AI at the Checkout: Making it Personal to Sell More

For ages, online stores have treated the checkout page like a boring form – just a step to get through to buy something. It works, but it is also where you lose the most customers during a sale.

The numbers are crazy.

Basically, about 70-74% of people leave their shopping carts without buying. That is, most people who looked around your shop. pick something out, and add it to their cart, quit right at the end.

Why does this happen? It’s usually because the checkout feels impersonal:

Almost half bail because of surprise costs (shipping, taxes).
A quarter doesn’t want to make an account.
Over a fifth give up if the checkout is too long or hard.

This is exactly where custom ecommerce development makes a real difference. Instead of using a one-size-fits-all checkout, brands can build smarter, faster, and more personalized experiences tailored to their customers.

Shops have tried to draw people to their sites and customize the homepage. But they’re still losing customers at the checkout.

Here comes Artificial Intelligence.

AI isn’t just for suggesting things on the homepage anymore. The best way for online stores to grow is to use AI to make the checkout personal. This fixes leaks and turns the checkout into a way to seriously boost sales.

Brands are now using their biggest problem to their advantage, improving how much each person spends (Average Order Value, or AOV) and how well their ads do (Return on Ad Spend, or ROAS).

From Leaky Bucket to Sales Machine: What’s AI at Checkout?

A normal checkout is the same for everyone. It treats someone buying $20 worth of stuff the same as someone who always spends $500. That’s a big mistake.

An AI checkout changes things depending on who’s buying. It looks at what’s in their cart, their past buys, how they’ve looked around the site, and information from similar shoppers to make the final step special.

It tries to figure out things like:

Will this person leave because of shipping costs?
Would this person want to add something else to their order?
What are they most likely to buy right now?
How do they want to pay, and can I make it easier for them?

This lets stores change things in ways a normal checkout can’t.

People think customers only care about price because you don’t give them anything else to care about. – Seth Godin, Author and Marketing Expert

AI checkouts give people a reason to care by making the end of the process easy and worth it.

5 AI Checkout Tricks to Increase AOV

The easiest way to get more money is to get people to spend more each time they buy something (AOV). Instead of just finishing the sale, an AI checkout tries to sell more.

Suggesting Stuff That Goes Well With What’s Already in the Cart
This is really helpful. A normal checkout shows a general You might also like… list. An AI checkout shows the perfect thing to add.

How it works: The AI looks at what’s in the cart and information about the person to find what goes well together. It’s not guessing, it’s using data.
Example: Someone has a camera in their cart. The AI knows many people who buy that camera also buy a specific memory card, but not as many buy a camera bag. It also sees that this person cares about performance. So, it offers them the memory card first, not the bag.
The AOV Result: This increases AOV. Studies shows suggestion engines can bring in about a third of all online sales. By putting a good offer right when someone wants to buy, people are more likely to take it.

Smart Free Shipping
This solves the issue of high shipping costs, the main reason people leave before buying.

How it works: The AI figures out how much more someone needs to spend to get free shipping. Then, it suggests something they looked at before or from a similar category to help them get there.
Example: Someone’s cart is at $42, and free shipping starts at $50. A normal site says, You need $8 more. An AI site says, Just $8 more for free shipping! Add this $10 pack of socks you were looking at to get free shipping.
The AOV Result: Instead of paying $8 for shipping, the person spends $10 on something else. Your AOV goes up by $10, and they feel like they got a deal.

Making Bundles
This is more than just suggesting one thing. AI creates complete the look or complete the set bundles on the spot.

How it works: The AI sees one main thing in the cart and suggests other things to make a full set, often with a small discount.
Example: Someone adds skincare. The AI makes a Your Personalized Evening Routine bundle, adding a cleanser and moisturizer from the same brand that go well with the skincare chosen. It offers a 10% discount if they buy all three.
The AOV Result: This can seriously increase how much someone spends.

Offers When Someone’s About to Leave
What if you could stop someone from leaving?

How it works: By watching how someone moves the mouse, the AI knows when they’re about to leave the checkout page. Instead of a boring 10% OFF! popup, the AI gives a specific offer.
Example: The AI sees someone having trouble on the shipping page. The offer is Finish your purchase now and get free shipping. For someone else on the payment page, it might be Use PayPal and get 5% off.
The AOV Result: This is about saving an AOV that you were about to lose. It helps keep people from leaving and secures the sale.

Easy Payments
This is all about making things easier, which helps sales.

How it works: The AI remembers how someone likes to pay and ship. It doesn’t make them enter their card if it knows they always use a specific payment method. It adds rewards or gift cards automatically.
Example: Someone comes back to buy something. The AI already fills in their shipping, chooses their carrier, and shows a Pay button making it very easy .
The AOV Result: By making things super easy, you stop people from leaving because the checkout is too long or hard.

The Important Number: How Checkout AI Improves ROAS

Getting more AOV is great, but what’s even better is how this affects your ROAS.

ROAS is simple: (Money Made From Ads) / (Money Spent on Ads).

AI at the checkout helps both.

If you’re looking at what your competition is doing, you’ll be waiting for them to do something first. If you look at your customers, you can lead the way.- Jeff Bezos, Founder of Amazon

Checkout is key to better ROAS. Here’s how:

Way 1: More Money (The Obvious Part)
This is the most direct way. By using the AOV tricks we talked about (suggestions, bundles), the money made off each buyer goes up.

The Math: You spend $1,000 on ads and get 100 people to buy (a $10 Cost Per Acquisition).
Without Checkout AI: Your AOV is $50. You make $5,000.
- ROAS = $5,000 / $1,000 = 5x
With Checkout AI: Your AOV goes up just 20% to $60. You make $6,000.
- ROAS = $6,000 / $1,000 = 6x

You didn’t spend any more on ads, but your ROAS went up.

Way 2: More Sales (Fixing the Problems)
Like we said, a special checkout that’s easy to use helps keep people from leaving. This means that more of the people you paid to get to your site will actually buy something.

The Math: You spend $1,000 on ads and get 1,000 clicks to your site.
Without Checkout AI: Your site turns 2% of visitors into buyers. You get 20 sales.
With Checkout AI: Your checkout helps fix problem areas and raises your rate to 2.5%. You get 25 sales.
The ROAS Result: You got 5 extra sales from the same ads. Studies show AI can raise rates by 30%, which means a higher ROAS.

Way 3: Better Ads (Learning and Improving)
This is the best part. The information you get at the checkout is very useful.

How it works: The AI learns what offers and bundles actually work. It learns that people who buy one thing also buy another or that people who care about price like free shipping.
The Feedback: This information then goes back to your ad platforms. You can find people who are like those who accepted an offer or who spend a lot, not just those who visited a page.
The ROAS Result: Your ads get better. You don’t waste money on those who don’t want to buy.