South Africans’ online spending patterns and behaviour continued to evolve at a rapid pace in 2022, with more local male shoppers than females.
This is one of the key findings of the Online Retail in South Africa 2023 study, released today by technology research firm World Wide Worx, in partnership with Mastercard.
The study shows online shopping shot up from 27% of adult South Africans in 2020, to 38% in 2022.
This is despite the country’s lifting of lockdown restrictions leading to a post-pandemic rebound in foot traffic at brick-and-mortar stores.
The research includes analysis of the annual Target Group Index survey conducted by Ask Afrika. The content analysis firm interviews 16 000 South Africans every six months to gather data on their consumption (products, brands and the media), purchasing behaviour, attitudes, motivations and beliefs.
According to the e-commerce survey, the growth in the proportion of the online population’s shopping behaviour indicates an almost 40% increase in the total number of people shopping since 2020. The preliminary findings from the study released at the end of 2022 revealed SA's online retail passed the R50 billion milestone in that year.
“The most revealing aspects of the new data lie in demographic differences between South Africans,” says World Wide Worx CEO Arthur Goldstuck, principal analyst on the research project.
“The gender breakdown in particular shows the traditional gender divide in online shopping, which was dominated by males in the early years, still persists, with 41% of men and 36% of women shopping online.”
According to the report, a contributing factor to men dominating the online shopping space is due to them purchasing electronic goods more frequently, which traditionally is a male shopping domain.
However, the fact that the biggest growth areas in online shopping in recent years have been in groceries and apparel categories, traditionally dominated by women shoppers, suggests there are other factors at work.
“These may well include elements like males often controlling household budgets and men being more likely to have a credit card in a household. It shows outmoded societal norms die hard,” says Goldstuck.
Major age swing
The age breakdown of online shoppers in SA has seen a significant shift from the 2020 figures. During the pandemic, online shopping had “normalised” across age groups, and at the time, an average of 27% to 30% penetration was seen in all age groups up to the age of 64, noted Gabriel Swanepoel, country manager of Mastercard Southern Africa.
In 2022, two significant shifts occurred, according to the survey. The first was that the pattern of shopping by age returned to a previously observed pattern − namely that online shopping peaked in the 25 to 34 age bracket and then steadily dropped off with each successive age group.
The second major shift observed during the past year was in the significant drop in penetration of online shopping among the 65+ age group. This is the only age group that sees lower penetration than during the height of the pandemic.
“One conclusion that we can draw from the research is that online shopping is strongly correlated with age, but with the youngest age group constrained by lack of earning ability,” noted Swanepoel.
“A second conclusion is that the oldest age group has a strong reticence towards online shopping, which is backed up by another finding that this bracket is the most likely to still prefer in-store shopping experiences.
“Now, more than ever, it is crucial for retailers to understand their consumers. This will assist in understanding how and where to reach the targeted consumers, therefore creating a seamless consumer experience from online to in-store.”
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