Account or no account, that is the question!

I'm usually completely against a no account checkout. However my better half, and that's no exaggeration, wants all of our sites to not require an account.

Now I'm building a new site with the option of not having an account, but for this discussion I want to hear from those of you that have a site without an account, and also those of you with no account option.

Have your sales increased?

Do you have fewer abandoned carts?

Do you have fewer arguments with your spouse? (0k, that's optional, you don't have to answer that one.)

Thanks in advance.

It's better to give customers more choices, that's what I believe. However, the more important thing right now is a single page checkout, that would really help a ton.

yellow1912:

It's better to give customers more choices, that's what I believe. However, the more important thing right now is a single page checkout, that would really help a ton.

Personal experience from testing different options shows that the Zen Cart split login page is a conversion killer. It should be taken out and shot. Better to use the vertical layout and change the wording to make it more checkout friendly. Trouble with that option is that it makes the login page look like a checkout page.

Using a single page checkout also reduces conversion rate. Asking for too much information in one go puts people off.

Best I've been able to come up with is to copy Amazon and use their checkout system which is multi-page, asking for a very small amount of information to start with and using Order Steps to show progress. Using this system I've managed to reduce checkout abandonment down to near zero and then it is usually because the person's card is declined or their PC crashes etc.

I tried the checkout without account mod but it causes problems for the Newsletter only subscription mod which I find very useful. It also leaves hidden accounts lying around (multiple for repeat shoppers).

Hope that helps.

Regards,
Christian.