RESTON, VA, September 15, 2006 - comScore Media Metrix today released its monthly analysis of U.S. consumer activity at top online properties and categories for August.  Youtube.com continued its rise, increasing 19 percent to reach 19.1 million unique visitors, making it the 32^nd most-visited Web property in the U.S., an eight-spot increase from July when it debuted in the comScore Media Metrix Top 50 for the first time.   

 

"As user-generated content increases in popularity, sites like YouTube.com will continue to become a destination of choice for people wanting to share their video, ideas, photos, and the like with friends and family," said Jack Flanagan, executive vice president of comScore Media Metrix.  "We're seeing consumer products companies like Coca-Cola, which was one of the top-ten gaining properties in August, follow suit by inviting consumers to post their videos online.  This type of marketing creates a forum for consumers to interact with the product and solidify a relationship with the brand."

 

In another example of brand-relationship building, the popularity of Xerox's "Let's Say Thanks" campaign, which enables consumers to send free postcards to overseas military personnel, was largely responsible for making the Xerox Corporation the top-gaining Web property during August with 5.6 million visitors, a 628-percent increase versus July.  Conversely, the much publicized recall of Dell laptops caused 18.1 million Americans to visit the Dell property, a 23-percent increase versus July.  

 

Back-to-School Means Back Online

As consumers prepared for "Back-to-school" season, education and reference sites saw traffic increases, as did retailers such as Staples.com Sites (7 million visitors and a 32-percent increase versus July), Office Depot (6.7 million visitors and an 18-percent increase), and OfficeMax (3.2 million visitors and a 46-percent increase), which represented three of the top four sites in the Consumer Goods category in August.

 

Sites providing resources for school-aged children and their parents also saw increases as evidenced by the 48-percent surge in traffic at AOL Research & Learn (4.7 million visitors), the 36-percent increase to Greatschools.net (3.4 million visitors), and the 26-percent increase to Coca-Cola-sponsored Family Education Network (2.5 million).

 

Notable increases at sites dedicated to college students and graduates included Allschools.com Network, which increased 66 percent to 386,000 visitors; Collegegrad.com, which increased 61 percent to 412,000 visitors; and Finaid.org, which increased 55 percent to 400,000 visitors.

 

Finally, test prep companies College Board Property and Princeton Review.com saw sharp increases versus July, rising 22-percent (to 1.9 million visitors) and 28-percent (to 910,000 visitors), respectively.  Additionally, Classmates.com, the site dedicated to connecting high school and college classmates, increased 23 percent to 17.2 million visitors in August.

 

Federal Reserve and Earnings Announcements Drive Traffic at Online Trading Sites

Traffic at online trading sites increased 10 percent to 12.4 million visitors, following second quarter earnings announcements and the Federal Reserve's decision to not raise interest rates.  Fidelity Investments led the category with 3.7 million visitors (up 8 percent), followed by Sharebuilder.com with 2.3 million visitors (up 112 percent) and Scottrade Sites with 1.7 million visitors (up 20 percent). 

 

"Investors were likely accessing their accounts with greater frequency this August to assess the impact of quarterly earnings results, geopolitical uncertainty, and ongoing concern regarding the direction of interest rates following the Federal Reserve's early August announcement that the target rate for overnight bank loans would not be increased after 17 straight increases since June 2004," Flanagan said. 

 

Americans Gear up for Football Season

Demonstrating America's obsession with football, the second-biggest gaining property in August was the NFL Internet Group, which grew 71 percent to 13.4 million visitors.  Within the sports category, the NFL Internet Group ranked fourth, bested by ESPN with 17.9 million visitors, Fox Sports on MSN with 14.1 million visitors and Yahoo! Sports with 13.8 million visitors.

 

Sports and Outdoors retailers also saw an overall uptick in traffic, driven by sites such as FootballFanatics.com, which rose 68 percent to 900,000 visitors, and the NFLshop.com, which jumped 139 percent increase to 820,000 visitors.

 

Top 50 Properties

In August, Yahoo! Sites maintained the number one ranking, attracting more than 131.3 million visitors.  After re-entering the ranking in July, Dell jumped 12 spots to number 35, drawing 18.1 million unique visitors, a 23-percent increase from the previous month. Ticketmaster, Citysearch, WebMD Health, and Craigslist.org all re-entered the ranking, at numbers 42, 46, 48, and 49, respectively.

