Why you need to include social proof in your abandoned cart flows

Guest Author: Kelsey Clutter
Content Marketing Manager, Okendo

Seventy percent of shoppers that add products to their cart don’t make it to the checkout — but that doesn’t mean it’s the end of the story.

Abandoned carts give you a unique opportunity to nurture leads who already know about your brand and products, and have demonstrated high purchase intent.

You’ve done the hard work.

Now, it’s time to re-engage their interest and convince visitors back to your checkout using an abandoned cart (AC) flow.

What is an abandoned cart flows?

An abandoned cart flow is a drip-feed email campaign sent to customers who added products to their shopping cart but didn’t convert. It aims to recover these gone (but not forgotten) customers by:

1. Reminding them about their visit
   Online shoppers visit many websites in their online shopping quest, making it easy for them to forget about yours. An AC flow keeps you fresh in their mind and at the top of their inbox.
2. Reigniting their interests
   An AC email re-sparks the emotions felt when browsing your website by reminding a visitor of the products they loved enough to put in their cart.
3. Overcoming their blockers
   Your abandoning customer left their cart for a reason. An AC email overcomes their purchase blockers and replaces them with motivators instead.
4. Attracting them back
   An AC flow provides customers with an easy way back to their shopping cart and through the checkout.

However, thousands of other online merchants are using abandoned cart emails to win back shoppers, making it harder to stand out amongst competitors.

Sending an abandoned email is just half the battle. The content that you include in your abandoned cart email is what actually grabs the attention of shoppers and persuades them to buy.

The importance of social proof in an abandoned cart flows

Social proof is one of the most effective abandoned cart tactics. It’s known that shoppers who interact with reviews and user-generated content (UGC) convert 4-5x more than those who don’t.

Social proof is the psychological concept that people will follow the actions of others — if a shopper sees that someone else has brought a product, they’re more likely to buy it themselves.

Social proof is especially common when someone is unsure how to act (especially when it comes to purchasing a product they’ve never purchased before). Why?

1. Trust
   Social proof increases trust in your brand and products because other people are vouching for you.
2. FOMO
   Social proof creates a fear of missing out on a product that everyone else is enjoying and benefiting from.
3. Reassurance
   Reviews and UGC provide reassurance on matters such as fit, quality, and other concerns that cause abandonment.
4. Ease
   Positive proof from others provides the brain with a shortcut to purchase, with no need to conduct additional research or consideration.
5. Help
   Including reviews in your abandoned cart emails gives customers everything they need to make an informed decision.

It’s clear to see now that social proof is a powerful weapon in the fight against cart abandonment. So, how do you leverage it effectively to help improve your bottomline?

How to include social proof in your abandoned cart flows

There are three effective tactics for providing customers with the temptation and information they need to return to your website:

1. Star ratings
   Star ratings next to viewed or recommended products are effective because they’re visual, quick to consume, and easily recognizable. If a customer sees a product with a five-star rating, they immediately know it’s good.
2. Review text and snippets
   Customer reviews or snippets are excellent for injecting personality and detail into your social proof, in a way that’s more reassuring than raving about yourself.
3. Review counts
   Sometimes volume speaks louder than words, making review counts incredibly impactful. By showing a customer how many people have taken time to write a glowing review, you immediately spark a herd mentality that shoppers feel compelled to follow.

The new Okendo-Klaviyo integration allows merchants to showcase product ratings and reviews within automated abandoned cart emails sent from Klaviyo.

The integration enables merchants to pull ratings and reviews collected in Okendo, into emails in Klaviyo to match the specific products abandoned.

How do we know these methods work so well?

Just take a look at Nimble Activewear. The brand used the new Okendo-Klaviyo integration to share compelling review snippets in their AC emails and saw instant positive results. They ran A/B testing on abandoned cart emails with and without reviews. Those with the reviews proved to be successful with a 6% increase in click-through rates and a 16% increase in average revenue per recipient.

Conclusion

Social proof is a powerful tactic for your abandoned cart flow, and the new Okendo-Klaviyo integration provides you with an easy way to inject it directly into your emails to recover lost customers.

What’s stopping you?

Learn more about the new Okendo-Klaviyo integration and the benefits it could hold for your store.