Stop Losing Sales: Why the Mobile App Cuts Cart Abandonment by 30%
Utilising your organisation's mobile app store is essential for organisations seeking to boost revenue and effectively sell merchandise in the digital age. The Member Jungle app significantly reduces the industry-standard cart abandonment rate. Our data shows that the cart abandonment rate for selling via the Member Jungle app is only 40%, which is 30% lower than the industry standard. This success is due to allowing members to capture impulse buys with a simplified checkout process. Furthermore, the app enables administrators to process in-person payments without an external POS system, offering robust stock management and transaction tracking directly from a mobile device.
The truth, whether you like it or not, is that we as a society spend a whole lot of our time on our phones. On average, people spend four and a half hours per day on their phones. That is enough time to watch the 2024 film Better Man twice back-to-back.
In case you’re not aware, Better Man is a jukebox musical biopic about singer Robbie Williams; except for a reason that is never adequately explained, Williams is inexplicably played by a CGI chimpanzee.
Everyone else in the movie is a human, and no one ever comments on the fact that the lead character is a CGI ape. It’s not even a bad movie, but it’s such a choice.
Given the considerable time we spend on our phones, it should come as no surprise that we also purchase a significant number of things directly from our phones. Online shopping has become a massive industry; in 2024, Australians spent $64 billion online shopping. It wasn’t just frivolous stuff, either $13.6 billion of that was spent on food and alcohol.
As a society, we have become accustomed to buying almost anything directly from our phones, and your members are no exception. They will expect to have the option to buy your merchandise, event tickets, and even memberships instantly from their mobile device.
This is where the topic of today’s article comes in: The Member Jungle app and its online store. The Member Jungle system features an online store that enables you to sell all of your organisation’s merchandise, both on the website and via the mobile app. It works too, with an average cart abandonment rate 30% lower than the industry average. So, today, let’s talk about why selling via the mobile app is so useful and how it can help you boost revenue.
The New Reality of Club Merchandising
For the vast majority of membership organisations, selling merchandise has historically been a physical, pen-and-paper affair. People come into the clubhouse or event, and they pay with cash. The issue is that people no longer use cash; a 2022 study found that only 6% of transactions in Australia were made by cash.
This shift presents a problem; relying solely on cash adds friction to the buying process. Having to visit an ATM or remember to bring cash creates an extra, unnecessary step that often results in a lost sale. You should aim to minimise the steps involved for members to give you money and make that whole process as easy as possible.
This is where the Member Jungle app comes in. It solves this problem in a few ways. First, you can accept card payments in person at events without a POS system. All you need is a mobile phone and the Member Jungle app. Second, it allows members to browse and buy what you’re selling anytime, anywhere, removing a whole lot of the friction points and sticking points of a manual cash-based system.
The Member Jungle online store still allows you to accept cash payments. You can easily log what was sold and how much in the system to track manual payments for stock and accounting purposes. So moving online doesn’t mean you have to shun cash.
It’s basically an easy way to make your organisation’s store more modern and effective without throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
How Selling Via The Mobile App Works
Selling via the Member Jungle app is extremely easy because it isn’t a separate store; it is a fully integrated extension of your main website store. The only difference is that you have to choose whether products are available in the app or not. You can do this when you are creating a new product or after one is already created.
For administrators, the process is hassle-free; if a product, ticket, or piece of merchandise is live on your website, you can make it available in the mobile app. You don't have to build a new store, upload separate images, manage two different inventories or set up a new payment gateway. Everything just works because the app is a native extension of your existing platform.
The member experience is the real game-changer. They open the app they already use, can easily see your online store, and complete a purchase in moments. This removes almost all friction: members no longer need to visit an ATM, log in to the website, re-enter payment information, or overcome several other hurdles that stop impulse buying. By having your store within reach at all times, you are perfectly positioned to capture a sale the moment they feel like buying.
You can also set products to be featured on the app’s homepage, so if you have a new club shirt or tickets to your big end-of-year event that you’re trying to push, you can feature them on the app so everyone sees them.
How Effective Is Selling Via The App?
Did you know that the average cart abandonment rate for online shopping is 70%? That means that seven out of every ten times a shopper adds a product to their cart, they end up leaving the website without making the purchase. This is a persistent challenge for all online sellers. You can see the decades-long trend of cart abandonment in the graph below.
This is where the native design of a mobile app makes a real difference. The Member Jungle app helps solve this by allowing members to stay securely logged in, securely store their payment details via Stripe, and immediately access a simplified checkout process. These features directly eliminate the most common sticking points that cause cart abandonment, such as requiring re-entry of passwords or payment information.
The results speak for themselves: in the two years the online store has been available on the Member Jungle app, the average cart abandonment rate has been 40%, significantly lower than the industry standard.
The mobile app's success isn’t just about making the sales process smoother; it’s about grabbing a sale when excitement is at its peak. When members get a push notification about a new event or product, that is the perfect time to make the sale. If they can access the store and their payment info right away, they can jump on that impulse and turn it into a sale before it slips away. This turns your merchandising from a quiet display into a lively sales tool.
In case you’re wondering, over the last two years, the most successful pieces of merchandise have been branded t-shirts, hoodies and hats with DVDs and USBs containing videos from club shows also doing quite well.
How Admins Can Process In-Person Payments Via The Member Jungle App
One standout feature of the in-app purchases is the ability for administrators to take payments for physical purchases at your club events. Suppose you’re selling club stickers, badges, jumpers, or anything else at an in-person event. This will allow you to take digital payments easily without resorting to cash or a point-of-sale system. While cash is still an option, using the app will allow the system to track stock sold during the event and which members bought what, which is vital for better stock management and member engagement statistics.
The way this works is super simple, but let’s walk through it anyway.
A member comes up to you at an event and says they would like to buy one of your club hoodies that are being sold at the event. You just need to open the app, find the hoodie in question and add it to the cart.
This time, however, instead of checking out as yourself, you will need to search for the member who is purchasing the product. This will ensure that the system is able to keep accurate records of how much stock you have and who is buying what.
If the person making the purchase doesn’t have an account, however, you will have the option of creating a guest account right from the mobile app to allow non-members to buy that item.
If you want to know how to set up a guest account for a non-member from the mobile app, please read this help article: How to purchase items for non-members/users as an admin?
Once you select the correct member, it will then apply that product to that member's cart, and you will be given the option to add more products or check out. If you cannot find the correct product or you are selling a one-off item, you can create a custom product by clicking the “Add Product” button.
You will then just need to add the product's name, description and price, and you will be ready to check out your member. Doing it this way will still add that transaction to the member's list of purchases, and it will make it easier for you to reconcile what items were sold on the day.
To find out all the details about selling in person via the app, check out How To Sell Your Club's Merchandise Without An EFTPOS Or POS System.
What’s The Next Step?
If you still have questions about how to make products available on the app, check out our help article: Adding Product Catalogue to the Mobile App.
If you are looking for a way to get more members on the app so you can get the most out of its benefits, you should check out 5 Ways To Get More Of Your Members Using The Member Jungle App.