Guest checkout enhancement - process redesign

It's great that OC has guest checkout

Jared M. Spool, Founder of User Interface Engineering wrote:It's hard to imagine a form that could be simpler: two fields, two buttons, and one link. Yet, it turns out this form was preventing customers from purchasing products from a major e-commerce site, to the tune of $300,000,000 a year....

The form was simple. The fields were Email Address and Password. The buttons were Login and Register. The link was Forgot Password. It was the login form for the site. ...

(first-time shoppers) did mind registering...As one shopper told us, "I'm not here to enter into a relationship. I just want to buy something."

The designers fixed the problem simply. They took away the Register button. In its place, they put a Continue button with a simple message: "You do not need to create an account to make purchases on our site. Simply click Continue to proceed to checkout. To make your future purchases even faster, you can create an account during checkout."

However, the current implementation leaves a lot to be desired.

Ideally, there would be no register option. There would only be 2 blocks - login and checkout.

In the checkout process, at the very end, the guest shall have the option of providing a password (or if the shop admin hasn't permitted guest checkout, then providing a password shall be required)...at this point benefits of providing a password to create an account shall be articulated:
e.g. Addresses saved (save time)
Loyalty programs (save money)
Carts saved (save time)
Order tracking (control and reliability)
etc

It may seem either
a. a tiny thing for me to crib about
b. too much work to re-do the checkout workflow

However, in the real world it has a big impact...when the customer is at the shop, all he wants to do is buy....if a new customer when trying to check out sees the register button, he is highly likely to abandon the cart. On the other hand, if at the end of the checkout process the customer is asked if he wants to create an account and the only difference is to either provide or not provide password, he is much more malleable and likely to sign up for an account.

Jared Spool agrees. Check out the $300M button article.

Jared M. Spool, Founder of User Interface Engineering wrote:The results: The number of customers purchasing went up by 45%. The extra purchases resulted in an extra $15 million the first month. For the first year, the site saw an additional $300,000,000.

It's no secret that the checkout process needs an overhaul. The powers that be I am sure have it jotted down. As annoying as you have been in the past 24 hours with your thousands of posts about how to improve Open Cart you do raise "some" good points lol. Many, including myself modify the framework to how we need it but you are correct not everyone has programming skills nor has the money to hire. Good day.

I think your concerns are addressed by this extension:

http://www.opencart.com/index.php?route ... on_id=4952

Interesting.

It's so basic and important that this is how it should be in the core. We should do it right the first time.

I agree that a simple checkout option is essential.

But who really knows how buyers behave?

Digmen1 wrote:But who really knows how buyers behave?

UX experts who actually run experiements, measure metrics and do clickstream analysis

Jared Spool is one of them. Check this out http://forum.opencart.com/viewtopic.php?f=20&t=68217

Q has an extension http://www.opencart.com/index.php?route ... on_id=6683

This is how the OC core checkout process should be to begin with!!

One step checkout is pretty popular but it still lacks important settings like the ability to pick and choose which steps to ignore if you don't need all of the steps. I am making an extension that will do all of this.

avvici wrote:One step checkout is pretty popular

Right, but in the OP I was talking about something else. In Q's extension, I find something else great. It's the customer-focused flow, especially login or checkout instead of login or register. Check this out: http://www.uie.com/articles/three_hund_million_button/

avvici wrote:it still lacks important settings like the ability to pick and choose which steps to ignore if you don't need all of the steps.

Yeah, surprising that even such products as (WP plugin) TheCartPress have a workflow editor but such a cool product like OpenCart doesn't.

avvici wrote:I am making an extension that will do all of this.

Good luck! Would be cool, I think.

OC2PS wrote:

avvici wrote:One step checkout is pretty popular

Right, but in the OP I was talking about something else. In Q's extension, I find something else great. It's the customer-focused flow, especially login or checkout instead of login or register. Check this out: http://www.uie.com/articles/three_hund_million_button/

avvici wrote:it still lacks important settings like the ability to pick and choose which steps to ignore if you don't need all of the steps.

Yeah, surprising that even such products as (WP plugin) TheCartPress have a workflow editor but such a cool product like OpenCart doesn't.

avvici wrote:I am making an extension that will do all of this.

Good luck! Would be cool, I think.

