• by November 14, 2000

Will this year's online holiday shopping season be as exciting as last year's? Last year, pundits predicted that this year's online holiday shopping season would start earlier. But a number of reports made it into the spotlight yesterday, leaving people in the advertising and e-tailing industries very confused.

For one, Nielsen//NetRatings says the holiday shopping season has yet to begin - the week ending November 5 showed a zero percent growth over the prior week. "Last year's holiday shopping season began with a big bang right after people put away their Halloween costumes," said Sean Kaldor, VP of eCommerce at NetRatings. "This year we are not seeing the same trends."

In contrast, Media Metrix said a 12-month audience measurement trend showing that the proportion of visitors to shopping sites throughout 2000 already resembles the holiday season of 1999.

In terms of spending, researchers are more consistent. New research from the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) and Harris Interactive (HI) shows that holiday online shoppers expect to spend 22% of their holiday budgets online. Accordingly, 88% intend to buy as many or more gifts online this year as they did last year, and they also expect to spend more. In 1999, the average online shopper spent $170 on holiday gifts, this year, those same consumers expect to spend $240.

Jupiter Research, however is slightly more optimistic, estimating that 6.3 million will spend the majority (more than 50%) of their holiday budget online this year - an increase of 294% from 1999 when only 1.6 million spent the majority of their budget shopping online.

One thing is clear, though. No matter what people spend online, the Internet will influence how they spend the rest. Two-thirds say they will use the Internet to compare prices before they buy an item from a store. Even among the online population who do not plan to purchase online, more than a quarter will use the web to compare prices, review product info, and generate gift ideas.