Retail websites continue to perform strongly

It would appear that UK shoppers are leaving more of their Christmas shopping to the last minute this year, with visits to Shopping & Classifieds sites reaching a new peak of 14.85% for the week ending December 10. Whilst the week-on-week increase was less than 1%, at this time last year visits were already in decline.

Hitwise has recently published its UK Online Research Note which includes analysis of the best performing shopping sites in the run-up to Christmas. To request the summary of these findings, click here. (offer valid until 31st December 2005).

Latest analysis of the Hitwise UK Shopping & Classifieds category:

• Earlier this year, Hitwise predicted that the online retail sector would grow 25% in share of visits from July to December 2005. Monthly data for November reveal that the sector has actually grown by 26% from July through to November, cementing an excellent few months for online retail in the UK.

• The Shopping & Classifieds category captured 14.85% of all UK Internet visits for the week ending December 10, 2005 - a new online retail peak - and represents a 14% increase over the same week in 2004.

• The retail sub-categories responsible for driving this further growth were Flowers & Gifts, with a 9% week-on-week increase, Intimate Apparel & Accessories with an 8% increase, and Music with a 6% increase.

• eBay continues to lead the pack of pure-play retailers who dominated 4 out of the top 5 most visited retail sites for the week ending December 10; Argos was the only traditional retailer in the top 5.

• The leading product-related search terms driving traffic to retail web sites were 'mobile phones', 'broadband', 'ipod' and 'digital cameras'.

• Apple's iPod is set to be a popular Christmas gift again this year - among the top 20 product search terms sending visits to retail websites, 3 include the keyword 'ipod'.

• Searches for 'ipod' are also more important to retail websites. The volume of visits that searches for 'ipod' represented to retail websites had increased 23% comparing week ending December 10, 2005 over the same week in 2004.

Fast Mover: Oxfam Unwrapped

www.oxfamunwrapped.com


Position week ending November 19: 495
Position week ending December 10: 180
Positions jumped: 315

The Oxfam site which allows visitors to make a gift donation, has enjoyed unprecedented market share in the run up to Christmas. For the week ending December 10, market share of visits to the site were up 244% year-on-year, with the site also taking the #1 ranking within the Community - Humanitarian category for the first time.

Oxfam Unwrapped is performing well against mainstream retailers as well. Last year the site peaked at a ranking of #369 based on visits to the Shopping & Classifieds category for the week ending 18th December 2004, whilst this year the site had already climbed to rank #180 for the week ending 10th December.

News In Brief

Cold weather snap fuels online shopping

Several recent studies suggested that high petrol prices and cold weather were fuelling a boom in online retailing, and Hitwise data reveal that consumers have been showing unseasonably high concern for the weather. Searches for 'weather' were up 430% year-on-year for the week ending November 26, and up 156% compared with the previous week - coinciding with the cold weather spell recently experienced in the UK.

The BBC was the preferred source for information on the weather, with 51% of visits from the search term 'weather' going to www.bbc.co.uk in the four weeks ending November 26. The Weather Channel (www.weather.com) and Met Office (www.metoffice.gov.uk) each received just short of 10% of visits each from the term.

World Cup Ticket Scramble

With the last major phase of World Cup ticket sales opening on Monday December 12, Hitwise reports a boost in traffic to the FIFA official website as fans scrambled for the 250,000 seats up for grabs.

Visits to www.fifa.com doubled from the previous day, with the site becoming the 7th most visited Football site in the UK.

The World Cup draw, which took place on December 9, also saw a corresponding spike in searches on German destinations as the draw for England was revealed. Searches on 'cologne' shot up 90% for the week ending December 10 as fans looked to book flights for the match against Sweden on June 20 next year.

Category Spotlight: Sports - Football

This category encompasses all websites related to soccer. The data below is based on All sites » Weekly rankings for the week ending 17/12/2005 » Ranks by 'Visits'.

Local Competitiveness Index 85.7% 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. Computers and Internet 40.8% 2. Sports 28.4% 3. Computers and Internet - Search Engines and Directories 23.0% 4. Sports - Football 17.8% 5. Entertainment 8.8% 6. News and Media 7.1% 7. Shopping and Classifieds 6.5% 8. Computers and Internet - Net Communities and Chat 4.0% 9. Computers and Internet - Email Services 3.8% 10. Business and Finance 2.9%	Top 10 Downstream Categories 1. Sports 31.5% 2. Computers and Internet 25.4% 3. Sports - Football 20.7% 4. Entertainment 14.6% 5. Shopping and Classifieds 12.4% 6. Computers and Internet - Search Engines and Directories 8.4% 7. News and Media 7.5% 8. Computers and Internet - Net Communities and Chat 7.1% 9. Business and Finance 4.4% 10. Entertainment - Games 3.7%

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Copyright Hitwise Pty Ltd, December 2005