TORONTO - A new study suggests that Canadians would spend more money online if they had better e-commerce experiences. The survey, Shopping Carts and Shipping Costs conducted by the NFO Cfgroup, found that for every transaction that did take place another was abandon. Despite this abandonment, Canadians spent $2 billion online for the first half of the year.

At 21 per cent, browsing and comparison-shopping were listed as the top reasons for not completing a transaction. The second most popular reason for leaving a transaction was shipping costs, with 17 per cent of respondents giving this reason. Poor web design and privacy issues rounded out the list.

Further highlights of the study included

• 40 per cent of respondents have abandon an online cart at least once in a three month period
• 1.2 abandon transactions each month are made by frequent online shoppers
• 0.9 abandon transactions are conducted by occasional online shoppers per month
• 83 per cent of online Canadian shoppers believe that personal information should be required only when they are completing a purchase

"With six in ten online Canadians believing that the shipping fees they pay are inflated, it would seem that shipping charges are an irritant for a number of online shoppers. Perhaps they believe that e-tailers have lower operating costs than their offline counterparts, and so should be able to absorb shipping fees into the product cost," said David Stark, public affairs director of NFO CFgroup.

When asked about shipping costs 59 per cent of online shoppers believed that e-commerce merchants are inflating shipping and handling prices. Here is how they would like to see the costs broken down

• 31 per cent want them included in the product price.
• 24 per cent want a flat rate
• 24 per cent would like to be charged by weight and dimensions.

To order a copy of the study go to http://www.nfocfgroup.com/.

 

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