There are lots of reasons why a mom might leave your site before buying. Sure, some of them center around your offerings -- and I could write a book on that topic alone.

But sometimes her departure is less a concern and more of a consequence, due to:

- phone interruption
- boss interruption
- kid interruption
- doorbell interruption
- credit card not handy
- laptop battery running out
- urgent bathroom need

What's great about the Web today is that you don't have to take no for an answer. Second chances abound for smart web marketers.

Here are a few tools to use to your advantage:

- Pop-Up Ads: we created an "abandon" pop-up ad for one Maternal Instinct client, offering the consumer a free trial of the product they were last viewing. Almost 30% of the viewers accepted the trial, raising conversion significantly. The headline was straightforward: "Not ready to sign up yet? Take a free 30-day trial."

- Email Coupons: Sweetening the pot is a proven way to recapture customers, especially those who have abandoned a filled shopping cart. Because abandoned carts are often due to frustrations with the order process, a short message of concern about your service does wonders.

- Retargeting Banners: Now this is brilliant. Imagine a potential customer leaves your site. But you have cleverly dropped a simple piece of code onto your site that allows you to serve ads up to that prospect as she navigates elsewhere online. Seeing an ad for a product she's just been evaluating feels a bit like kismet: like you were meant to connect. I recently had the pleasure of attending an event where ReTargeter President Arjun Dev Arora spoke about this revolutionary technology and I was wowed.

- Pick up the Phone: Not every company can afford to do this (or has captured a prospect's phone number). But if you can, call. Just this week I received a call from a representative of a Web service I began to order but didn't complete. Just as described above, my failure to complete was completely circumstantial. That one phone call got me back on track and scored points with me about the company's service model.

Lastly, and this goes without saying, always give a consumer an opportunity to save what she's doing on your site to revisit later. Whether she's creating an online profile, ordering a product, setting up a registry -- have a persistent "Save for Later" button throughout the path.

Labels: coupons, lost sales, retargeting

Please leave your thoughts and opinions in the comments section below, even if -- no, especially if -- you don't agree with what I've written.