If you’re new to the game, shopping cart abandonment measures the amount of times customers visit an ecommerce site and go through the process of buying a product, only to bounce off a shopping cart page without making a transaction.

Nicholls’ findings show that while the average shopping cart abandonment rate peaks in October, shoppers are getting more savvy about searching for hot deals on a weekly basis with the highest abandonment rate occurring on weekends – especially Sundays.

Nicholls makes a great point that consumers are searching for a deal, and the lure of Cyber Monday Specials affects not only these shopping trends, but the early November shopping promotions as well. People are just smarter. We want promo codes from RetailMeNot and deep discounts we can’t afford to pass on. And if we feel like we can save a buck by waiting a week – why not? We’re already willing to buy it online.

To conquer this cart abandonment in 2010, we might see realtors turn to discount offers within the cart process to promote the “unexpected savings” of a limited time opportunity. Maybe it’s a time sensitive discount offer – giving the customer five minutes to make the purchase, or maybe it has something to do with the IP address – limiting one discount per week. Either way, retailers need to make a change if they want to capture those cart abandoners in the days and weeks leading up to the Cyber Monday Specials.

Yahoo thinks not!

Last year’s November advertising data produced some tell-tale signs that Cyber Monday isn’t necessarily the day of reckoning for online retailers that everybody once thought. Black Friday is actually a bigger fixture in terms of conversion rate.

The Yahoo Network Insights Team’s survey was enlightening:

“When compared with the average day in November, Black Friday showed a 147% increase in conversions, while Cyber Monday had a 73% increase in conversions.”

So what does this mean for you, the consumer?

Be prepared to see more deals on Black Friday this year as advertisers adjust their holiday sales strategies. Research early and be prepared to snatch up specials before Cyber Monday.

Watch the Cyber Monday Specials RSS feed for details on the best of these deals throughout the Fall to stay on top of the bargains!