Editor’s note: Kimberly Struyk is director of client service at CRM Metrix, a Secaucus, N.J., research firm.

Editor’s note: Kimberly Struyk is director of client service at CRM Metrix, a Secaucus, N.J., research firm.

The objective for e-commerce Web sites is always the same: drive sales and revenue. Yet, e-store abandonment rates remain at 90 percent. Naturally, when visitors are not convinced to hit the purchase button during their session this raises site abandonment rates and lowers sales and revenue numbers. When speaking about abandonment rates - a critical metric - there are often misconceptions that require clarification. The reasons behind abandonment are not always due to site usability, as might typically be anticipated.

Extensive research reveals that abandonment is broken down into six key drivers: consumer condition, consumer behavior, merchandizing shortfalls, business rules, site mechanics and, lastly, pain points within the shopping process.

Further, there are varying degrees of persuasion needed to recapture the sale. By uncovering the true reasons behind abandonment, we can build best practices for transactional Web sites and also foster the emergence of new strategies. This information is derived from the behaviors that can be changed within each point of the conversion funnel and can be adapted as a business model across all transactional Web sites. Through observations about the change in consumer behavior during the online shopping experience, a “re-marketing research” model is born, one that focuses on the rationale behind, reaction to and recapture of abandonment.

Thinking about today’s online shopping environment, consumers can take several actions within the online setting. They can shop directly on brand Web sites; visit competitive Web sites or aggregator sites (i.e., Amazon.com); or seek input from consumer opinion sites through reading blogs or by obtai...