How to Reduce Cart Abandonment (Without Discounting)

If you’re an online retailer, chances are:

• You’re experiencing cart abandonment;
• You’ve googled how to reduce it; and
• You’ve read that you need to offer a discount at checkout.

While that’s not bad advice, it’s not always viable, especially if:

• Your margins are tight;
• You’re offering discounts elsewhere; or
• You can’t afford to offer free shipping.

The good news is, there’s another way to combat cart abandonment… without offering a discount… or free shipping.

And in this recipe, I’ll show you how, step-by-step.

Step 1. Create a Giveaway

For this strategy to work, you’ll need to run a giveaway.

If you’re unfamiliar, a giveaway involves asking a visitor for their email—usually through a website popup—and entering them into a contest. 

The prize, if you’re an online retailer, is often a free product such as a bottle of wine, a mystery box, or, as seen in the below example, a coffee maker.

To create a giveaway campaign, click the campaign below:

Step 2: Customize to Your Preference

Once you know what you’re offering as a prize, you need to add an image to your campaign. (Note: we’ve found that adding an image increases conversions.)

To do that, click the image of the coffee maker and click “Change Image” and upload an image of the product.

Then, resize, if necessary, and click “Save.”

Next, update the campaign’s copy to match something like the one below, and proceed to “Display Settings.”

Note: If you want to customize your Success Step—what visitors see after entering their email—you can do that by clicking “Next Step” and editing the existing copy.

Step 3: Choose Where to Show Your Campaign

You want to ensure that your campaign:

1. Shows at a checkout step; and
2. Has an exit-intent trigger.

To make the changes, go to “Triggers” and select “Exit-Intent”:

Then, move to “Page-Level Targeting,” choose “URL Contains,” and add “checkout”:

Save your campaign and that’s it!

You now have a live giveaway that will turn abandoning visitors into email subscribers.

When the giveaway ends, notify the winner and ask for their address so you can send them their prize.