Cart abandonment is a key issue for online businesses with most consumers visiting a website without signing up or making a purchase.

To help uncover why people abandon carts and login boxes, and what online businesses can do about it, identity management experts at Auth0 commissioned international research in conjunction with YouGov, asking business leaders and consumers about their expectations for login and sign-up experiences. 

The survey found that half of Australian consumers (50%) are frustrated by long login and sign-up forms, compared to 49% globally. However, three in ten Australian businesses surveyed (30%) estimate that it takes potential customers between one and five minutes to sign up for their app – and one in four (25%) say the login process for returning customers takes more than one minute.  

Survey data previously released by Auth0 reveals that 9 in 10 Australian consumers (90%) admit to reusing passwords for more than one account, and that their main frustrations with the sign-up process for new apps are password related.

Consumers want alternatives to passwords, including biometrics and passwordless authentication. However most businesses fall short of consumer expectations for these login experiences. 

According to the survey, almost 9 in 10 Australian organisations (88%) admit that potential customers abandon their cart or sign-up process, compared to 85% globally. Two in three (66%) attribute these abandonments to sign-up processes and more than half (56%) attribute them to the login processes.      

However, the research shows that almost 9 in 10 Australian consumers (86%) abandon their shopping cart or registration attempt due to a complex login process. 

Around the world, Australian (86%), together with Singaporean (89%), French (86%), and British (85%) consumers are more likely than those living in Germany (78%) and Japan (76%) to abandon their cart or sign up to online content if the login process is too arduous. 

Organisations from Asia-Pacific countries are much more likely than their European counterparts to attribute cart abandonment to sign-up processes (Australian 66%, Japanese 63%, and Singaporean 60%, compared to French 49%, British 46%, and German 41%).