’s compliance restrictions, varying tax laws (and interpetations of), unusual shipping components, really confuse running carts and do not reflect ACCURATE FINAL pricing until the end thus (again) causing consumer confusion on pricing and customer dissatisfaction. Additionally, most single screen carts do a filtration method BEFORE you have the customers information reducing the ability to capture that potential customer AND distilling your product selection to only what is available in that state. As an example, note the different selections that wine.com presents when choosing a state. From a winery’s point of view, you want ALL products to display in that state, even if they are not available for marketing purposes.
Also if you deter the customer from giving his information by distilling them before they give it to you, you very much eliminate the ability to form some sort of relationship. For example, though you many not ship to UT, you do want to communicate your brand message to UT customers( e.g. f you are at the Sundance Film Film Festival pouring, you want their names to tell them to come and visit). Having them choose their states first, reduces their interest in signing up with you. Hope this helps.
Josh
4 years ago
Paul,
Thanks for the detailed explanation. I hadn’t considered gifting to the extent that you have, and if the various tax laws and compliance regulations prevent accurate final pricing even with a single screen cart, then the benefit of having one goes out the window.
Your arguments make good sense, and given your extensive research on the subject, your Kung Fu is clearly stronger than mine.
Thanks again. I’m looking forward to talking with Dan on Thursday.
pinotblogger: the Capozzi Winery blog » UPDATED American Market for Wine - OIV Day 2
4 years ago
[...] Both Core and Marginal wine drinkers think wine makes a good gift (something Paul at Inertia has been way out in front of – check out his comments here on the subject), that moderate use is good for you and that you can buy good wine without spending a lot. Where they differ is: [...]