Store owners report a persistent issue since March 2023: sessions have increased significantly while conversion rates have dropped dramatically (from ~2% to below 1% in many cases). The problem appears concentrated at checkout, where more customers reach the payment stage but fewer complete purchases.
Key observations:
Troubleshooting attempts:
Shopify’s response:
Support provides generic answers and emphasizes their business model depends on merchant success. They suggest checking abandoned carts, shipping rates, and discount strategies. One moderator mentions Google indexing analytics URLs as a potential cause.
Current status:
No resolution found. Several merchants, including Shopify Plus users doing $1M+ annually, are considering migrating to other platforms due to lack of actionable support and ongoing conversion issues.
The role I believe the platform has is an issue with the checkout process. I pulled some data on checkout sessions vs conversions. The number of customers going to checkout has increased but the number then proceeding to complete the transaction has dropped. This leads me to believe there are checkout issues; i have heard this complaint from other store owners as well.
My conversion rate has been above 2% for over a year, but ever since Feb/Mar it’s been around 1%, lower than I’ve ever seen.