RichRelevance Shopping Insights™ Study Unveils How Social Platforms Fare Leading into Holiday 2013
Data from nearly seven hundred million shopping sessions reveals which networks are driving more sessions, conversion, sales and average order value
San Francisco, CA – Nov. 26, 2013 – RichRelevance® today released its Social Media Shopping Infographic. The data analyzes nearly seven hundred million online shopping sessions to showcase how social channels are impacting ecommerce and how they stack up against each other in the lead up to the 2013 Holiday Shopping Season.
“While social shopping remains a small percentage of total online commerce, our findings show that there are key trends that retailers can glean from consumer habits and preferences in these channels,” said David Selinger, CEO of RichRelevance. “The key takeaway is that each social channel is unique and can deliver different types of benefits to a brand’s marketing efforts.”
Although social channels account for less than one-percent of total online shopping sessions, some trends remain and others have emerged. Of all social sites, Facebook produces more than three times the number of sessions and 10 times the number of orders than the next most prolific social site, Polyvore. Pinterest has been gaining ground on Facebook with 25% of social shopping sessions (up 14% from last year) and now generates more than double the average order value (AOV) of Facebook. Twitter continues to produce the smallest numbers across the board. Other key findings include:
Facebook Dominates Social Shopping Sessions, Traffic
- Of all social sites, Facebook produces more than 3X the number of sessions (4.31M) than the next social network (Polyvore 1.41M sessions). It also drives the most traffic, accounting for 60% of social sessions.
- While Facebook dominates, Pinterest has grown more than 10% in the last year and now accounts for 1.1M sessions.
- Twitter delivers the least amount of social shopping sessions (322K), and accounts for only 5% of traffic.
Facebook Leads Conversion, Orders
- Facebook’s conversion rate (2.69%) is comparable to that of non-social shopping sessions, which is 2.98%.
- Moreover, Facebook generates more than seven times more orders than the next most successful social site (Polyvore)
- Polyvore, Pinterest and Twitter show conversion rates of 1.17%, .96% and .49%, respectively.
Polyvore Drives Highest AOV
- While Facebook saw the most sales during this period ($10.7M), Polyvore drove the highest AOV per session with consumers spending $383.34 per session.
- Pinterest followed Polyvore in AOV with $199.16 per session, which was more than double Facebook ($92.27) and more than triple Twitter ($58.02).
“Facebook’s audience is huge, so it’s not surprising that they drive a mass audience, with somewhat lower average spend, on retailer sites, ” said Diane Kegley, RichRelevance’s Chief Marketing Officer. “Pinterest and Polyvore attract a different shopper—in large part because the user experience is predicated on highly visual, catalog-like sites. Furthermore, because Polyvore attracts an audience of predisposed shoppers, the high AOV this site drives is not that surprising.”
The full infographic and data is available here.
Methodology
This RichRelevance Shopping Insights™ study is based on data gleaned from more than 689 million shopping sessions that took place between January 1 and September 31, 2013, on select US sites which have deployed RichRelevance’s retail recommendation software. The study includes only browser-based shopping sessions and does not include shopping that may originate from mobile app versions of these platforms. Sessions are defined as Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, or Polyvore respectively, if the referrer for that session originated from that site.
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About RichRelevance
RichRelevance is the global leader in omni-channel personalization. More than 160 international companies use RichRelevance to turn data into actionable insight, which delivers the most relevant experience for consumers as they shop across web, store and mobile. RichRelevance drives more than one billion decisions every day, and has delivered over $10 billion in attributable sales to its clients, which include Target, Marks & Spencer and Priceminister. Recently, the company opened its cloud-based platform to allow clients to easily merge disparate data sources and build real-time applications tailored to their specific business needs. RichRelevance is headquartered in San Francisco and serves clients in 40 countries from 10 offices around the globe. For more information, please visit www.richrelevance.com.
