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News Corp. Google-less?
Posted: 2009-11-10 00:37:15 UTC
Rupert Murdoch made an interesting statement in a Sky News interview today, when asked about news content available through search engines such as Google, Murdoch says he would consider blocking Google from indexing News Corp.'s news websites such as the Wall Street Journal. Of course it would naturally follow that I would immediately chart the amount of traffic that Google drives to Murdoch's flagship news site.
Here's the same chart from Google News to WSJ.com
In fact, on a weekly basis Google and Google news are the top traffic providers for WSJ.com account for over 25% of WSJ.com's traffic. Even more telling. According to Experian Hitwise data, over 44% of WSJ.com visitors coming from Google are "new" users who haven't visited the domain in the last 30 days.
While Mr. Murdoch makes some strong points in his Sky News interview regarding the plight of the news industry and the perils of making all content free, as clickstream data demonstrates - blocking Google could isolate the Journal from potential new online subscribers.
Thanks to Cheyne Winterton for the data hat-tip.
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Twitter Revisited - in More than 140 Characters
Posted: 2009-10-29 18:01:06 UTC
A quick update from my Twitter post from last month. I had the pleasure of speaking at two excellent conferences this week, iMedia Breakthrough and Digital Media West. During the Q&A of my talk at Digital Media, I was asked about my views of Twitter's staying power versus competition from Facebook.
I think this charts sums up the competitive threat that Twitter may pose to Facebook's astounding 6% of all U.S. Internet visits (read: no threat).
Facebook's dominance minimizes the detail and recent decline in visits to Twitter's domain. This chart gives a clearer picture of Twitter's decline over the last few months. As I noted in last months entry, this chart only portrays web visits to Twitter versus application traffic.
At iMedia Breakthrough, Jeff Rosenblum from Questus referenced a Harvard Business School Study finding that the median number of tweets per twitter user over the life of their twitter account is 1!
I Believe this figure confirms our original hypothesis of Twitter-stall due to a drop in new users. As Facebook continues to grow, its user-base across Mosaic types shows that its user-base is becoming ubiquitous. Twitter by contrast was showing greater coverage amongst types earlier in its growth phase. Since Twitter's decline in July, the number of over-indexing has narrowed significantly, indicating that early growth may have been the result of significant trail behavior leading up to this summer.
That being said, I still plan to tweet this entry.
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Twittered Out?
Posted: 2009-09-25 17:11:44 UTC
On the heels of yesterday's rumor that Twitter is close to securing an additional $100 million in financing, which would place the company's valuation in the $1 billion range, I decided to take a quick look at Twitter's market share of visits to see if the hype is matched by site traffic.
It should be noted that the above chart indicates visits to Twitter's website, and does not include application and mobile traffic. That being said, even without application and mobile data, visits to the main Twitter domain should have some correlation to new user adoption.
Another angle on measuring new user adoption is to track the volume of searches on "Twitter." As we can see in both visits and searches, Twitter appears to have hit a resistance point as of April 2009.
To explore the hypothesis that slowing and now decreasing market share of visits may be attributable to the drop in new users, we can turn to our Experian Hitwise Clickstream report that shows new versus returning users from the top Twitter traffic sources. Here's a table for those traffic sources in April 2009:
You can see the drop-off in new users if we examine the same report as of last week:
Temporary set-back or user-saturation, what are your thoughts?
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Free Shipping - Vendor and Consumer Perspectives
Posted: 2009-09-15 23:00:37 UTC
Our sister company Experian CheetahMail released an insightful white paper on the topic of free shipping email offers (download the paper here). Among several interesting findings, the paper provides some seasonality data on the percentage of clients that sent free shipping offers by quarter. "As expected, the sharpest increase occurred at the end of the year for the holiday shopping season." The paper also notes that free shipping offers were at equal to higher levels when comparing Q1 2008 to Q1 2009.
Leveraging Experian Hitwise data, we can visualize free shipping demand using search terms as a proxy for interest.
A couple of interesting observations:
- "Free shipping" search breadth has been accelerating earlier each year, with 2008 holiday season searches beginning in mid-October (in 2007 "free shipping" searches began ramping early November)
- The actual peak for "free shipping" searches each year is the first week of the New Year, as online buyers look for post-holiday sale items
- "Free shipping" searches have increased 75% comparing the first week of 2008 versus 2009, which given CheetahMail's data might indicate a gap between vendor offers and consumer interest.