 

 

Top 50 Ad Focus

Advertising.com retained the top spot in the August Ad Focus ranking for the 28th consecutive month, reaching 85 percent of all U.S. Internet users.  Within the top ten Ad Focus ranking ValueClick, Tribal Fusion, and Google each gained one spot, moving to numbers two, four, and seven, respectively.  Burst Media gained three spots to secure the number 10 position, reaching 53 percent of Americans online, up from 48 percent in July.  Advertising networks ContextWeb and Undertone Networks debuted within the top 50 in August, claiming the 25th and 28th spots, respectively.  Finally, online video site Youtube.com and networking site Classmates.com also entered the Ad Focus ranking this month.

 

TABLE 1

Top Ten Gaining Properties by Percentage Change in Unique Visitors* August 2006 vs. July 2006 Total U.S. Home, Work and University Internet Users Source: comScore Media Metrix
Property	Jul-06 (000)	Aug-06 (000)	Percentage Change	Rank by  Unique Visitors
Total Internet Population	173,191	173,407	0%	N/A
Xerox Corp	775	5,643	628%	170
NFL Internet Group	7,832	13,355	71%	66
eWoss	2,416	3,817	58%	236
Forbes Property	5,644	7,840	39%	122
MOVIES.COM	3,369	4,543	35%	205
MonsterCommerce	3,624	4,874	34%	193
Staples.com Sites	5,332	7,034	32%	135
The Away Network	2,959	3,860	30%	231
The Mozilla Organization	7,436	9,674	30%	94
Coca-Cola Company	3,219	4,171	30%	219

*Ranking based on the top 250 properties in August 2006.

 

 

TABLE 2

Top Ten Gaining Categories by Unique Visitors August 2006 vs. July 2006 Total U.S. Home, Work and University Internet Users Source: comScore Media Metrix
	Jul-06 (000)	Aug-06 (000)	Percentage Change
Total Internet : Total Audience	173,191	173,407	0%
Training and Education	8,240	9,886	20%
Religion	19,440	22,659	17%
Education - Information	52,512	60,229	15%
Retail - Food	12,308	13,876	13%
Consumer Goods	23,336	26,215	12%
Comparison Shopping	55,787	61,918	11%
Online Trading	11,280	12,388	10%
Reference	69,623	75,904	9%
Jewelry/Luxury Goods/Accessories	13,794	14,939	8%
Ground/Cruise	10,386	11,221	8%

 

 

TABLE 3

 

Top 50 Properties August 2006  Total U.S. - Home, Work and University Locations  Unique Visitors (000) Source: comScore Media Metrix
Rank	Property	Unique Visitors (000)		Rank	Property	Unique Visitors  (000)
	Total Internet Users	173,407
1	Yahoo! Sites	131,250		26	CBS Corporation	24,512
2	Time Warner Network	121,595		27	Bank of America	23,449
3	Microsoft Sites	119,089		28	Real.com Network	20,904
4	Google Sites	107,989		29	CareerBuilder LLC	20,657
5	eBay	80,164		30	Gannett Sites	20,586
6	Fox Interactive Media	72,107		31	Shopzilla.com Sites	19,708
7	Ask Network	53,816		32	YOUTUBE.COM	19,089
8	Amazon Sites	48,570		33	Vendare Media	18,863
9	New York Times Digital	38,276		34	Comcast Corporation	18,417
10	Verizon Communications Corp	37,997		35	Dell	18,146
11	Weather Channel, The	34,619		36	ESPN	17,850
12	Viacom Digital	31,988		37	Cox Enterprises Inc.	17,606
13	CNET Networks	31,771		38	ARTISTdirect Network	16,645
14	Apple Computer, Inc.	31,582		39	WhitePages	16,358
15	Wikipedia Sites	31,038		40	Weatherbug Property	16,064
16	United Online, Inc	29,513		41	E.W. Scripps	15,894
17	Adobe Sites	29,063		42	Ticketmaster	15,186
18	Expedia Inc	27,765		43	Trip Network Inc.	15,032
19	AT&T, Inc.	26,319		44	iVillage.com: The Womens Network	14,931
20	Monster Worldwide	26,110		45	EA Online	14,811
21	Wal-Mart	26,049		46	Citysearch	14,785
22	Gorilla Nation Media	25,976		47	FACEBOOK.COM	14,782
23	Lycos, Inc.	25,803		48	WebMD Health	14,778
24	Target Corporation	25,408		49	CRAIGSLIST.ORG	14,612
25	Disney Online	24,851		50	Capital One	14,590

