Creating an account in an e-shop

I don't like having to create an account.

I recently bought some thing for our new puppy and won't need to shop at the site again so I wasn't too happy about having to register my details.

Having said that I shop at a couple of craft sites that gave me the option to save my details which is handy when you shop somewhere a lot (yes I am a craftaholic!).

So I suppose to clarify my confusing answer ... I prefer to have the choice.

Most shops that give the impression that you dont have to create an account, do still create an 'account' (customer records) since they need to store and keep a record of your shipping address details anyway for their fulfilment, accounting, and customer support purposes.

In a lot of cases the only difference between making a purchase where you don't have to create an account, and making a purchase where you do have to create an account, is the additional requirement of asking a customer to fill in a password field. In both cases the customer still has to fill in all the other fields like name and shipping address, so the real choice the customer gets is to fill in either 8 fields or fill in 9 fields.

If your system does require the customer to create an account before purchase, the best thing to do is be enthusiast about this feature and try to make your customers enthusiastic about it too. Inform the customer upfront about the reasoning why they have to create an account, and sell them on the benefits it gives them, e.g. they can log in later to track the status of their order (whether it is being processed, what time/date it was sent out, etc), it helps you provide a better service to your customers, it puts you in control of your data, it saves re-entering your address details the next time (and say that due to the nature of your products you get a lot of repeat business). Make it a selling point of your store!

I personally don't mind creating an account when buying something off a site - well actually i prefer it as it means i can keep a check of my order process.

Hi Pelenna,

I just visited your site and see what you mean. I added an item to the basket, then proceeded to checkout and see a long form asking me to put in my billing and shipping details. At this point, I don't actually know the methods of payment you have available. You may have PayPal only, or Paypal and offline methods (cheque/BACS), or Paypal and Nochex, or Paypal, Nochex and a payment provider like Protx/WorldPay etc (these are just examples). I'm reluctant to fill in a form, to then be confronted by one payment method only which is not to my liking (e.g. PayPal only). I'd make it clear on the site that you accept A, B and C payment methods and the user can choose after filling in their details - I'd say the best place for this would be on the checkout page itself. This lets users know what to expect after they complete the form. I suspect many buyers drop out after clicking on "Checkout" as the long form is a barrier to them finding out the payment methods available.

As Paul (alistapart) points out, people register when buying on an e-commerce site anyway, whether explicitly or 'behind the scenes' - as the website needs to know information on each order while giving the shopper order tracking facilities too. We don't ask people to join anything on our template, but upon order confirmation we give them an automatically generated password that's included in their e-mail which they can use to track their order (this password is only used for order tracking).

It's just a question of making payment a relatively painless process for the shopper that doesn't confuse them, keep them uninformed, or make them feel like they're joining something they don't want to.

I dont mind creating an account at all and do like some of the benefits.

What does bug me is when you cannot see the final price until you have logged in/ created an account and that will at times mean I create a junk account so I can see the final price and then will create the "true" account if I am happy with the price or just go elsewhere if P&P is too high or such.

.Spiralling. said:

I don't like having to create an account when I want to buy something, and I don't want my customers to have to - it increases the time needed for them to spend their money!

The cart I use doesn't have the option to create an account, but it does give them the option to save their details so that they don't have to fill in the delivery/billing form every time. I shop at another site using the same cart and have saved my details there, and it's great.

Click to expand...

That's an interesting system. If your customer don't create an account, how does your store recognize them the next time??? I just can't figure it out myself. If the customer left his delivery/billing, shouldn't this info be 'attached' to something like profile, user ID?