In today’s world, only a foolhardy business owner will ignore e-commerce. Without an online store, you stand the risk of missing out on the billions spent on online purchases.
For those who have an e-commerce store already, maximising sales is necessary. A good tactic for increasing conversions on your e-commerce website is to add an “Add to Cart” button.
What is the “Add to Cart” button and how does it contribute to greater e-commerce sales? Follow along to find out!
What is Meant By the Add to Cart Button?
When buying goods at the mall, you often walk around different aisles, adding products to your shopping cart. Then you head over to the cashier to pay for the goods in your cart before checking out.
Buying products online follows a similar process: buyers navigate the site to select the product they want and pay.
But what if a customer wants to buy more than one product at the same time? How do they keep track of their selections and pay once instead of buying products bit by bit?
The Add to Cart Button!
The Add to Cart button allows customers to add products to a virtual cart before proceeding to pay. With this feature, users can create a list of goods and monitor their selections.
Immediately you click the Add to Cart button for an item, it gets added to your online shopping cart. At intervals, you can choose to go back and view the cart to see the items you selected. You will also see the total price of all the selected items.
Most online shopping carts allow buyers to adjust the selections in their shopping carts. Some items can be removed from the cart or changes made to the selected item’s attribute (color, weight, size, etc.)
You can continue to add more products to the cart until you’re satisfied with your selections. Then you proceed to checkout and make payment for the goods in the cart.
Essentially, the Add to Cart button initiates the online buying process. More importantly, it allows users to pay for multiple items simultaneously.
Why is Add to Cart Important?
In the e-commerce industry, competition is fierce. Every online seller is constantly developing strategies to make shopping easier and provide a better user experience for customers.
The Add to Cart feature increases your e-commerce website’s ease of use. An Add to Cart button makes it easy for visitors to select what they would like to buy. They can quickly add an item to their cart — which frees them up to check out other products — before coming back to it later.
The Add to Cart button also makes it easier to review similar products while shopping online. Once you add products to the cart, you can view them on the same page and compare their price and other attributes.
Now, imagine trying to compare products if the Add to Cart option was non-existent.
You would have to check the first product on one page and go to another page to get details of the other item. A side-by-side comparison would be impossible since the two products are on different pages.
The Add to Cart button is what starts off the buying process. In fact, without the Add to Cart button, customers would be lost on how to order a product from your site.
In this sense, the Add to Cart button is a Call to Action (CTA). The CTA is what tells website visitors to take action — that is, to buy a product. So, the Add to Cart helps convert website visitors into buyers quickly.
The importance of an Add to Cart button cannot be overestimated. By prominently displaying the Add to Cart button on a product page, you subtly nudge customers to complete the next step in the buying journey.
For small business owners, the Add to Cart feature removes the need to spend on building an online store from scratch. They can just integrate an Add to Cart button to the website and turn it into an online shop.
What Is the Difference Between Add to Cart and Buy Now?
To the neophyte, the Add to Cart and Buy Now buttons mean the same thing. After all, don’t they both serve as CTAs urging customers to buy a product?
Well, yes — Add to Cart and Buy Now both induce a customer to buy an item. However, there are significant differences between the two.
The Buy Now option is used when you’re buying a single product. Clicking the button takes you to the checkout page, allowing you to buy the product immediately.
In contrast, the Add to Cart option allows you to pick multiple items and then pay for them at the same time. This removes the need to pay for each product separately.
But that’s not the only difference.
The Add to Cart and Buy Now have very varying meanings and affect customer behaviour differently.
According to research, “Add to Cart” is great for getting customers to buy because it suggests a lower level of urgency. “Buy Now” may trigger fear of making impulse purchases in the customer and scare them away.
Adding products to the cart doesn’t equal buying, but it gives the consumer more time to think about the purchase. The customer will feel less pressure and find it easier to make up his mind about buying.
Besides, an Add to Cart option often guarantees a higher average order value compared to Buy Now. The latter allows you to buy only one product, while the ATC lets buyers pay for multiple products together.
However, a Buy Now button might have its uses. For instance, the sense of urgency it creates can increase the odds of a customer purchasing the product.
A customer can add a product to his cart and forget it. By the time he sees it again, the desire to buy the product may be gone.
The Buy Now option may also play on feelings of excitement or attraction towards a product. Taking advantage of those feelings is a great way to increase your sales conversions.
We recommend doing some A/B testing with both CTAs and see what works. You can compare the conversions recorded when either button was used and use the information to make an informed decision.
How is the Add to Cart Rate Calculated?
The Add to Cart rate is an important metric in e-commerce performance. It indicates how well your efforts to turn visitors into buyers are paying off.
The Add to Cart Rate measures the percentage of website visitors who added an item to their cart in a session.
If your ATC rate is low, ie, customers aren’t adding items to carts, it means something is wrong. It could be that your goods are too expensive or the shipping costs are exorbitant.
To calculate the ATC rate you have to add the number of sessions where website visitors added an item to the total number of sessions.
According to research, the average ATC rate is between 9 per cent to 11 per cent. A lower figure means you must find ways to improve the Add to Cart rate of your e-commerce store.
How Do I Add an Add to Cart Button to My Website?
As stated earlier, an Add to Cart button transforms a regular site into a functional e-commerce store. It aids the quick selection and payment for products listed for sale in your store.
Adding an Add to Cart button to your site is easier than you think. In most cases, all you need is to embed the HTML code on any page and edit the attributes of the Add to Cart button (colour, size, positioning, etc.).
Some easy-to-use e-commerce solutions like Wix don’t even require embedding any HTML code. Just use the editor to drag and drop the Add to Cart button on the page where you want it.
Another way of adding an Add to Cart option is the use of plug-ins. For example, Shopify requires users to install a plug-in to set up the Add to Cart button.
The process of adding an Add to Cart option to your online store may be different — depending on the e-commerce software used.
However, you should ensure to assess the ease of integrating an Add to Cart button before choosing a particular e-commerce package to avoid issues.
Conclusion
An Add to Cart button is one of the most effective tools for maximising sales on your e-commerce website. Aside from serving as a strong Call to Action, it simplifies the buying process for customers.
Know what’s even more important than getting an Add to Cart button? Building your online store with an e-commerce solution that promises speed, flexibility, and high-grade security.
Daalder provides an e-commerce solution that utilises the Laravel framework and is fast, safe, and flexible. Are you interested in getting a Laravel-based e-commerce site? Leave us a message!
