Retailer Web Services Digital Advisor Fall 2017 | Page 6

EASY E-COMMERCE
10 FEATURES YOUR CART
NEEDS TO SUCCEED
A
mazon has trained us well and
today’s consumers expect
every retailer—from big
boxes to local mom-and-pop
stores—to provide easy and secure
online checkout. If your site doesn’t
offer this convenience—or makes the
process uncomfortable in any way—
you risk losing your best business to
competitors who do.
Set your store up for e-commerce
success by following the 10 important
guidelines discussed below.
SAFETY FIRST
Safeguarding consumer information
should be your No. 1 priority. Your
customers trust you with their most
private information. Make sure their
trust is justified by taking these critical
steps to protect their data:
1. Only use Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)
to communicate information. This
establishes an encrypted link between
the web server and the user’s browser
to ensure sensitive information is sent
over a secure, private connection.
2. Comply with the Payment Card
Industry Data Security Standard (PCI
DSS). This ensures all entry, processing,
storage and transmission of sensitive
information is secure. Ask your
e-commerce provider to supply an
Attestation of Compliance to prove they
meet this standard.
3. Encrypt and purge credit card
information. Be sure any credit card
information your site collects and
6
stores is encrypted using PCI-compliant
standards. Fully purge old credit card
information in a timely manner.
4. Carefully control who can see credit
card information. Not everyone that
works on your website should have
access to credit card information
submitted through online orders.
Ensure you can control what each user
can see and keep these permissions
up to date whenever roles change or
employees leave your company.
SOFTWARE, TOO
In addition to these safety measures,
choose software that allows you to
provide a convenient and customized
checkout experience. Look for these
specific capabilities:
5. Confirm credit card information
via Luhn validation. This alleviates
consumer frustration by immediately
indicating if the credit card number
used at checkout is invalid (typos
happen!). It also saves you from wasting
time on orders that don’t include valid
payment information.
saves them aggravation and maximizes
ticket sizes.
8. Auto-complete forms. Your cart
should auto-populate all information
consumers have previously entered,
even if that information was provided
outside of the shopping cart.
9. Out-of-cart pricing. Some vendors
allow certain discounts inside the cart
only. Make sure your site supports
showing a different price outside the
cart versus inside the cart and adds
appropriate verbiage around these
prices to make consumers aware of,
and comfortable with, this variation.
10. Robust and variable distance
restrictions. Some vendors only allow
online transactions within a specific
distance from your physical retail
location. They may not allow items to be
added to a cart without first confirming
the delivery address is within the
accepted distance radius. Make sure
your cart can handle these restrictions
and vary them by brand.
6. Use interactive delivery calculation.
Your cart should allow you to create
rules that automatically vary delivery
fees according to items purchased,
delivery location, total order price and
other important choices made during
checkout. Don’t assume all software providers are
able to provide the secure transactional
cart experience your customers
expect. Use the above list to ask your
e-commerce provider specific questions
and request demonstrations of all the
capabilities you know your business will
require.
7. Prompt for add-ons. Asking
customers to consider adding items
like related accessories, warranties and
complementary products to their order If you already have an online shopping
cart, visit GradeYourCart.com for a quiz
that will help you evaluate your cart’s
current performance.