👻 Don't Let Abandoned Carts Haunt Your Store This Halloween: Recover Sales with SMS Reminders

As we approach the Halloween season, e-commerce stores are gearing up for increased traffic – and unfortunately, increased cart abandonment. Whether you're dealing with abandoned Stripe checkout sessions or Shopify carts, the challenge remains the same: converting these almost-sales into revenue. Now is the perfect time to implement a powerful cart recovery strategy using SMS reminders just in time for the holiday shopping season.

If you're looking for a simple solution to reach out to customers via SMS to convert abandoned carts, consider matrucart

The Reality of Cart Abandonment

The numbers tell a clear story: the average cart abandonment rate hovers around 70%, meaning you're losing 7 out of 10 potential sales. During busy shopping periods like Halloween and the upcoming holiday season, this can translate to significant lost revenue. Whether customers are comparison shopping, got distracted, or encountered technical issues, these abandoned sessions represent a major opportunity for recovery. Imagine capturing even just a sliver of that %70!

Why SMS is the ideal recovery channel

While email remains a standard choice for cart recovery, SMS messages have proven to be significantly more effective:

• 98% open rates (compared to email's average 20%)

• 90% of messages read within 3 minutes

• 45% response rate for SMS marketing messages

An effective SMS Recovery Strategy

Timing the Recovery Messages

When it comes to cart recovery, timing is everything. There's no one-size fits all ... depending on what you're selling, to whom you're selling, the scheduling will vary. Here's a sample schedule for your SMS reminders:

1. First reminder: 1 hour after abandonment

2. Second reminder: 24 hours after abandonment

3. Final reminder: 48 hours after abandonment (with a special offer/promo code)

Create compelling message bodies

Your recovery messages should be concise, engaging, and compelling. Consider using discount codes to incentivize shopper purchase behaviors. Here are some examples:

Your cart misses you! Complete your purchase now and get free shipping with code FALL2024

Still interested? The items in your cart are selling fast. Secure yours before they sell out...

Special offer: Complete your purchase in the next hour and save 10% with code SAVE10

Best Practices for Maximum Impact

1. Personalization: Include the customer's name and specific items they left behind

2. Urgency: Create FOMO with limited-time offers

3. Clear CTAs: Make it easy to return to their cart with a direct link

4. Mobile optimization: Ensure your checkout process is mobile-friendly

Technical Implementation

Let's say you've decided reaching out to customers via SMS is an effectrive strategy. How do you get started? Do you need to know how to code or not really? Depending on which Storefront you use (Magento, Shopify, Stripe), you will interface differently, but the overall concept remains the same. Identify abandoned carts (either through a webhook or an API Endpoint) and then send the appropriate abandoned cart recovery message.

Step 1: Ensure you have user's permission

certain regions have restrictions around how you can market to users via SMS. Ensure you have the users have opted into receiving SMS messages from your company. In the United States, there are 2 pieces of regulation you should be aware of:

1. The Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA)

2. The Can-Spam Act

Be sure to check region-specific regulations prior to sending SMS!

Step 2: Identify Trigger Event

Stripe Checkout

• Use the checkout.session.expired webhook event to trigger an SMS to the shopper.

• Stripe doesn't collect the phone number of shoppers. You as the merchant will need to ensure that you have the permission to reach out via SMS.

Shopify Storefront

• Use Stripe's Abandoned Cart Endpoint to identify carts and trigger an SMS to the shopper

• Use the buyer_accepts_sms_marketing to identify if the shopper has given permission to you to send SMS Marketing.

Step 3: Send Recovery Message

Sending programatic SMS Messages is super-easy with services like Twilio. Be sure to include the helpful practices mentioned above such as providing a direct link to complete the purchase and incentivizing with a discount code.

Ready to start recovering abandoned carts?

Cart abandonment doesn't have to be a source of lost revenue. By implementing a strategic SMS recovery campaign, you can effectively re-engage customers and convert those abandoned sessions into sales. Be sure to have a strategy to re-engage with every visitor that has potential to become a paying customers.

If you're looking for a dead-simple solution to recover abandoned cart, take a look at matrucart -- an abandoned cart recovery tool which seamlessly plugs into your Shopify Storefront or Stripe Checkout Session. With competitive pricing and a super-simple tool, it's a no-brainer.

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