When you’re running an online business, you can’t be face to face with your customer so you don’t have that organic method of figuring out when they need help and what they need help with.

Customers have pain points with all businesses, things that might make them hesitate to cross over to the point of conversion. However, by identifying the most common pain points and working to solve them in advance (or in real-time), you can make sure you’re not turning your customers away.

They’re landing in the wrong place

The first impression that your website makes is going to be one of the most important interactions between your business and your customers. To that end, whenever they click a link, be it through a search engine result, social media post, or advertisement, what interaction directly follows?

If you’re using landing pages, you can make sure that the content that follows is directly relevant to the link that they clicked and what they should commonly expect to see on the other side. SEO promoting a certain product show link directly to a page about that specific product, for instance, rather than taking them to a more general products page.

The pages load super slowly

You would think, given the speed of the internet continuously improving throughout the years, that long page load times would be a thing of the past. However, if your page takes more than 3 seconds to load, the statistics suggest that you’re likely to lose up to half of your traffic. There are few eCommerce stores that can sustain losses such as that.

Take a look at the different ways you can make your website faster. This can include ensuring that you’re online using small, quickly loaded files such as images, that you’re not relying too much on redirects, and that your hosting service is able to keep up with the traffic heading to your website.

They can’t find the products that they’re looking 

If you have plenty of products on the website, then it only makes sense to anticipate that customers might need a little extra help in navigating them. To make sure that they can find what they’re looking for, make sure you’re choosing the right platform such as the Shopify eCommerce website builder with built-in search functionality that makes it a lot easier for customers to find the products that they’re looking for. Of course, keeping your product data organised so that they’re able to match search queries to information about those products is just as important, as well. Otherwise, customers are going to get frustrated and move on.

They’re getting confused by inaccurate information

The world of eCommerce moves fast. It should be accepted that the information you might have on the website is going to become outdated at some point. However, what’s important is that you don’t leave that inaccurate information up for the customers to stumble upon.

Make sure you’re using product information management tools like Oporteo to ensure that any data you have on products is always up-to-date with the latest information on your own databases and that you’re taking the time to update any products that are changing.

Don’t forget to change information on the website when it undergoes any changes, too. You don’t want to have inaccurate customer support pages, after all. That will only lead to creating more barriers down the line.

They’re lost and don’t know what to do

This is a much more general pain point compared to some of those above. However, that’s because no matter what issue is affecting a customer, one of the most widely recommended solutions is always the same: talk to them.

If your business can reach out and help them on their way, even being proactive to address any issues they might have on the website, then you can encourage them to address barriers as soon as they arise. Tools like Click4assistance live support chat can make sure that your team has their finger on the pulse and is ready to act to help the customer at a moment’s notice. As such, you can have that organic interaction that is otherwise missing in the eCommerce world.

They don’t know what they’ve purchased a product

It’s a very common problem in eCommerce websites, especially smaller ones. The customer finds the products they want, they fill their shopping cart. They click the button to start the sales process. They provide the information needed on the first page and click onto the next one. Then they fill out that page and click onto the next one. Then the next one. And the next one.

At some point, the customer is going to wonder how many steps they have to complete to finalise the purchase. Without the breadcrumb navigation telling them precisely which part of the process they are in, they can be left wondering about that for too long, too. You want to keep the purchase process short and sweet where possible but, even if it is slightly longer, the customer should have some indication of how much longer they have to go, or else you’re likely to experience many cases of shopping cart abandonment.

You have unclear customer support provisions

All eCommerce websites need to provide some kind of customer support. There should be no disagreement on that. However, the way that you provide support might be different from that of another website. As such, you shouldn’t anticipate that your customer is going to know how to find the support that they need when they need it.

To that end, make sure that your customer support page has clear information on what methods of support are available and the different circumstances that affect them. For instance, if you’re only able to respond to live chat during certain hours of the day, then you should tell the customer which hours you are going to be active in.

They can’t check out as guests

We all know the benefits of getting customers to sign up to your eCommerce site. It’s easier to collect data on them when they provide the information necessary for registration, which can improve your marketing and retention methods.

You can encourage them to sign up for emails, which can be used to improve their lifetime value through effective outreach. However, customers don’t want to have a thousand logins for a thousand different sites. Giving them a guest checkout will encourage them to try buying from the website and a positive experience will keep them coming back.

They can’t pay

It happens all too often: a customer completes the purchase process, going through all the necessary steps only to be cut off at the last moment. They don’t have the method of payment that your website accepts. First of all, you should avoid this by making sure all information on what kinds of payment you accept are broadcast loudly at the start of the purchasing process.

Furthermore, consider looking at services like Merchant Machine merchant accounts to ensure that you do accept the majority of highly common payment methods. You don’t have to accept every single one, but you want to make sure that you’re at least reaching the majority of your customers.

There’s a lack of delivery options

Customers want to make sure that they’re able to have their products delivered at the time that they’re best able to receive them. To that end, if you’re unable to offer them any delivery options, then they might simply decline to go through with the purchase because they are afraid of missing the deliver.

Your ability to offer a variety of delivery options is going to depend largely on which logistics providers you’re working with. If you work with those who can be more flexible to your delivery needs, then you can be flexible to your customer needs, as well. Otherwise, at least be as transparent about delivery estimates as possible so they can make more informed choices.

You’re too greedy with your fees and delivery charges

Charging some kind of delivery charges and fees on the bill is not unreasonable. Your business should be able to cover the costs of facilitating delivery with some help from the customer. However, you need to know when it’s worth biting some of the costs to make sure that you’re able to get a sale through in the first place.

Finding good delivery services to make sure your charges aren’t too high is one way. Otherwise, if you do have any fees that you have to apply, try to be transparent about them as early in the purchasing process as soon as possible, showing it on the total cost calculations.

The above pain points might be some of the most common ones affecting your customers but they’re not likely to be the only ones, ever. Get to know your customers and continue to collect data on how they use your website to keep updating your understanding of what pain points need to be addressed next.