Retail Sites Dominate Canadian Internet Traffic in December

Jan 22, 2008, 7:46 AM

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ComScore, Inc. released its December rankings of the largest and fastest-growing Internet properties and site categories in Canada based on data from the comScore World Metrix audience measurement service.

Retail sites dominated the top-gaining site category rankings for December. The consumer goods category rose 70% from November 2007 to nearly 5 million visitors, while the consumer electronics category jumped 15% to 9.4 million visitors, led by Futureshop.ca Sites with 5.4 million visitors (up 39%).

Traffic to greetings sites also grew in December versus November. The e-cards category experienced a 25% increase to 8 million visitors, while the flowers/gifts/greetings category gained 12% to 6.3 million visitors. Other categories with increases included online gambling (up 13%)and shippping (up 11%).

Bolstered by the popularity of its viral holiday greeting site ElfYourself.com, OfficeMax surged 395% to 2.7 million visitors, making it the top-gaining property for the month. Photo-sharing site Slide.com increased 39% to 2.1 million visitors in December, while social networking destination Skyrock Network jumped 32% to 1.9 million visitors.

Online holiday shopping activity saw Best Buy Sites jump 32% to 6.8 million visitors, while Wal-Mart saw a 15% increase to 4.2 million visitors. The preparation of holiday meals also seemed to be foremost on Canadian minds, with Kraft Foods increasing by 27% to 2.9 million visitors. Microsoft Sites maintained its position as the top property with nearly 22.5 million visitors, reaching 94% of the Canadian online population. Microsoft was followed closely by Google Sites with 22.3 million visitors, Yahoo! Sites with 16.3 million visitors and Facebook.com with 15.4 million visitors. Complete results are available at www.comscore.com.

--Tanya Irwin