• by Masha Geller , August 19, 2002

comScore yesterday released the comScore Media Metrix U.S. Top 50 Internet properties for July 2002 and it looks like things are going well for computer hardware and travel.

It’s not a good idea to compare anything to last year, but online consumer sales (excluding auctions) of Computer Hardware grew to $927 million in July 2002, an increase of 30% versus the same month last year. As Dell Computer continued its aggressive pursuit to gain market share, traffic to Dell.com increased 34% between June and July, moving it into the top 50 ranking. The site ranked number 49 with 9.2 million unique visitors in the latest month.

Sales of Travel Services, the largest e-commerce category, grew 32% in July 2002 versus the same month last year, reaching a level of $2.9 billion. Traffic to Orbitz.com benefited from consumer interest in the category, and the site entered the top 50 ranking at number 40 with 10.3 million visitors, up 19% versus June 2002.

Total online consumer sales (excluding auctions) in July 2002 were $6.0 billion, up 26% versus the same month last year. Non-travel sales grew 20%, to $3.1 billion.

The good news is, as comScore Media Metrix division president Peter Daboll said, "Although consumer spending has been variously impacted by market uncertainty, we're seeing encouraging results in key e-commerce categories."

comScore Media Metrix also said that with company scandals and economic uncertainty continuing to dominate headlines, Financial Information and Advice was the fastest growing website category, increasing 19% to 23.2 million unique visitors in July 2002. And with mortgage interest rates hitting a 36-year low, the Real Estate category raised the roof on traffic, which increased 15% to 23.0 million visitors, an impressive gain which made this the second fastest growing sector. Among the 25 real-estate sites with 200,000 or more visitors, only three decreased in traffic while the rest increased between five and 158%.