• by Jack Loechner , Staff Writer @mp_research, October 7, 2002

Audiences and Ad Impressions Up on Sports Sites

In a recently released report by David Martin, manager, Analysis Milpitas, and derived from a sample of Internet users based on the current Nielsen//NetRatings research methodologies, one conclusion presented is that "when traffic levels increase on Web sites, the result is a potential goldmine for both publishers and advertisers." The report goes on to say that as unique audience levels on sports Web sites have increased in the past five months, so have ad impressions levels on those sites. During the period April through August, paid impressions on sports sites increased an average of 23 percent per month, despite an overall market that saw an up and down summer.

Despite the impressions growth, the number of advertisers purchasing ads on those properties went up for the first time in five months in August, suggesting that the appeal of seasonal crossover was too great to pass up for some advertisers who had pulled spending previously.

Some of the data included in the report include findings such as:

Traffic to sports sites increased 5.3 percent in August over the month of July (a gain of nearly two million unique visitors.) Augmenting the increase in visitation, users spent more time on sports sites and viewed more pages, as shown by a 29 percent category gain in page views in August.

MLB.com appeared to hit a minor decline, dropping by 11 percent over July. While the football season may have had something to do with that drop, strike worries may have also swayed interest temporarily. Summer golf action also fueled an 18 percent increase in the unique audience of the PGA Tour official Web site, as their 1.2 million visitors put them at 15th on the top sports sites list.

College Sports Network spiked by 61 percent over July. While the predominant draw is college football, OCSN hosts the official athletic pages for many universities entire lineup of athletics. OCSN’s popularity ranked them seventh on the top sports properties list.

NHL.com in August was down 31 percent over July numbers, and the property currently sits 37th in the rankings for sports sites. These numbers reflect website traffic from the US only, and NHL numbers are most likely much higher in Canada.

Usage of Top Sports Properties (U.S. Combined At-Home and At-Work Users)

	August UA	July UA	Change (%)
All Sports Sites	38,348	36,408	5
ESPN	13,173	12,178	8
NFL Internet Network	7,867	3,781	108
Yahoo! Sports	6,838	6,000	14
Sportsline	6,316	6,677	-5
CNNsi	5,937	6,113	-3
Majorleaguebaseball.com	4,837	5,455	-11
OCSN	3,319	2,066	61
eBay Sports	3,248	3,313	-2
nascar.com	3,232	3,065	5
sportingnews.com	2,032	1,721	18

Source: Nielsen//NetRatings, August 2002 UA Unique Audience

Retailers, promoting fall clothing lines, back to school gear, and the inevitable holiday shopping romp, increased impressions purchases by 94 percent from July to August and led all advertisers with nearly 1.4 billion impressions on sports sites in the month.

Ad Impressions by Industry on Sports Sites

Industry	August Impressions (000,000)	July Impressions (000,000)	Change (%)
Retail Goods & Services	1,398	720	94
Web Media	1,033	954	8
Consumer Goods	625	602	4
Travel	319	422	-24
Business to Business	284	369	-23
Financial Services	274	270	2
Entertainment	191	129	48
Telecommunications	165	116	43
Automotive	149	207	-28
Software	133	68	95
Hardware & Electronics	107	106	1
Public Services	85	84	1
Health	60	41	47

Source: Nielsen//NetRatings, September 2002

Hewlett Packard led all advertisers on sports properties in the month of August with close to 200 million impressions, but that figure was down 39 percent from July

Top Advertisers on Sports Sites

Advertiser	August Impressions	July Impressions	Change (%)
Hewlett Packard Company	199	326	-39
eBay, Inc.	165	129	28
CMGI, Inc. (uBid)	114	21	454
MBNA Corporation	108	102	6
Microsoft Corporation	94	21	356
Orbitz	93	105	-12
priceline.com Incorporated	82	159	-48
Philip Morris Companies Inc.	80	57	39
MegaSports	80	49	63
Diageo PLC	78	61	27

Source: Nielsen//NetRatings, September 2002

For more information on the Nielsen//NetRatings research methodologies, see nielsen-netratings.com.