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About 39 million Russians use social commerce, shopping in online social channels such as social media, instant messengers, classified ad websites, and other P2P platforms.
The number of users paying for goods and services at these websites will continue increasing over time, according to the Yandex.Checkout and Data Insight analysts after studying the customer behaviour in online social channels as well as user buying preferences, and transaction scenarios at different platforms.
In the past year, Russians spent $8.98 billion (591 billion rubles) on goods and services in social channels. 40% of orders were paid online. 33% of social channels purchases were paid via bank cards, 11% via electronic wallets, 8% with bank accounts.
Portrait of a social commerce customer
Men and women are equally interested in shopping via social commerce channels: 49% of all customers at these platforms are men, 51% are women. Men make up the majority of users on classified ad platforms (53% of buyers), women in social networks (56%). Women make 4 times more purchases at joint purchase websites than men.
In general, customers who use social commerce channels are a solvent audience. 18% of them have an income per month of more than $1,477 per family, 38% earn $739 to $1,476. The average ticket size for purchases via social channels is approximately $22.5, but users often decide on larger purchases: 8% of social channels purchases are made on products priced $148 or more.
Cards and cash are equally popular in most social commerce channels. In general, 34% of purchases in these channels are paid for with cash, 33% with cards. However, 51% of orders on joint purchase websites are paid with cards, 47% of transactions on advertisement sites are paid in cash. Payments from e-wallets are most often used in instant messengers: 16% of orders there are paid from wallets with 11% being the average for this payment method.
Every third customer buys regularly
More than 26 million Russians have used the services of sharing economy services over the past 12 months. About 21 million purchased something via social networks, almost 12 million on classified ad platforms, and about 5 million via messengers.
Almost a third (31%) of users have made purchases via social media at least once in the past 12 months. Every tenth user of instant messengers paid for an order in this channel. In general, 55% of the online audience over the past year have made purchases on any of the online social platforms.
Social online channels show a monthly average of 3 orders per customer, yet 26% of those who pay for purchases via social networks do so between 6 and 20 times a month, with 4% making over 20 purchases. Thus, 46% pay for more than 1 order per week.
The sharing economy websites show the lowest purchase frequency. More than 40% of users of these platforms pay for orders only once a month.
Classified ad services and social networks have the highest activity among users: 69% of buyers on these channels make 2 or more orders per month.
When it comes to specific social commerce platforms, then largest number of customers are shopping via Vkontakte (44% of all Russian users paying for goods and services in social channels), with Avito (28%) and Youla (16%) in second and third places respectively.
Most often, users browse Avito to buy plants and animals (12%), computers, tech, and household appliances (9%), various services (9%), while at Youla, they look for children’s products (14%), apparel and footwear (13%), tech and household appliances (13%).
Most often people use social channels to shop for everyday products. 15.7% of purchases are made for apparel and footwear, 10.1% for food, 8.2% for tech and household appliances.
Further on, the popularity of shopping via social networks will continue growing. 25% of users who’ve never bought via these websites before plan to try it soon.
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