Facebook, Mobile are Hijacking E-Commerce Traffic, Study Finds
Just when you thought Facebook couldn't get any bigger, a recent study from Webtrends titled The Effect of Social Networks and the Mobile Web on Website Traffic and the Inevitable Rise of Facebook Commerce, shows that Fortune 500 brands are seeing more web traffic go to their Facebook pages than their websites.
The study was based on unique visits to brands' websites over a three-month span from August 2010 to November 2010. The data was collected by Compete.com. Unique visits to a Facebook page were measured in terms of fan count. Therefore, the number of newly added fans represents the minimum number of unique visitors, not people who visited the site and didn't click the "Like" button or returning customers.
Of the Fortune 100 companies surveyed, 68 percent said they're experiencing shrinkage in unique visits to their website, with an average drop of 23 percent. Out of 44 of those companies sampled, 40 percent found that they had higher traffic volumes to their Facebook page.
Companies that have a Facebook store saw, on average, a 1 percent to 10 percent base level of traffic, with the stores averaging a 17 percent social engagement rate, expressed in likes and shares per visitor. The conversion rates for Facebook stores ranged from 2 percent to 4 percent, which is on par with regular e-commerce sites. Visitors spent an average of two minutes and 50 seconds on Facebook storefronts, viewing an average of 5.9 pages per visit. What's more, Adgregate Markets, a provider of social commerce solutions, has signed over 50 Fortune 500 retailers who are looking to open f-commerce stores this year, indicating that while this trend is still in its early stages, it's set to explode.
Of the 22 companies in the study that don't have a Facebook store, 65 percent of them received more unique visits to their Facebook page than their website.
Facebook isn't the only thing threatening e-commerce sites. Mobile is another fast-growing trend, illustrated by the rise in the number of mobile-ready websites, which grew from 150,000 in 2008 to 3 million in 2010 — an increase of 2,000 percent. A report from PayPal revealed that there was a 300 percent increase in mobile shopping and payments during the 2010 holiday season, making it clear that mobile is a field that can't be ignored.
Social and mobile networks will continue to grow, leading to a vastly different web traffic landscape. As a result, retailers must be fully aware of these channels and adapt to the changes as Facebook and smartphones continue to revolutionize the way people shop, share and interact online.
