A new survey finds 73% of shoppers find products on social media but only 10% purchase there.
Shoppers find products on social media, they are just buying them elsewhere.
In fact, 73% of shoppers say they regularly find products while browsing social media but only 10% go on to make the purchase within the platform, according to a Coveo survey with Arlington Research of 4,000 U.S. and U.K. adults in November 2024.
After shoppers discover products on social media, shoppers say the next step they typically take is:
- Try to find the product on a marketplace like Amazon, eBay or AliExpress— 38%
- Navigate to and purchase the product via the retailer’s website — 18%
- See if the product is in stock at my preferred local store — 18%
- Purchase the product via the social media site — 10%
- I’ve never discovered a product through social media — 16%
Despite only 10% of shoppers saying they purchase via social media after finding a product they like, in a separate question, 37% of consumers say they are likely (somewhat at 25%, very at 13%) to make a purchase directly through a social media platform.
This discrepancy of how many shoppers say they are actually purchasing on social media is likely because social media is still viewed as a discovery channel and not a primary purchasing channel, said Peter Curran, general manager of commerce at Coveo.
“Shoppers are open to the idea, but trust, checkout friction, and product confidence hold them back,” he said. “Social platforms perform well from a discovery perspective, but when it’s time to buy, most shoppers prefer to turn to trusted marketplaces or retailers.”
When shoppers go to a retail site to look for a product, they also can run into friction. If shoppers are looking for a product on a website and they can’t find what they want from the search bar:
- 53% use a search engine, such as Google, to look for a product
- 36% adjusts their search terms
- 36% visit a different website to find the product
- 30% use filters to narrow down options
- 26% browse other parts of the website
The survey also asked consumers about sharing their personal data. At 71%, the majority of shoppers say they restrict their data sharing to what’s absolutely necessary. Although, a large chunk of shoppers say they will share their data with brands they trust (58%), if it means they get better deals (53%), and if it improves personalization (48%).
The survey also found that 90% of shoppes say the online shopping experience should be better (40%) or equal to (50%) the in-store experience. The remaining 10% said online is worse than store shopping.
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