To help startups across Europe fuel and enhance their ecommerce checkout flows, Stripe launched a state of European checkouts report in partnership with Edgar, Dunn & Company in September 2021.
The data revealed that 9 out of 10 lost sales in Europe fail on the checkout page. In fact, 94% of the top 800 ecommerce websites across Europe make at least five basic checkout errors.
Stripe recently hosted a 30-minute webinar to share the findings from the report featuring the most common checkout errors, and how to fix them. Leaders from three high-growth European startups—Patch Plants, Buymie, and Butternut Box—joined a fireside chat where they discussed how to deliver the best checkout experience.
They outlined four key ways to build a high-performing checkout: intelligent form design, mobile optimisation, localisation, and ensuring buyer trust and security.
Intelligent checkout form design
Stripe found that automating elements of the checkout makes a massive difference to a successful checkout experience. Its recent research showed that a staggering 61% of European checkouts don’t support autocomplete, and 75% of websites don’t let consumers save their information.
Stripe recommends including auto-complete on checkout forms as a simple way to increase conversions on your site. The COO of Patch Plants highlighted how intelligent form design has massively improved their business:
“Auto-populating delivery addresses was one of the first things we experimented with in our checkout. We’ve seen significant conversion improvements as a result, and it adds a huge degree of seamlessness to our customer experience.”
Checkouts need to be fully mobile-optimised
When up to 50% of ecommerce sales come from smartphones, it’s a no-brainer that checkouts should be fully mobile-optimised for consumers. However, Stripe found that carts on mobile devices are twice as likely to be abandoned than on a desktop.
Stripe recommends adding mobile wallets, such as Apple Pay and Google Pay, as payment options in the checkout. This creates the opportunity for businesses to offer a one-click payment experience that, on average, is three times faster than having to manually enter payment details.
Localise the checkout
Localising your checkout is extremely important when selling into different markets. It must feel familiar to the consumer’s everyday shopping and checkout experiences. Stripe recently analysed the impact of accepting popular European payment methods in Austria, Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, and Poland. By enabling local payment methods, businesses saw a 40% incremental increase in sales and transaction fees were reduced by 0.4 percentage points, which drove further revenue growth.
Failure to automatically surface key local payment methods can be a major missed opportunity.
Win over trust
Stripe found that buyer security is one of the biggest influential factors to a consumer’s checkout experience; it can truly make or break the transaction. A checkout with too many security steps is off-putting, while not having enough leaves a site feeling illegitimate and could deter consumers from completing a purchase.
The general consensus from the panelists was that in order to find a balance, you have to lead with open communication, transparency, and progressively disclose security details so consumers don’t feel overwhelmed.
The stakes are higher than ever before
Consumer expectations have changed, and creating a seamless checkout experience is more important than ever. With ecommerce booming, there’s never been a better time for startups to focus on their checkout experience to drive incremental growth.
Check out Stripe’s webinar and learn how to optimise your own checkout flow.
