Guest Checkout in Your Online Store: Yes or No?

The checkout stage in e-commerce sites and online stores is perhaps the most important one for merchants. That’s where the sale happens and this directly impacts an online store’s longevity and profitability. 

For online retailers, this stage is essential. But one overlooked aspect on their checkout page is the option to checkout as a guest.

Also called anonymous checkout or express checkout, in this article, we cover what a guest checkout is, delve into some benefits and drawbacks, and discuss a few ways in which you can implement it at your online business. 

Let’s explore in more detail below.

What Is Guest Checkout?

A guest checkout option is an extra functionality that online businesses use in their store’s ecommerce process when accepting payments and making sales.

This eCommerce feature is simple for new customers to use because it does not require them to enter many details. Only basic customer data is required in a guest checkout option such as name, billing and shipping details.

On the other hand, creating a customer account requires more details and additional fields to be completed, among which include account names and passwords.

Benefits of Guest Checkout

By not having to create store accounts and enabling guest checkout, online businesses are better able to capture sales.

In addition to this, they help their customers with a smooth customer experience as:

• Users don’t need to remember multiple usernames and passwords for different sites;
• Reduces friction and abandoned cart rates;
• Boosts conversion rates for first-time shoppers;
• User details aren’t stored in a merchant’s database;
• Reduces uncertainty for buyers who are on the fence;
• Good for buyers with a low level of trust;
• Good for buyers who only buy one item rarely;
• It is much faster for customers to check out this way;
• It is easier to use for mobile users;
• Acts as a solution to “account fatigue”;
• Encourages impulse purchases.

Overall, the process of account creation can feel more challenging and time consuming for first-time buyers. When they don’t have to remember and manage multiple account passwords and usernames, they can have a more seamless checkout experience in your eCommerce site.

Drawbacks of Guest Checkout

Despite all the advantages of a guest checkout, there are also several drawbacks to offering this functionality both for merchants and for online shoppers. 

Some worth considering include:

• Guest checkout is not helpful for repeat purchases.
• No data is stored and, therefore, a merchant can’t implement customer loyalty programmes.
• Merchants are unable to offer customers the chance to take advantage of sales and discounts.
• No customer’s order history tracking is available for greater levels of personalisation.
• Guest checkout makes it harder to view, manage and track orders.
• With this approach, merchants can offer fewer options for customer support.
• Returns processes after a purchase are usually manual and not automated. 

While it would be ideal if every customer created an account with your business, merchants that offer guest checkout must contend with the fact that they need to cater to a broader audience if they want to earn valuable sales. 

That’s why despite the drawbacks of having guest checkouts, they still play an important role in an ecommerce site’s performance.

Impact on User Experience

Many ecommerce stores are slowly starting to see the benefits of offering guest checkout for their new or first-time customers. However, even with a guest checkout option, they still struggle to create a seamless user experience. This is due to several reasons.

Among these include the fact that guest checkout isn’t always clearly labelled or it is a plain text link. In other cases, guest check appears underneath the “account sign in” or other options or alternatively, it is only offered once users input their email address.

For those merchants that want to optimise their customer experience, it’s ideal to make the guest checkout option clear and prominent on your checkout or sign-in page. This creates a smoother and more frictionless flow to your next sale.

Implementing Guest Checkout: Best Practices

Apart from focusing on creating a smooth user experience, it’s also advisable to follow a few industry-leading best practices when implementing guest checkout at your online store. We’ve gathered a collection of some of the most important ones that you should consider. 

Let’s take a closer look:

• Start by offering guest checkout as an option in addition to the option to create an account.
• Communicate the benefits of each checkout option to your customers. You may wish to do this through a specially dedicated frequently asked questions section on your site.
• Make guest checkout as smooth as possible for your guest users by requiring as little input and information from your customers as possible. Also, your checkout design should summarise all the critical details of the customer’s order in a single view. This can include information such as the subtotal, the items selected, shipping costs, payment details, VAT, total cost, etc.
• Implement strict security measures to assure your customers that their financial data and payment details are safe. This can be achieved when you use a secure payment gateway, implement SSL/TLS certification, reduce the number of pages that need to be filled for each transaction, update software, plug-ins and third-party apps, etc. Also be sure to add badges to your guest checkout so that your users know their information is safe with you.
• Improve your site’s loading speed for both desktop and mobile shoppers. Examples of things you could do include optimising your images.
• Break up the information gathering stage into several parts. If you need additional customer data, you can ask for this information at a later stage of their purchasing journey.
• Use microcopy to guide your customers. They need to know what to do at every stage and this is where placeholders in the checkout page play a key role.
• Make sure you offer error notifications in the event that some information was entered incorrectly. It can frustrate a user when they don’t know what they’ve entered incorrectly in a field due to a typo or another reason.
• Focus on creating mobile-friendly pages that don’t require much scrolling. Also add collapsible sections which users can expand if they wish to.
• Enable auto-fill option to reduce the friction and time spent on completing the purchase with manual input actions.
• Automatically apply discount codes through the use of plugins that are compatible with your e-commerce store.
• Allow sign-in on different devices. It often happens that potential customers will navigate from shopping on their phone to shopping on desktop and that’s why “remember me” options are so useful.

These are all excellent approaches to help you boost sales by making your ecommerce features more accessible and frictionless for your ecommerce sites. You’re more likely to see customers return when you offer fewer steps for them to checkout. 

You can even convert them into a returning customer, thus boosting the value of your future transactions.

Guest Checkout vs. Account Creation

Whether guest checkout or account creation make sense to you, here are some of the pros and cons of creating an account vs. guest checkout.

Pros:

Guest checkout	Account creation
Fewer input fields	Enables merchants to send marketing emails
Faster and more frictionless checkout process and lower cart abandonment	Customisation and personalisation of customer communication
Helps buyers who are on the fence and boosts conversion rates	Encourages repeat purchases and returning customers

Cons:

Guest checkout	Account creation
Does not encourage repeat purchases	The checkout process is slower
Does not collect customers’ personal data so personalisation is not possible	Reduces the anonymity that guest checkout offers
Makes it harder to implement loyalty programs and operate valuable data	Login is required, meaning more passwords and usernames to be remembered

Conclusion

The last thing any online merchant wants to see is drop-offs and abandoned carts. Luckily, there are ways to address this challenge with a guest checkout option.

While it may limit merchants in terms of storing and collecting customer data for future marketing communication, it can improve the customer experience and convert a new, first-time buyer into a repeat buyer due to the ease and convenience you’re offering them.

In short, guest checkouts are a must-have eCommerce feature for merchants that want to boost the customer experience and journey. Therefore, it should not be overlooked when creating or optimising your online store.

Frequently Asked Questions

How does guest checkout affect my ability to collect customer data?

As an online merchant, by offering guest checkout in addition to creation of customer accounts, you’ll have limited information with which to personalise your marketing communication or future offerings to your guest. At most, you’ll likely have an email address that you can use but your communication will not be as tailored as it could be.

What are some of the risks associated with a guest checkout?

Some of the risks associated with a guest checkout include having limited access to customer data, which can affect both guest experiences and your ability to market to them.

Are there any alternatives to a guest checkout?

Yes, there are. For example, you may want to offer sign in through the customer’s social media channels, use a one-time-password or biometrics to help your customers log in, offer delayed account creation, offer sign up after checkout and entice customers with a reward at this stage, highlight returns, exchanges and refunds, offer the option to sign up for reorders and subscriptions, offer multiple and affordable shipping options, encourage feedback and referrals, etc.