CartGoals vs Hextom Free Shipping Bar

CartGoals vs Hextom Free Shipping Bar

Hextom Free Shipping Bar is one of the oldest and most popular progress bar apps on Shopify. Here’s how CartGoals compares.

Quick Comparison

What Hextom Does Well

Hextom has been around since the early days of Shopify apps and has several strengths:

1. Proven Track Record

• Thousands of installs
• Years of merchant feedback
• Stable, reliable codebase
• Well-documented

2. Low Entry Price

• $9.99/month for premium features
• Affordable for small stores
• No long-term commitment

3. Simple, Focused Feature Set

• Does one thing well: free shipping bars
• Not bloated with extra features
• Easy to understand interface

4. Geo-Targeting

• Set different thresholds per country
• Handles multi-currency stores
• Regional customization

What CartGoals Does Better

1. A/B Testing (Exclusive to CartGoals)

Hextom’s blind spot: You install it, set a threshold ($75? $100? $50?), and hope it works.

CartGoals’ approach: Test $75 vs $100 and see which actually converts better.

Example beta merchant results:

• Tested free shipping at $75 vs $100
• $75 converted 18% better
• Changed threshold based on data
• Increased revenue by $890/month

Hextom provides zero data on what works. You’re guessing.

2. True Multi-Goal Stacking

Hextom: Can show up to 3 goals on paid plan, but display is basic.

CartGoals: Unlimited stacked goals (Premium) with visual progress for each:

Your Cart: $127
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
✅ Free Shipping at $75 (UNLOCKED! 🎉)
✅ 10% Off at $100 (UNLOCKED! ✨)
⬜ Free Gift at $150 (85% complete - add $23)
⬜ VIP Discount at $200 (64% complete)

Customers see the full journey, not just “spend $X more for shipping.”

3. Auto-Theme Color Matching

Hextom setup:

1. Open theme editor
2. Find brand colors manually
3. Copy hex codes
4. Paste into Hextom settings
5. Hope it matches

CartGoals setup:

1. Install app
2. Done (auto-extracts theme colors)

Saves 15 minutes per setup. Updates automatically if you change themes.

4. Checkout Conversion Tracking

Hextom tracks: Cart adds, cart value updates CartGoals tracks: Everything Hextom does + actual checkout completions

Why this matters: Cart activity ≠ revenue. CartGoals shows which goals drive actual purchases, not just cart browsing.

5. Built-In Multi-Language

Hextom: Provides empty translation fields. You manually translate “Free Shipping at” into German, French, Spanish…

CartGoals: Works in 10 languages out of the box. Proper pluralization, currency formatting, date localization.

Pricing Analysis

Hextom Pricing

• Free Plan: Single goal, basic features
• Premium Plan: $9.99/month
  • Up to 3 goals
  • Geo-targeting
  • Custom styling
  • Priority support

CartGoals Pricing

• Free Plan: Up to 5 stacked goals, basic animations
• Standard Plan: $39.99/month
  • Unlimited goals
  • A/B testing
  • Premium animations
  • Checkout tracking
• Premium Plan: $69.99/month
  • Everything in Standard
  • Onboarding call
  • Priority support
  • Advanced customization

Price vs Value

Hextom at $9.99: Great if you just need a simple free shipping bar and don’t care about data.

CartGoals at $39.99: Worth it if A/B testing reveals even a $5 AOV increase.

Example ROI calculation:

• Store: 200 orders/month
• CartGoals A/B test reveals: Changing goal from $100 to $75 increases AOV by $8
• Additional revenue: 200 × $8 = $1,600/month
• CartGoals cost: $39.99/month
• Net profit: $1,560/month

Hextom can’t provide this data. You’d never know if $75 or $100 works better.

Who Should Choose Hextom?

Choose Hextom Free Shipping Bar if:

• ✅ Budget is primary concern ($9.99 vs $39.99)
• ✅ Simple single free shipping goal is all you need
• ✅ Don’t need analytics - “set and forget” approach
• ✅ Small store (<100 orders/month) where $30 extra/month matters
• ✅ Testing the progress bar concept before committing

Who Should Choose CartGoals?

Choose CartGoals if:

• ✅ Want to prove ROI - Data-driven decisions
• ✅ Run multiple campaigns - Stack 3-5+ goals
• ✅ Sell internationally - Multi-language support
• ✅ Medium-large store (200+ orders/month) where AOV increase pays for itself
• ✅ Value brand consistency - Auto-theme matching
• ✅ Premium positioning - Sophisticated animations, not basic bars

Migration from Hextom to CartGoals

If you’re currently using Hextom and considering CartGoals:

1. Install CartGoals (run both apps simultaneously for testing)
2. Replicate your Hextom goals in CartGoals
3. Run A/B test: Hextom setup vs CartGoals setup
4. Let data decide: After 100-200 orders, check which performs better
5. Keep the winner

No commitment required. Test both, keep what works.

Research & Data

Cart abandonment baseline:

• 70.19% of carts are abandoned (Baymard Institute, 2024)
• 48% abandon due to unexpected costs (shipping fees)
• 88% more likely to complete when free shipping is visible

Goal-gradient effect:

• Customers accelerate purchases as they approach rewards (Kivetz et al., 2006)
• Visual progress bars leverage this psychological principle
• Both Hextom and CartGoals benefit from this effect

The difference: CartGoals tells you which thresholds trigger the effect. Hextom doesn’t.

Technical Comparison

Performance: Both apps are fast. No significant difference.

Support & Documentation

Hextom:

• Email support
• Knowledge base
• Response time: 24-48 hours

CartGoals:

• Email support (all tiers)
• Premium: 1-on-1 onboarding call
• Documentation + video guides
• Response time: <24 hours

Bottom Line

Hextom is a solid, affordable free shipping bar. If you need basic functionality and $9.99 fits your budget, it works.

CartGoals is the data-driven choice. If you want to know whether your progress bar actually increases revenue (and by how much), CartGoals is the only app with built-in A/B testing.

The $30/month difference between Hextom ($9.99) and CartGoals Standard ($39.99) pays for itself if CartGoals’ A/B testing reveals even a $2 AOV improvement per order.

For a store with 200 orders/month:

• $2 AOV increase = $400 extra revenue
• CartGoals cost = $40
• Net profit = $360/month

Hextom can’t provide this optimization. It’s a static progress bar.

References

• Baymard Institute (2024). Cart Abandonment Statistics.
• Kivetz, R., Urminsky, O., & Zheng, Y. (2006). The Goal-Gradient Hypothesis Resurrected. Journal of Marketing Research.

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Hextom Free Shipping Bar is a trademark of Hextom. CartGoals is not affiliated with or endorsed by Hextom.