By utilizing our Search Intelligence tools, we can also see that during the height of "free shipping" searches, the most common search phrases contain a brand name + "free shipping" as well as the word "code" or "codes".
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Swine Flue, Gripe Suina and Hitwise Brazil
Posted: 2009-09-01 19:34:30 UTC
Greetings from Sao Paulo. I'm in town this week to attend today's launch of Hitwise Brazil, a new offering from Serasa Experian Marketing Services. In preparation for this event, I've been immersed in studying how Brazilian Internet behavior is similar and different from the other markets that we serve.
While I've written before about bird flu and swine flu in the past. Today, using our new Brazilian data is the first time we've analyzed search queries from a non-English speaking region. The chart below compares searches for "gripe suina" (Portugese for "swine flu") against the scientific term "H1N1" and the medical term "Influenza A."
The initial spike in volume on "gripe suina" occurs when the first cases of swine flu are reported in Mexico and the United States. As we noticed years ago with bird flu, there are different patterns to popular search (swine flu) scientific interest (H1N1) and medical interest (Influenza A). Those differences show-up very clearly in the chart above.
By examining search term variations and where people click when searching on "gripe suina" we can see the shift in user intent from general interest queries in May 2009 that continued to reference and news sites, to August 2009 where there are increased instances of symptom related searches that result in visits to health and medical sites.
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Bing + Yahoo! Now Equals 26% of Search Market
Posted: 2009-07-29 22:49:40 UTC
Two weeks ago we posted about the potential deal between Microsoft and Yahoo! . Now that the deal is official, the latest search numbers tell us that Google has 70.6% of all U.S. query volume while the combined Bing and Yahoo! Search now comprise 26% of all U.S. searches, leaving only 3.4% for the other 54 engines that we track in search share (1,465 search engines that we track in market share of visits). More data to follow tomorrow.
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Bing, Yahoo! Search and Ad Sales Efficiencies
Posted: 2009-07-17 19:56:30 UTC
We've been following the Microsoft, Yahoo! Search dance for some time now. Yesterday, Kara Swisher posted that we might finally be close to an advertising deal between the #2 (Yahoo!) and #3 (Bing) players in search.
While given previous false alarms on this topic, I'm not holding my breath. However, I thought it would be interesting to analyze this deal from the perspective of advertising efficiency. In the past, the three major engines had very different demographic make-ups. The screen-shot below is an age comparison of visitors to MSN Search compared with visitors to Yahoo! Search one year ago (four weeks ending 7/12/08).
You can see the clear age difference between the two, with Yahoo! skewing towards the younger searcher, and MSN Search - older. Demographic distance between the two properties could be an important factor in understanding how well Yahoo! Search ad inventory would sell on MSN Search (now Bing). Fast forward to current data as of last week:
When comparing Bing to Yahoo! Search their appears to be a closer demographic fit which should yield more search advertising sales efficiencies. Finally, the homogeneity of search behavior is becoming evident in where searchers click-off to when executing a search. In the past, searches on the different engines showed very different downstream industries. The table below indicates that search behavior now looks strikingly similar between the two:
If Swisher is right and we're close to Microsoft and Yahoo! joining forces, the similarity in demographics and behavior should bode well for the relationship.
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MySpace - Returning to Entertainment?
Posted: 2009-07-14 22:06:54 UTC
I was living vicariously through WSJ's Julia Angwin's Mogul-fest tweets last week (ironically throughout the week she tweeted that several moguls didn't see the future in Twitter).
While in Sun Valley, Angwin reported a brief interchange with Murdoch regarding the future direction of MySpace. Murdoch stated that MySpace needed to be re-focused "as an entertainment portal."
Having followed MySpace via Hitwise over the last five years, I was interested to see what user behavior revealed regarding MySpace's positioning in the online entertainment space. Clickstream (or what sites were visited immediately prior to and after a subject site or industry) provides an interesting angle on that question.
At one point in its history MySpace was the most significant contributor of traffic to Entertainment - Mutlimedia sites (YouTube remains the #1 site in that category) providing over 35% of traffic to the category. As the chart below illustrates, that percentage now hovers below 10%.
As I wrote in Click (and Angwin goes into much greater depth in her book), MySpace's initial growth focused on community and music. Here's a chart of MySpace's contribution of traffic to the Music - Bands & Artists category.
As a top 5 site with 3.45% of all U.S. Internet visits, MySpace remains a massive force to be reckoned with. However, as the two charts above illustrate, the site has become increasingly removed from Entertainment and Music traffic.
