Kaspersky has released a global survey report examining consumer shopping behavior on Black Friday or Cyber Monday. The report found that social media is now playing a significant role in people's buying decisions during the holiday shopping season.

More than half (58%) of social media users said they attempt to get whichever special deals their favorite influencers and online bloggers recommend. The survey also found that 90 percent of Black Friday and Cyber Monday purchases occur spontaneously. Women (22%) are the more dedicated super-sales shoppers than men (17%), and most respondents (69%) wait for big events to get the best deals.

Black Friday online sales grew 3.5 percent to $65.3 billion globally in 2022, while consumer spent $1.14 trillion online globally across the entire holiday season. Kaspersky's survey sought to explore users' behavior and habits related to these major sales events.

The results show that bloggers, friends and relatives have a major influence on spontaneous purchases. For example, 58% of respondents are willing to buy a product if they saw it in recommendations from bloggers they follow. At the same time, 40% of users are ready to buy something unplanned if they receive a recommendation from friends or family members. Among people aged 25 to 34, 23 percent said that they will always buy something spontaneously during these events, significantly more than in any other age group.

As for the importance of big sales events for respondents, 71 percent said they will wait until big events like Black Friday or Cyber Monday to get the best deals. Seventy-five percent of consumers said that they make use of the run-up to these events to plan their bigger purchases in advance, hoping to make the most of price cuts and special deals.

"For many, Black Friday and Cyber Monday are a great way to save serious money on a variety of purchases, so each year, these days are marked by unprecedented excitement and interest in online and offline shopping," said Marina Titova, vice president, consumer product marketing at Kaspersky. "As our research shows, 90 percent of users buy things spontaneously during big sales events and may not pay much attention to safety, trying to snatch the best offer. Our solutions for safe online shopping - like Kaspersky Premium - can be a reliable assistant in online payments security, which will protect not only your personal data, but also financial information, and will also warn you so you don't end up on a phishing site."

The full report, "The Super Sale Game: who's the winner? A study on how we shop and pay" is available here.