This is how online shoppers navigate the digital offerings

A recent CX study illustrates how online shoppers browse the product offerings of online stores. In this process, recommendations prove to be particularly relevant: repeated purchases are especially relevant for German-speaking customers in the areas of groceries, fashion, and household items.

An examination of 2,368 online shoppers from various European countries, conducted by the market researchers RetailX through the homepage of the company Relation Browser and Factfinder, reveals that two-thirds of German-speaking online shoppers abandon their purchase if they have to visit more than five pages to find the product that interests them.

Even one in nine respondents gives up if they can’t find a suitable match on the first or second page. In the context of the British Isles, there’s a higher tolerance: a quarter of respondents are even willing to go through eight or more pages before giving up on the search process.

For the vast majority of buyers, recommendation engines are a useful tool: about half of the survey participants find product recommendations on shopping sites “always” or “mostly” helpful when searching for products.

Only one in ten respondents ignores such recommendations or finds them bothersome when they come from computer systems.

The search bar on online shop pages is utilized by most people. This behavior aligns with how most people interact with search engines in general: the majority enter a single term. Only two out of five respondents “always” or “mostly” use multiple search terms in succession to achieve more accurate results.

However, features for requesting product recommendation suggestions are hardly utilized. Half of the respondents never use such features. Either due to unawareness or because they don’t believe the answers could be meaningful.