Cart abandonment is usually explained with a single word: price. Shipping cost too high, total higher than expected, and the customer leaves. It's a tidy explanation, and in our experience it's incomplete far more often than it's wrong.
Uncertainty, not cost
Post-purchase and exit surveys across our engagements consistently surface a different pattern: customers leave because something about completing the purchase feels uncertain, not because the number is too big. Will this fit? Will it arrive in time? Can I return it easily if it isn't right? Is this website secure?
Price plays a role, but it's frequently a proxy customers reach for when the real hesitation is harder to articulate — a form of 'something feels off' that gets reported as 'too expensive' because that's the easiest box to tick on a survey.
Designing for confidence, not just cost
This reframing changes what gets tested. Instead of defaulting to discounts or free shipping thresholds, we look at where certainty is missing: delivery date clarity, return policy visibility, security signals at the exact point of payment entry.
Reducing genuine uncertainty tends to lift conversion without touching margin — a materially better outcome than discounting a way around a problem that was never really about price.