Indians take advice on social media before shopping online according to new research.

Frost & Sullivan says more than 60 per cent of Internet users in urban India spend four hours and more a day browsing online for various purposes, including entertainment, social networking, business, academics and shopping.

Over 130 million Indians are connected to the web via fixed and mobile broadband and over 60 million are registered on Facebook and 20 million on LinkedIn. Frost & Sullivan finds that nearly 50 per cent of young urban Indians spend more than two hours on social media sites daily.

Interestingly, consumers are increasingly relying on social media to make their purchases – either as informed choices, or through peer conditioning. Empowered by social media, consumers are becoming forthright and fearless with their opinions and share views on news, politics, products, movies, and food, among others, says the study.

It says that over 67 per cent of urban Indians are influenced by social media in their purchasing decisions.

The survey further revealed that for over 30 per cent of the respondents, friends or peer-reference influenced their online shopping; 17 per cent were influenced by social media sites such as ads, product reviews, recommendations, product launch announcements and others.

And over 40 per cent of the respondents indicated that they purchased one or more items after seeing it on a social networking site, with many of these purchases routed through ads on the sites.

“For improved results and generating increased revenues online, companies need to find means to integrate online portals with social media,” says Vidya Nath, research director, ICT practice, Frost & Sullivan.

“They will also have to watch customer behaviour closely to chart their marketing strategies for the still evolving online shopping medium in India.”