Most online shoppers are familiar with this pattern:
See an ad on social media. Click on the ad that takes you to the retailer’s website. Shop there.
However, in recent years, those same social media platforms aren’t happy with only showing you the ads.
They want you to stay and shop on their platforms as well—hence the rise of social media marketplaces.
The “social commerce” as users online are calling it—is rising year after year, with big popular platforms all now having dedicated marketplaces where you can shop and sell.
With the launch of TikTok Shops late last year and its rapid growth, we decided to look into social commerce—how big it is, how big it will be, and is it just a passing fad?
🖱️📈 Clicking on each individual chart will take you to its interactive board.
Social Commerce Is Already Racking Up Billions Worldwide
Selling on social media isn’t an unproven concept.
Chinese companies have seen social commerce success—mostly thanks to Douyin—or the TikTok for the Chinese market, which is projected to rack up almost $200B in social commerce sales.
Before Douyin, the “all–in–one” WeChat app made shopping convenient, while Little Red Book—the Chinese answer to Instagram—is also approaching the $100B mark this year.
Now here’s a chart:
There you have it. Half-a-trillion-dollar proof that integrated ecommerce works.
Obviously, Chinese apps are dominating the social commerce market. But you can see that Meta, TikTok, Google with YouTube, and even Pinterest see sales in the billions of dollars.
And the revenue is likely to keep rising, as we can see in the next section.
The number of social commerce shoppers is rising in the US
Social commerce is relatively new for US shoppers.
Previously, shoppers preferred buying from designated marketplaces, or brand websites.
But thanks to the integration of commerce tools, combined with platforms going leaps and bounds to keep on you within their feeds, social commerce is becoming more popular.
Not only that, but it can also be more convenient—you see a product ad on the feed and you can complete your purchase with a couple of clicks, without leaving the platform.
This convenience seems to be working:
Most of the social platforms have seen a rise in customers over the years.
Facebook has seen a 31% increase in the past four years, while Instagram social shoppers increased 56.2% during the same period.
This rise didn’t pass unnoticed, with finance experts acknowledging that “Mark Zuckerberg is sitting on a shopping empire four times bigger than Amazon.”
Pinterest’s shoppers went up by 44.6% over the same period, which was directly reflected in the platform’s recent promising quarterly reports.
Finally, TikTok’s unreal growth and aggressive investment in e-commerce features brought the company a 915% increase in social shoppers from 2020 to 2024—with media touting it as the app to carry social commerce on its back. Wow.
Of course social shopping is at its infancy and is expected to rise in the coming years.
These were the reports in 2023:
In 2023, around 12% rarely or never shopped on social media, while slightly less than half shopped from once to several times a year.
At the same time, a bit more than one third shopped monthly, or frequently.
But notice the change here:
Just between two quarters in 2024, the sentiment towards online shopping shifted.
All of Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and even LinkedIn have seen an increase in social shopping between Q1 and Q2 2024. That’s a big jump in a short time span.
The only app that sees a decrease in social shopping is X, which might be connected to the decrease in ad spend on the platform, among other things.
Who is most likely to buy directly from social media?
You can guess once.
It’s the Zoomers, of course. And they are putting the “oldies” to shame when it comes to social commerce. Here’s the report from last year:
The reports saying Gen Z and TikTok are leading the social commerce boom are nail to the head—even back in 2023.
On the other hand, you can see that Snapchat is making a surprise comeback with Zoomers as well, with 55% likely to buy from the platform.
If you want to sell directly from users that grew up before “swiping” was a thing: Your best bet would be to post stuff on YouTube or Facebook’s marketplace.
That’s where adults in the US like millennials, Gen X, and boomers are most likely to buy.
📰 Further reading: Social media and selling to Zoomers go hand in hand. If you want to learn more about the Gen Z’s shopping behavior, you can find a lot of data in a story we did earlier this year.
What products do social media users buy directly from the platforms?
Some products sell better than others on social media marketplaces:
Apparel and accessories sell well on social media marketplaces, as are health and wellness products, personal care products, and groceries and food supplies.
If your brand falls in any of these industries or categories, it might not be the worst idea to add your store to the social marketplace and run some ads.
But if you’re selling higher-ticket items or products where more context is required—such as dedicated landing page explainers, testimonials, how-to guides—it’s still better to have a designated website.
🤳🏻 Different social platforms attract different social shoppers.
For example, Instagram’s marketplace works best for apparel, while you might find most success selling beauty products on TikTok, according to reports.
Why do users turn to social media marketplaces?
We’ve already mentioned convenience.
And it seems to be among the leading factors that would drive online shoppers to social media marketplaces.
Here’s the rest:
Deals and discounts are the biggest needle movers, no surprise.
Another thing that would attract customers to social commerce are exclusive offers—but also faster and seamless payments, which most platforms are incorporating.
Moreover, customers are also likely to buy on social media platforms if they see more customer reviews and see products on real customers.
What can you do: Most marketplaces show stand-alone product shots.
But if you run ads to the marketplace, you might want to include photos of real people using the product, as well as some testimonials in the copy.
And here’s also why:
According to this report, users don’t trust platforms where they’d have to enter payment information.
Thus, look to sell on marketplaces that either integrate with most popular payment processors, or most popular platforms with secure payments.
There’s also the fact that users can’t see customer reviews on socials—and it’s a problem that platforms might want to tackle in the near future.
But there’s one telling thing. Over 37% aren’t even aware that you can shop directly from the social media marketplace.
This further solidifies the idea that social media marketplaces are just starting.
And as more people become aware of their existence, there will be more shopping—and growth.
Let’s shop on socials
The data tells us that social commerce might reshape how online shopping works.
Platforms like Meta, YouTube, and TikTok lead the charge—all looking to offer the most seamless experience for their users and keep their eyes locked on their feeds.
And as more users discover the convenience of shopping directly from their social feeds, the trend might grow. And grow exponentially.
It’s up to you whether you’ll tap into social marketplaces, but if you do—keep in mind that customers would still prefer hearing and seeing real people and real experiences.
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