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Gas Pump Prices and Cost Sensitivity
Posted: 2009-06-25 22:05:36 UTC
According to a survey fielded by AAA, 37.1 million Americans will be traveling over the July 4th holiday weekend. According to AAA if this prediction proves true, it will represent a 1.9% decrease from the same week in 2008.
As we've done in the past, I'll update our charts on actual gas prices and corresponding Internet activity. First, a chart showing U.S. Retail gas prices (regular grade, nationwide) charted with the volume of searches on "gas prices."
As we can see from this chart, even though gas prices have been steadily increasing over the last several weeks, searches for "gas prices" have remained well below their highs from last fall. Arguably, "gas price" searches represent cost sensitivity as Internet searchers are most likely looking for either news on gas prices or the lowest priced gas in their neighborhood.
To get closer to price sensitivity, the following chart, visits to a custom category of gas price websites, may be a more accurate reflection of our concerns over pump price:
Finally to the survey-based prediction from AAA, here's a chart of gas prices and visits to a custom category of leading roadside motel chain websites:
Roadside motel site visits appear to have peaked during the week ending 6/13/09 (most likely representing research and online bookings for this upcoming holiday week). Comparing visits data year-over-year, we find that visits are down 5.5% compared to the same week in 2008.
While it might be easy to blame a potential decrease in next week's holiday travel on rising pump prices, Internet behavior tells us that our price sensitivity is relatively low. Perhaps general economic concerns are the more likely culprit.
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Movie Tickets - Reconciling Web Visits with Box Office Dollars
Posted: 2009-06-16 22:24:32 UTC
As we discovered in yesterday's post, the demographics of web visitors by site and industry are constantly changing. I ran into this same phenomenon this morning when analyzing visits to the top movie ticket sites (e.g. Fandango and Moviefone).
According to IMDb's Box Office Mojo, year-to-date box office revenue for 2009 at $4.6 billion, puts this year ahead of last by 10.7%. Based on the chart below I was expecting box office numbers this year to show a steep decline.
So why the discrepancy between visits to movie ticket sites and actual ticket sales which should show some correlation? I checked the demographics of visitors to these sites for the four weeks ending June 13, 2009 to the same week in 2008.
The change in movie ticket site demographics could indicate that this year's movie-goers are less likely to check online movie ticket sites versus a year ago. Closer examination of the demographic change shows that higher income visitors are declining in year-over-year visits while lower income visitors are increasing. We know from previous analysis that affluent Internet users exhibit more cost-savings behavior then their less affluent counterparts. Could that be the cause of divergence between visits and dollars?
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Facebook Surge – The Gen X/Gen Y Tradeoff
Posted: 2009-06-16 19:46:00 UTC
Robin Goad, our UK Research Director wrote about the surge in traffic to Facebook in the UK in response to the premier this weekend of personalized or vanity usernames. Here’s a daily chart of Facebook’s U.S. marketshare:
While we also witnessed an uptick in marketshare this weekend, up 2.8% from Friday June 12th to Saturday June 13th (personalized usernames were made available at 12:01am on Saturday), the more interesting chart trend in the U.S. is the inflection point in marketshare growth in early May.
Since May, the marketshare of visits to www.facebook.com have increased 22%. I was curious as to if this growth was the result of increased usage among the same demographic or if demographics of visitors to the site had changed. While the change in age demographics over the last month has been minimal, a year-over-year comparison tells a very striking story:
While Millennials (18-24 year-olds) have decreased by nineteen percentage points, Gen X’ers (25-34 year-olds) have increased over twelve points and (35-44 year-olds) seven points.
May’s tipping point may indicate the mainstream adoption of Facebook. If that is true, and early adopters are, in the case of social networking, the 18-24 year old crowd, where are younger Internet users flocking to today?
NB percentage drop in 18-24 corrected from "nine" to "nineteen" - Thanks for the spot Phil.
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Real Estate Looking Up? Comparing Home and Apartment Queries
Posted: 2009-06-09 23:22:35 UTC
Last months release of April real estate figures indicates an uptick in the market. Existing home sales of 4.68MM for April were up 2.9% compared to March. New home sales registered a very slight increase of .2% or 352,000 new homes for the month. Even though housing starts were down a dismal 12.8%, when you pull out multifamily dwellings, single family homes actually showed an increase of 2.8% for April.
As we've shown in the past, search data around the real estate market can help us figure out market direction. Based on the assumption that most home buyers in today's Internet age start their home purchase mission online, searches for terms such as "homes for sale" should correlate to the NAR Existing Home Sales number.
