Imagine a customer visits your e-commerce website, looks at a few items, places nothing in their shopping cart and walks away. On the surface, it could be thought of as a lost opportunity. In fact, not all consumers are ready to make a purchase on the web. They can be shopping around, holding off for payday, scouting or thinking about their next purchase.

If they don’t have a means of saving the products of interest, there’s a strong possibility that they will forget about your store altogether. This is where wishlist features come in handy.

What Is a Wishlist Feature?

Wishlist is an e-commerce functionality which enables users to add products that they are interested in buying later. Customers are able to save an item to their shopping list/wishlist by just clicking “Save to Wishlist” or a heart icon rather than placing an item in the shopping cart.

The most popular features of most wishlist include:

• Shareable wishlists
• Mobile-friendly access
• Price-drop notifications
• Back-in-stock alerts
• Quickly and easily add to cart from a wishlist

It’s a handy shopping feature for the consumers. In business, it’s an excellent indication of purchase intent.

The Importance of Customer Engagement in e-commerce

Customer engagement is a metric that reflects how customers respond to your online store before, during and after they buy something from you.

Customers who are high engaged are likely to:

• Log back in to your online store
• Browse additional products
• Open marketing emails
• Respond to promotions
• Make repeat purchases
• Recommend your brand

With these activities, you will have a reason to keep your customers engaged in your store even if they aren’t ready to make an immediate purchase.

1. Wishlists Encourage Repeat Visits

The majority of customers do not buy their first time on the internet. Customers tend to do comparative shopping across several stores, talk to their family about the product they’ve purchased, or wait for the time to be right to make the purchase.

Having a wishlist can make it more likely for customers to remember where the item has been purchased. A wishlist is a great way to find a reason to come back. Users can return to any of the products that they have saved, make comparisons and keep shopping without having to begin the search again.

2. They Capture Purchase Intent

All saved items carry the narratives. By putting items on their list, customers are indicating their interest in the products, even if they are not ready to buy them.

This is useful to the store owner because it provides him/her with information about:

• Popular products
• Seasonal demand
• Customer preferences
• Emerging trends
• High-interest categories

Wishlist purchases become visible, as opposed to anonymous browsing, which will inform businesses of potential purchases by a buyer.

3. More Personalization Equals Better Experience

Personalized shopping is expected by customers today even more than before.

The business can suggest:

• Similar products
• Complementary products
• New arrivals
• Products that have been viewed recently
• Personalized deals

Instead of sending mass emails, it is possible to contact people, who have shown their interest to your products in the past.

4. Price Drop Alerts Bring Customers Back

Price is one of the major factors that deter customers from making purchases. Using the wishlist functionality will enable the store to notify customers about changes in prices in order not to miss out on potential customers.

Some popular notifications are:

• Reduction in prices
• Sales for a limited period of time
• Discounts
• Flash sales

Through this notification, you can ensure that your customers will come back to your store and buy whatever they want.

5. Back-in-Stock Notifications Reduce Lost Sales

Customers that find a product they want but it’s out of stock will leave and purchase it from another store, if they can. The use of wishlists helps to keep that relationship alive.

Once the items are back in stock, customers are automatically notified that the item is back in stock! This simple enhancement helps to satisfy the clients, and to gain back the sales that are lost.

6. Wishlists Reduce Cart Abandonment

Some customers use shopping carts as a wishlist. Unfortunately, this can make for false purchase intent signals and inflated cart abandonment rates. Having a specific wishlist provides a hassle-free option for customers.

The shoppers don’t have to leave the cart if they are not ready to purchase. This is because they can save the products to buy later without leaving the website and continuing the engagement with your brand.

7. Shareable Wishlists Expand Your Reach

There are a lot of consumers who buy the products as presents. Shareable wishlists make this process easier, and lets users share their saved collections to friends and family.

This results in a number of benefits:

• Increased product visibility
• Additional referral traffic
• Gift purchases
• Seasonal shopping opportunities
• Organic word-of-mouth marketing

Each shared wishlist will be a great avenue to make your products known to potential new customers.

8. Wishlists Improve Mobile Shopping

People use their mobile phones to shop while commuting, relaxing or multitasking. While they may not be willing to make a purchase on the spot, they will definitely be ready to follow through.

The mobile users can use the wishlist feature to:

• Save products instantly
• To come back later using another device

This integral functionality enables today’s cross-device shopping experience and minimises friction along the entire customer journey.

Best Practices for Adding Wishlist Features

Make your wishlist easy to use and access to ensure the most engagement.

Here are a few guidelines to follow:

• Have a catalogue of visible wishlists on each product page.
• Let visitors save products prior to registering for an account.
• Sync wishlists from device to device.
• Make it possible to share via email or social networks.
• Be proactive with price drop and back-in-stock emails.
• Allow easy transfer of wishlist items to shopping cart.
• Use wishlist data to personalize recommendations.

Thus, the easy-to-use wishlist will help attract more and more customers to your store over time.

Build Your eCommerce Website with Engaging Features with getUstore

The wishlist is not only a function but rather a highly effective customer-engagement solution which helps the online store build better relations with customers, retain them, and make them buy. The wishlist provides an easy and pleasant shopping experience, helping customers save their products and receive special notifications.

getUstore lets you develop an e-commerce website with advanced functionality that is going to engage your business and make it grow.