The Best Postcode Lookup API for WooCommerce

E-commerce owners are always looking for new ways to increase sales, but many overlook the biggest opportunity – refining the checkout experience.  

Customers in your checkout are at the end of your sales funnel, so all your hard work marketing and creating killer product descriptions paid off. However, if your checkout isn’t fast and easy to use, people will abandon their cart.

You have to remember that online buyers are ruthless. Thanks to Amazon and leading retailers like Nike, fast checkouts and frictionless payments are minimum standards people expect. It’s your job to deliver this user experience.

You can do this by:

• Reducing steps
• Using one-page checkout
• Enabling guest checkout
• Reducing load times
• Using a faster payment gateway
• Using shop now, pay later
• Automate address lookup

The latter solution is solved with Addressify postcode lookup API, and it’s the single best upgrade you can make to speed up your customer’s checkout experience. Here’s what you need to know about it:

Postcode lookup API

Cart abandonment proves that no sales are guaranteed. Even when people go to buy, you still have work to do to win the sale.

A proven way to reduce cart abandonment is making your checkout faster, and a quick win is integrating postcode lookup into your checkout.

It takes 20-30 seconds to type out an address manually but only 2-3 seconds to use postcode lookup. By providing a postcode lookup feature, you can take advantage of auto-fill and significantly reduce user-created address errors.

If you have a WordPress WooCommerce shop, the best postcode lookup API to use is AutoPostcode. AutoPostcode has a marketplace plugin, and integrating it is simple. No other tool is as simple to use, and it requires no coding experience.

How AutoPostcode works

AutoPostcode is a UK postcode lookup tool that is linked to the Royal Mail Postcode Address File (PAF), an open database containing the postal addresses of over 30 million properties in the United Kingdom and 1.8m UK postcodes.

When a visitor uses the postcode lookup field in your checkout, the AutoPostcode API communicates with the PAF database, providing instant search results. All the user needs to do is select the correct address from the presented list.

Once selected, the postcode lookup tool will auto-fill the address field for the customer, saving them around 20 seconds. Assuming you only require an address for shipping, you can move customers to pay in less than 10 seconds!

How to use AutoPostcode

AutoPostcode takes 2 minutes to download and install and only 1 minute to set up. In less than 5 minutes, you’ll have tested and verified it!

Here’s how to use AutoPostcode:

• To use AutoPostcode, you need a WordPress website built using WooCommerce.
• The next thing you need is an AutoPostcode account. Sign up for an account for free here, and you will receive 100 lookups as part of a free trial.
• After signing up, you will be given an access token. Copy this.
• Once you’ve created your AutoPostcode account, log in to your website and search for the Addressify plugin from the plugins page. Alternatively, visit this link and download the plugin to your computer for manual installation.
• Install the plugin and activate it.
• After activating the plugin, navigate to WooCommerce / Settings / Integration from the sidebar and select the AutoPostcode Lookup tab from the admin panel. Paste your access token into the required field.
• After pasting your access token, AutoPostcode will link your website to our API.
• You can now select the features you wish to use. By default, AutoPostcode has all features turned off. Activate the postcode lookup feature for testing.
• Visit your checkout page. You should see a postcode lookup feature in your form (this happens automatically). You can test the lookup without using any of your 100 credits with the postcodes AA1 1AA, AA1 1AB, AA1 1AD and AA1 1AE.
• Did it work? Congratulations! If it didn’t, please contact us for support.

Is AutoPostcode worth the effort?

When we talk to conversion rate experts, the number one tip most have with checkouts is speed. Customers just don’t have time to waste going through a slow checkout, so it makes sense that the faster the checkout, the more sales you get.

AutoPostcode increases basket conversion rates by up to 40% because it eliminates the slowest part of checking out – typing in an address.

You have to remember that not everyone uses auto-fill on their phone and computer (this requires storing information in browsers). For these customers, postcode lookup is a way to save lots of time and a way for you to make people’s lives easier.

Another reason AutoPostcode is worth the effort is reduced errors. We estimate that 2 out of 10 (20%) of addresses inputted manually have an error. This error could be something simple, like using a 0 instead of an O or using the postcode next door.

By using AutoPostcode postcode lookup in your checkout, you significantly reduce the chances of inaccurate address information. This will help you avoid costly mistakes associated with cancelled orders and returned and undelivered mail.

Lastly, you have to factor in customer’s expectations. As we alluded to earlier, Amazon, Nike and other leading retailers have slick checkouts. As a result, consumers now expect these same experiences across the web, even from small retailers.

As a small, medium or large online retailer, checkout experience matters. The last thing you want is to lose a sale to a competitor because of something you can fix! It is critical to basket conversions and crucial in a competitive landscape where all your competitors deliver a fast, slick, user-friendly checkout.

Get 100 lookups on us!

Give AutoPostcode a try today. It’s free to sign up and trial. With a free account, you get 100 lookups on us. You can get a monthly plan to unlock more lookups or buy an annual plan. All our plans have some of the lowest costs in the industry.