Here's a three year chart on search volume for "homes for sale":
While we saw a promising uptick in home purchase related searches earlier this year, over the last two weeks that upward trend seems temporary. In the past, we found it very illuminating to examine the competitive substitute of apartment rental searches alongside home sales purchases to get a better sense of rent versus buy consumer sentiment.
In March this year we saw another promising signal, the drop in "apartments for rent" searches compared to "homes for sale." Unfortunately, over the last two weeks apartment searches have surged counter to the drop in home sales queries. Looks like April's positive outlook may be short-lived.
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General Motors, Search and Consumer Demand
Posted: 2009-06-02 00:09:33 UTC
As General Motors files for Chapter 11 today, and the government steps in with $30 billion in additional aid, online discussion seems focused on the appropriateness of government intervention. I'm preoccupied with a more basic question; assuming General Motors successfully restructures itself, is there sufficient demand for GM vehicles to maintain a viable business?
Lets check-in on Hitwise search term data to see what our queries might reveal about the GM brand. According to the Wall Street Journal, over the last eighteen years, GM's U.S. market share has fallen from 45% to 22% as of 2008. The chart below shows a precipitous decline in searches for top GM brands.
Going through the list of all search terms driving traffic to our Automotive - Manufacturers category, I ranked the top 10 automotive brands searched over the last four weeks (period ending 5/30/09):
1. Toyota
2. Honda
3. Ford
4. Nissan
5. Hyundai
6. Dodge
7. Kia
8. Suzuki
9. Volkswagon
10. JeepThe first GM brand, "Chevrolet" shows-up in the #12 spot during this period. But most telling for brand challenges going forward, is the variations in search queries containing "GM" over the last four weeks. (on a separate note, over the last two years luxury auto brands have dropped out of the top ten signaling price-sensitivity to economic conditions).
In the weeks leading up to today's bankruptcy filing, of the top 100 searches containing "GM," 65% focused on financial information (e.g. stock price, bankruptcy filing, bondholder interest), while 25% sought information on closing dealerships. What was noticeably missing from the top 100 was any mention of GM models or brands. Reviewing the list of GM search variations in their entirety, one of General Motors' most significant challenges going forward will be to create demand in new and existing car models while overcoming fear that dwindling dealerships will diminish support.
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Wither the Auction?
Posted: 2009-05-29 17:16:08 UTC
Geoffrey Fowler had a very interesting piece (subscription required) in the the Wall Street Journal yesterday detailing eBay's shift in focus at the hands of CEO John Donahoe. According to the article, while auctions accounted for over half of eBay's $8.5 billion in revenue last year, looking forward, the company will focus on building secondary markets.
I read Fowler's article via Kindle last night during my Chicago to San Francisco flight. The discussion about changing focus to providing fixed priced goods left me pondering the fate of online auctions versus other secondary markets (namely classifieds) in an economic downturn.
Turning to Hitwise data, I charted volume of searches for "auction" v. "classifieds" over the last three years.
Summer 2008 marked the first sustain lead in "classifieds" v. "auctions" searches. During the last months of 2008, however, "auctions" regained the lead, signaling the utility of auctions for holiday gift buying. 2009 however, has been the year of the "classifieds" as the economic downturn has fueled our desire to save money by buying second-hand goods.
Given the uncertainty of how long this downturn will last, Donahoe's direction towards building out additional secondary markets within eBay, looks to be a defensible strategy. Your thoughts?
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The Lambert Edge - American Idol Prediction
Posted: 2009-05-20 18:56:28 UTC
It's time again for our American Idol season finale prediction. The chart of search volume for the two finalists, dramatic rocker Adam Lambert and boy-next-door Kris Allen would appear to make this prediction a no-brainer.
Searches for "Adam Lambert" outnumber "Kris Allen" queries by a factor of 5-1. Closer examination of search variations on the two finalists reveal a Stacy Keibler Correction Coefficient lurking in the background. Of the top 100 search variations for Adam Lambert, 15% centered on his sexual orientation. In fact search variations for Kris Allen also demonstrate that searchers are less concerned with ability then with contestant's personal lives. The most common searches for Kris Allen center on his religious beliefs and questions about his wife.
Despite our ability to focus on singing ability, given the wide margin of queries, if searches correlate to popularity and vote, and I believe they do, advantage Adam Lambert.
If you want to learn more about our history making reality television show predictions, check out my book Click: What Millions of People do Online and Why it Matters.
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