The beauty and personal care products purchases based on social commerce in the UAE is predicted to surge to a billion dollar market by 2025, fuelled by consumers’ increasing use of social media for product discoveries and purchase decisions, a new research said.
The UAE is becoming a pioneer of social commerce in beauty and personal care, while other Middle East countries are anticipated to follow the trend soon.
“Social commerce-based purchases of beauty and personal care products have the potential to grow into a large shopping revolution and its impact on the shopping behavior is expected to grow in the coming years,” said the latest research by Redseer Strategic Consulting, a global consultancy specializing in digital services.
“The beauty and personal care market through social commerce is expected to grow 5-6 times to make it a massive $1 billion opportunity in the UAE by 2025,” the study said.
The social commerce-driven beauty and personal care products market in the UAE is currently estimated in the range of $180-$200 million.
The study also revealed that the beauty and personal care segment is the top beneficiary of the increasing trend of heavy adoption and usage of digital media platforms for product discovery and purchases.
“The trend of increasing trust towards content creators [on social media], among other aspects, is giving rise to a surge in social commerce in this sector,” Redseer said.
The market study also revealed that about one-third of online beauty and personal care shoppers in the UAE have initiated a purchase on social media channels through brand and retailer pages or engaging with their advertisements.
“There has been high search, discovery and engagement through social media advertisements, which greatly influences purchases,” it said.
According to the study, as high as 66 percent of UAE consumers use social media channels for product discovery in beauty and personal care segments, while about 28 percent take purchase decisions based on their online searches.
“While friends and family sources continue to be the top influence for purchase of beauty and personal care products in the UAE market, social media-influenced purchases are almost catching up with it,” the study said.
Celebrity-influenced purchases of these products stand way below.
The study said brands that are not cognizant of this emerging trend will lose out on creating new user experiences and widening the horizon of their revenue streams.
“However, many beauty brands have also understood the importance of such influencers and have started utilizing its potential through various collaborations,” the study said.
The study said comment sections on digital media enable buyers to obtain real time feedback, increasing the feeling of reliability and trust towards the brand.
Interestingly, the preference for social media platforms varies across age cohorts.
“Gen Z usually rely on short form content for product discovery, hence discovering products through digital media platforms like TikTok and Instagram is high for the age group.
“On the other hand, Gen X and Gen Y prefer engaging with long form content, leading to high product discovery on platforms like YouTube,” the Redseer study said.
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