The pandemic has forced most people to stay at home, logically leading to a huge increase in e-commerce spending. These sudden and unprecedented shopping behaviors are set to become a habit for many, even after the health crisis, the ease of use and convenience of home shopping are now second nature to an increasing number of consumers. But in this context, it is important to understand how consumers find and buy products in order to have a better social media strategy…
With this in mind, The Influencer Marketing Factory, an agency specializing in influencer marketing, recently conducted a survey of 350 consumers focusing on Gen Z and Millennial buyers.
The study provided insight into their social media preferences, products, and overall consumer behavior, with the main results being:
- 40% of Gen Z and Millennials surveyed bought a product while watching a live social media post;
- 53% of them said they prefer to research a product thoroughly online before buying it, while only 12% said they buy something immediately after seeing it on social media;
- 61% prefer “add to cart” (without leaving the social network), while the remaining 39% prefer “buy on third-party websites” (when exiting the app).
Generation Z and Social Commerce
The use of devices by Generation Z is increasing significantly. According to these figures:
- 98% of them have a smartphone;
- They spent an average of 4 hours a day on apps in the third quarter of last year, this figure does not include time spent on games.
However, there has been a slight change in their habits of using the social platform. Gen Z has gone beyond traditional e-commerce and embraced social commerce – the practice of shopping entirely on social media platforms. Gen Z’s social commerce platforms include Instagram, TikTok and Pinterest.
In fact, the algorithm can learn their preferences for:
- make relevant recommendations;
- Provide a personalized shopping experience (which also minimizes the risk of abandoned vehicles);
- bridging the gap between the desire to purchase and online payment;
- Push them even more to stay connected using augmented reality features, live broadcasts and other exciting options.
According to other data:
- 97% of Gen Z consumers say they now use social media as their primary source of inspiration for their purchases;
- 65% say they use social media to find entertaining content;
- 61% of them are specifically interested in watching more video content.
Brands that want to capture the attention of this particular audience should prioritize authentic, organic content over the more polished ingredients that millennials have become accustomed to producing.
Why target Generation Z?
Evolving directly into the 21st century, Gen Z is the first generation to make no distinction between online and offline reality. In fact, IBM calls them autonomous “digital natives.” In 2017, their global survey of 15,600 Generation Z members aged 13 to 21 revealed powerful results about their true economic impact. Generation Z:
- All areas of family spending influence the decisions of consumers small and large.
- It is also the leader in numbers, as it represents 32% of the world’s population. It would have surpassed Generation Y for the first time, which represents 2.47 billion of the world’s 7.7 billion residents (source: Bloomberg)
Thanks to these statistics, brands and companies have hailed Generation Z as the “next generation” of consumers in recent years.