Not really "cool". It's critical. Rarely do people just "go along with the default opencart checkout setup." There always is need to either remove a step or add a step. Making everything on one page is nice....and also critical. I intend to offer both.

For people looking for a very customizable (in admin) one-page checkout process, I would recommend Simple Checkout by Deeman: http://www.opencart.com/index.php?route ... on_id=4811

You can choose all of the fields that are shown. This works as a whole block (ie. show/don't show Billing Address block), and then also works in each block (ie. show/don't show fax, etc in Billing Address). And you can add your own custom fields very easily (again, in admin, not having to edit the controller or template).

The customer can register on the checkout page (or there is also the option of a customizable registration page), or login in if they have an account (both optional - show/don't show). They can add a new address to their address book (only if the have an account) directly on the checkout page, no redirecting to the account/address page. And then they can easily switch between those addresses (with a drop-down).

There's heaps more options that I don't use personally, but you can link shipping methods to payment methods.

The small cart on the checkout page allows customers to add/subtract quantities of product with +/- buttons (or the default way).

And the support is great. Deeman spent quite a bit of time getting "Checkout Question" by Johnathan working (http://www.opencart.com/index.php?route ... on_id=2733). Which is essential for me, as it is the best way I've come across to track advertising that turns into conversions.

There's a new version being released shortly that will fix the one or two things that I think need attention (currently, the shipping address is used as the main address, which is a little back-to front, but doesn't really affect my store - this is being changed).

I used Uber Checkout until I upgraded to the latest OC, and I liked it, but it just lacked functionality and customization that I wanted (and it wouldn't play nicely with Checkout Question).

It's hard to say how conversions have changed since I started using Simple checkout, because it hasn't been long enough, but I think it will help because it definitely makes the checkout process a lot simpler.

There are 3 principles I coined from my experience.

1. Ask people info you really need only
Each extra field and extra step decreases the checkout chances to be finished. Especially the fields that people feel are not really required to make the deal.

2. Don't make people to do things that can be done automatically or prefilled
Every confirmation checkbox, option selection (when only 1 option is really avaible) or even text line to be read and analyzed makes the whole process to feel longer. The most hate you receive for information to be typed twice.

3. Don't show all the survey at once, start with simple thing
To see a screen full of fields and options, is real shock! Remember your feeling when you got two-sided paper form to fill? And the worst thing is that there is no guarantee, thats there will not be more steps after that space-ship panel. Start with simple and harmless things at first step. People less likely exit the middle-process when they already made some work.

I tried my best to create such a process, and it really works. What do you think about my concept?

philbydevil wrote:For people looking for a very customizable (in admin) one-page checkout process, I would recommend Simple Checkout by Deeman: http://www.opencart.com/index.php?route ... _id=212582

You can choose all of the fields that are shown. This works as a whole block (ie. show/don't show Billing Address block), and then also works in each block (ie. show/don't show fax, etc in Billing Address). And you can add your own custom fields very easily (again, in admin, not having to edit the controller or template).

The customer can register on the checkout page (or there is also the option of a customizable registration page), or login in if they have an account (both optional - show/don't show). They can add a new address to their address book (only if the have an account) directly on the checkout page, no redirecting to the account/address page. And then they can easily switch between those addresses (with a drop-down).

There's heaps more options that I don't use personally, but you can link shipping methods to payment methods.

The small cart on the checkout page allows customers to add/subtract quantities of product with +/- buttons (or the default way).

And the support is great. Deeman spent quite a bit of time getting "Checkout Question" by Johnathan working (http://www.opencart.com/index.php?route ... on_id=2733). Which is essential for me, as it is the best way I've come across to track advertising that turns into conversions.

There's a new version being released shortly that will fix the one or two things that I think need attention (currently, the shipping address is used as the main address, which is a little back-to front, but doesn't really affect my store - this is being changed).

I used Uber Checkout until I upgraded to the latest OC, and I liked it, but it just lacked functionality and customization that I wanted (and it wouldn't play nicely with Checkout Question).

It's hard to say how conversions have changed since I started using Simple checkout, because it hasn't been long enough, but I think it will help because it definitely makes the checkout process a lot simpler.

I like the checkout survey extension you mentioned here. Very handy.

avvici -arvixe- wrote:I am making an extension that will do all of this.

How's it coming along?