Hitwise releases its UK Online Retail Report

The UK Online Retail Report provides an overview of the retail sector as of July 2005, a review of the category at Christmas 2004, projections for the growth of the category for Christmas 2005 and insights into best practices adopted by successful retailers last December.

To request your complimentary copy of the Hitwise UK Online Retail Report, click here. Some key insights from the report include:

• The Shopping & Classifieds category grew 12% in July 2005 compared with July 2004.

• Auctions is the largest sub-category within the Shopping & Classifieds parent category. This is largely driven by the popularity of eBay UK, the top ranked Shopping & Classifieds site in July 2005.

• Visits to online retailers peaked the week ending December 4, 2004 last year. This peak was largely driven by visits to eBay UK with many other popular Christmas shopping sub-categories peaking the following week ending December 11, 2004. eBay's early peak is likely due to the increased lead time needed to accommodate uncertainty over the outcome of auctions, mailing times from independent sellers, and the fact that buyers can't pick up purchases in store.

• Retail sites grew 23% in December 2004 compared to December 2003.

• Growth during the 2004 Christmas season was driven by many sub-categories, in particular Flowers and Gifts, Video and Games, and Music.

• Hitwise predicts that the Shopping & Classifieds category will average 13.5% of all internet visits in December 2005, and will peak the week ending December 3, 2005.

• 2005 has seen the overall market share of the industry's top 20 sites increase in comparison to last year. The top 20 sites now accounted for 57.40% of visits to retail sites in July 2005.

Fast Mover: Apple UK

www.apple.com/uk

Position on September 1, 2005: 693
Position on September 11, 2005: 377
Positions jumped: 316

The latest iPod innovation from Apple has again inspired a stampede of online enthusiasm in the UK. With the launch of the iPod Nano, an ultra-lightweight version of the original iPod, UK consumers have rushed to be the first to own the sleek, new technology.

Traffic to Apple's official UK website, www.apple.com/uk, increased by 46% from September 1 to the Nano's official launch date on September 7, and peaked on Sunday September 11 with a 84% increase from its initial position. The second biggest downstream destination from www.apple.com/uk was Apple Store (store.apple.com), attracting 1 in 5 downstream visits.

Amidst increased panic buying at pumps across the UK as concerns grew that fuel protests may disrupt supplies, searches on 'petrol prices' surged by 400% in the weeks following Hurricane Katrina. With many garages running out of petrol and prices hitting a record high, UK drivers have been flocking to the web to seek out further information.

The top destination for searches on 'petrol prices' for the 4 week period ending September 10, 2005 was www.theaa.com which publishes its Fuel Price Reports: www.theaa.com/allaboutcars/fuel/ whilst www.petrol-prices.co.uk, a service which texts registered users the cheapest price of petrol in their area each week, was the 5th most popular site receiving traffic.

Hitwise Search Intelligence further reveals that searches for 'toyota prius', Toyota's revolutionary petrol-electric hybrid car, increased by more than 200% during the disruption as UK motorists sought out information on fuel-efficient cars.

News In Brief

Hurricane Katrina sees surge in visits to weather and environmental sites

Searches on Hurricane Katrina increased 9-fold in the week following the tragedy, with traffic to the Hitwise Environment category seeing a significant surge as UK internet users struggled to comprehend the implications of the natural disaster. From August 27 to the 29th, traffic to sites in the Environment category surged by 15%. In particular, market share for the website of National Geographic (www.nationalgeographic.com) saw a pronounced spike, with traffic surging 32% from August 27 to August 31. This increase followed on from news that the environmental publication had predicted the impact of the Katrina disaster in its October 2004 issue.

While traffic to environment and lifestyle sites tapered off since the height of the disaster, the weight of visits to related charity sites continued to grow as the seriousness of the situation in New Orleans and surrounding areas became more apparent. The official website of the American Red Cross (www.redcross.org) experienced a sixteen-fold increase on its pre-hurricane share of internet visits.


Cricket overtakes football online

Cricket has now overtaken football as the UK's favourite sport online, with 73% more searches for 'cricket' than 'football' for the 4 week period ending September 10, 2005. Since the start of the Ashes in July, visits to cricket websites increased by almost 50% whilst searches have risen by more than 150%.

England's amazing performance against Australia has also resulted in searches for Andrew 'Freddie' Flintoff, the country's new sporting hero, increasing by 300% since the start of the series. Captain Michael Vaughan and Kevin Pietersen, whose maiden Test century secured the Ashes for England, have also seen a boost in searches as cricket fever gripped the nation.

On the day of the Ashes victory, the Sporting Life Ashes 2005 website (ashes2005.sportinglife.com) was the site where sports fans spent the most time, with cricket fans remaining for over 42 minutes as they anxiously checked the result. In addition, BBC Sport (news.bbc.co.uk/sport) had its highest daily market share figure for the entire year on Monday, September 12, representing 16.76% of visits made to all sports sites in the UK.

Category Spotlight: Entertainment - Gambling

Sites which offer online gambling, casino promotion and other gambling-related information. The data below is based on All sites » Weekly rankings for the week ending 17/09/2005 » Ranks by 'Visits'.

Local Competitiveness Index 79.7% of traffic to this category was directed at domestic sites.	Traffic Distribution The chart above illustrates the distribution of this category's traffic for the week among sites in various rank ranges.
Top 10 Upstream Categories 1. Entertainment 35.6% 2. Computers and Internet 34.6% 3. Entertainment - Gambling 27.6% 4. Gambling 27.6% 5. Sports 22.2% 6. Computers and Internet - Search Engines and Directories 16.4% 7. Gambling - Sport Betting 12.4% 8. Shopping and Classifieds 6.9% 9. Computers and Internet - Email Services 4.7% 10. Business and Finance 4.2%	Top 10 Downstream Categories 1. Entertainment 40.3% 2. Entertainment - Gambling 32.9% 3. Gambling 32.9% 4. Sports 25.5% 5. Computers and Internet 21.5% 6. Gambling - Sport Betting 15.0% 7. Shopping and Classifieds 10.3% 8. Computers and Internet - Search Engines and Directories 6.7% 9. Business and Finance 5.6% 10. Gambling - Casinos 5.5%

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Copyright Hitwise Pty Ltd, September 2005