UK shoppers have embraced the rise of social media shopping and noted that buy-now,-pay-later schemes prompt impulse purchases, according to Royal Mail.
Though the ability to shop on TikTok and Instagram is still relatively new, Royal Mail said that almost half of British online shoppers had purchased items due to such apps.
Some 46% of 2,000 surveyed adults said they had been driven to buy items online over the past year based on what they had seen on social media.
This was mainly through Meta Platforms Inc (NASDAQ:FB)-owned Facebook, Royal Mail said, followed by Instragam and TikTok.
These apps themselves have introduced shops on their platforms in recent years in a bid to capture the growing use of social media to shop.
Instagram, for instance, introduced a shopping feature in 2020, following the addition of a marketplace at sister company Facebook in 2016 while ByteDance’s TikTok added its shop this year.
According to a Shopify survey earlier this month, the addition of these shops has coincided with a rise in ‘Gen Zers’ purchasing items through social media.
Almost half of those aged between 18 and 29 will shop through social media apps directly in America this festive period, Shopify found, with analysts pointing to a shift in fashion trends towards what influencers advertise online.
Back in the UK, Royal Mail also highlighted the increasing adoption of buy-now-pay-later options by retailers, with the company reporting that almost two-thirds of respondents felt they encouraged impulse purchasing.
“Shoppers are continuing to choose online over going to stores but they’re doing more research and looking for validation in multiple places,” chief commercial operator Nick Landon said.