 

 

 

TABLE 4

 

Ad Focus Ranking August 2006  Total U.S. - Home, Work and University Locations  Unique Visitors (000)  Source: comScore Media Metrix
Rank	Property	Unique Visitors (000)	Reach %		Rank	Property	Unique Visitors (000)	Reach %
	Total Internet Users	173,407	100%
1	Advertising.com**	148,005	85%		26	EBAY.COM Home Page	39,795	23%
2	ValueClick**	131,004	76%		27	Vibrant Media**	37,912	22%
3	Yahoo!	129,845	75%		28	Undertone Networks**	33,147	19%
4	Tribal Fusion**	113,571	65%		29	ABOUT.COM	33,003	19%
5	AOL Media Network	113,055	65%		30	Business.com Network	29,987	17%
6	Casale Media Network**	107,570	62%		31	Lycos Network	25,608	15%
7	Google	103,671	60%		32	Disney Online	24,851	14%
8	MSN-Windows Live	101,225	58%		33	WEATHER.COM	23,928	14%
9	Vendare Media - TrafficMarketplace**	95,260	55%		34	CNN	21,849	13%
10	Burst Media**	92,062	53%		35	CareerBuilder Network	21,560	12%
11	AOL	88,939	51%		36	YOUTUBE.COM	19,089	11%
12	24/7 Real Media**	87,894	51%		37	GameDaily Custom Network	19,062	11%
13	YAHOO.COM Home Page	86,359	50%		38	Vendare Media	18,863	11%
14	Blue Lithium**	73,414	42%		39	EXPEDIA.COM*	18,792	11%
15	EBAY.COM	71,840	41%		40	SuperPages	18,443	11%
16	Tremor Network	70,207	40%		41	IMDB.COM	18,287	11%
17	PrecisionClick**	68,997	40%		42	ESPN	17,850	10%
18	DRIVEpm**	66,471	38%		43	The WebMD Health Network	17,588	10%
19	AdBrite**	61,643	36%		44	CLASSMATES.COM	17,207	10%
20	Gorilla Nation Media Network	60,368	35%		45	ARTISTdirect Network	16,645	10%
21	MYSPACE.COM	55,778	32%		46	Travelocity All	16,620	10%
22	MSN.COM Home Page	54,520	31%		47	WhitePages Network	16,279	9%
23	Ask Network	53,816	31%		48	CNET	16,126	9%
24	AdDynamix.com**	42,084	24%		49	WeatherBug	15,887	9%
25	ContextWeb**	40,056	23%		50	WHITEPAGES.COM	15,139	9%

 

Reach % denotes the percentage of the total Internet population that viewed a particular entity at least once in August.  For instance,Yahoo! was seen by 75 percent of the more than 173 million Internet users in August. 

* Entity has assigned some portion of traffic to other syndicated entities.

** Denotes an advertising network. 

 

About comScore Media Metrix

comScore Media Metrix, a division of comScore Networks, provides industry-leading Internet audience measurement services that report - with unmatched accuracy - details of online media usage, visitor demographics and online buying power for the home, work and university audiences across local U.S. markets and across the globe.  comScore Media Metrix continues the tradition of quality and innovation established by its Media Metrix syndicated Internet ratings - long recognized as the currency in online media measurement among financial analysts, advertising agencies, publishers and marketers - while drawing upon comScore's advanced technologies to address important new industry requirements.  All comScore Media Metrix syndicated ratings are based on industry-sanctioned sampling methodologies.

 

About comScore Networks

comScore Networks is a global leader in measuring the digital age. This capability is based on a massive, global cross-section of more than 2 million consumers who have given comScore permission to confidentially capture their browsing and transaction behavior, including online and offline purchasing. comScore panelists also participate in survey research that captures and integrates their attitudes and intentions. Through its proprietary technology, comScore measures what matters across a broad spectrum of behavior and attitudes.  comScore consultants apply this deep knowledge of customers and competitors to help clients design powerful marketing strategies and tactics that deliver superior ROI.  comScore services are used by global leaders such as AOL, Microsoft, Yahoo!, Verizon, Best Buy, The Newspaper Association of America, Tribune Interactive, ESPN, Fox Sports, Nestlé, MBNA, Universal McCann, the United States Postal Service, Merck and Expedia.  For more information, please visit www.comscore.com.

 

 

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