Online shoppers acting before they think is good for business. You do not want your customers to overthink their purchases. If they do, the chances are that they will not go through with them. If you want to eliminate the thought process that creates doubt in your customers, instilling a sense of urgency is a very effective tactic.

There are many ways to intensify urgency in your customers’ shopping experience and increase your e-commerce conversion rates. Here are 4 recommendations that you can implement on your social media, email marketing, landing pages and product pages.

  • Amplify a sense of scarcity

If there is limited availability of something, its value shoots up in our minds, and we want it more. It is human nature. This works for both services and physical products. Travel sites and tech companies like Apple do this all the time. They advertise limited supply to create a sense of urgency in their customers’ minds.

Invoking scarcity on your e-commerce site is easy. You can do this with real-time data aggregation if your e-commerce platform is integrated with your inventory management solution.

  • Use verbiage that creates FOMO (Fear of Missing Out)

Marketers know that customers naturally respond to words that create a sense of urgency. Such words include “hurry,” “now,” “approaching,” “Over,” “rapidly,” etc.

Online shoppers have a tendency to procrastinate or get easily distracted and abandon shopping carts. You have to use words that pressure them to focus on making a decision and completing the purchase.

  • Add a persistent visual reminder like a clock or a countdown

A persistent visual reminder that time is running out is probably the most potent tactic. It instills the fear of missing out on what is on offer and influences a customer to make a purchase faster. You can add a timer on your product pages counting down to the beginning or end of a limited time offer or a sale.

  • Give your customers something to lose

 Fear of loss is greater than the desire to acquire the things we want. Psychologists call this tendency “fear aversion.” You can instill a sense of urgency in your customers by giving them an impression that they stand to lose something if they do not act accordingly. For example, sending marketing emails that tell your customers that they could miss out on learning about future discounts, and offers if they do not sign up for the emails. They will not want to miss out on future discounts so they will sign