• by Michael Shields , April 9, 2004

Oprah Winfrey's power appears to be limitless. Besides having the ability to essentially dictate the top spot on the New York Times Bestseller list and launch the superstar career of a certain folksy shrink, Oprah now has influence in cyberspace--specifically over Web traffic.

A new report from Hitwise demonstrates Oprah's influence on the "Health & Medical Wellbeing category," which encompasses 274 diet- and health-related sites analyzed by the online competitive intelligence company.

Following fitness guru Bob Greene's March 29 appearance on Oprah, and prominent promotion within the Mind and Body section of the talk show host's Web site, traffic to Greene's site--www.getwiththeprogram.org--skyrocketed during the week ending April 3. The site went from a ranking of 135 to number 7 in Hitwise's Health & Medical Wellbeing Category. More than 30 percent of the site's traffic came via a link from www.oprah.com.

"That is one of the biggest jumps we've seen," said Bill Tancer, vice president of research for Hitwise, which has been tracking Web site usage in the United States for about a year. "The biggest jump we have ever seen from a 'TV promotion' was, of course, the 'wardrobe malfunction' during the Super Bowl."

The Greene site also made a huge leap in market share within the category, increasing by an astronomical 1,127 percent. It jumped from a paltry .14 percent on March 27 to 1.92 percent on April 3.

Hitwise reports that traffic in the Health & Medical Wellbeing category doubled during the week of January 3, as New Year's resolutions went into full force. However, since that period, traffic has plummeted by 26 percent. The category is dominated by Weight Watchers' 18.43 percent market share, which has dropped from a high of 23.7 percent in January, perhaps losing some users to Greene's "Get With The Program."

"It's a fascinating category to watch, as people begin to migrate to these sites in January," Tancer said. "It's then fascinating to see the drop-off."

The Web site of America's favorite TV shrink, Dr. Phil, regularly receives 5 to 6 percent of its traffic via Oprah's site.

Now if Oprah could only get Americans to actually stick with the program.