New Checkout Manager

Over the past few years, Yahoo! Small Business has undergone numerous changes, both to the backend and what customers see when they view your site. One thing that has been missing was a customizable checkout flow which matches your store’s look and feel. The new Yahoo! Checkout Manager changes that. The new Checkout will allow merchants to set up your stores however you like (1 page Checkout, 2 page Checkout, etc.). You will also be able to customize the look and feel of your Checkout so the branding will better match your store. The checkout process is the most important aspect of any store. It is very difficult to retain customer confidence if the final steps of the shopping experience are confusing.

Let me repeat: the checkout process is the single most important aspect of any online store. No matter how well your company ranks in search engines, no matter how well laid out your page is or how attractive your design, even if 50% of your visitors add an item to their cart, it means nothing if you don’t convert the visit to a sale.

Shoppers went online to find something, located it on your site and they’re ready to buy. Conversions should be easy, right? Subtract “window shoppers” and others who don’t plan to purchase online, what’s left are people who want to buy from you. When they hit that checkout button - what do they expect to happen?

It depends on your store, your market, and your target consumer, and that’s the advantage of the new Checkout flow. There is more in-depth access to behind the scenes code for style and positioning, you can customize your cart into a conversion dream.

One feature sure to increase conversions is the ability to calculate shipping rates and add coupons on the View Cart page. Many customers avoid being “locked into” the checkout process, and won’t go past the View Cart page unless the shipping information is displayed. This new feature allows your customers to comparison shop your rates against those of your competition. Research shows that 50% of shoppers will compare total price (with shipping) across multiple stores before deciding, so this is a genuine benefit for your customers because it increases their confidence. The new Checkout feature also has a built-in “Cookie Check Alert” which alerts customers if they have cookies turned off.

What if you want the cart to be part of the checkout? You may feel your customers would benefit from having their Cart, Shipping Information and Billing information in one place. With the new Checkout you can customize the entire process. The new Checkout allows you to combine pages or make each step separate. You can even decide whether you want to show an “order review” page before taking them to the final “order confirmation” screen.

All these pages can now be fully customized to match the look and feel of your store. Yahoo! provides a global HTML area for the top and bottom of the page so you can surround the process with your site shell. There is an area specific to each page where you can customize text. There is also an area to paste HTML into the “Head” section of the page, which is where JavaScripts and CSS styles belong. Speaking of CSS, the entire new checkout was built with visual customization in mind. Yahoo! now provides a page where you can easily change the fonts and colors of your new Checkout, and you can view the changes as you go. It is now much easier to design a heavily customized Checkout which reflects your store style and identity.

Shipping and Billing pages can be combined onto one page or separate pages, and you can place different custom fields wherever you like. So, if you’re a pet medicine retailer, you can now add a listing for “Veterinarian Name” where the shopper enters his or her Shipping Address, or you can create an entirely new section on the page for “Veterinarian Info.” There are default setups for Gift Wrap, Gift Certificates, Coupons, and you can customize or add to these areas as well. You can even customize the “progress indicator arrows” at the top of the page, as well as every button that appears in the entire checkout process.

Best of all, Yahoo! has made the basic customization process easy and intuitive. Help files are abundant, and the process and screens are logical and easy to understand. There is a fully functional “Preview” mode, so you can see what each step will look like before you publish. Checkout Manager contains a “Testing Cookie” you as the store owner can turn on for your computer only. When you check out of your live site, you are taken to the new Checkout. This Testing Cookie lets you place orders as if the new checkout flow were live - without actually publishing it! Yahoo is making the new Checkout manager available to all merchants so legacy users will be able to use it as well.

The new Checkout flow, implemented with the shopper in mind, will increase conversions in most stores immediately. To become familiar with the settings, log in and try it out. Of course, if you want to fully understand the potential of this great new feature, or are interested in a high-end customization of your checkout, simply contact Solid Cactus today at 1-888-361-9814