RESTON, Va., July 21 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- comScore, Inc. , a leader in measuring the digital world, today released its monthly analysis of U.S. Web activity at the top online properties for June 2009 based on data from the comScore Media Metrix service. Online visitation to travel sites gained as Americans began planning and preparing for their summer vacations. The end of another school year resulted in an increase of interest at gaming sites. Career services and development sites saw strong growth due to the influx of recent college graduates entering the job market, in addition to a rising unemployment rate.
(Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20080115/COMSCORELOGO)
"Travel sites typically see an increase in activity around this time of year as Americans look to get away," said Jack Flanagan, executive vice president of comScore Media Metrix. "Summer vacation also means more leisure time for those out of school, leading to a seasonal increase in leisure categories including online gaming and entertainment."
Online Vacation Planning Jumps in June
June heated up the Travel category as Americans sought seasonal getaways. The Airlines category ranked as the top gaining category for June, growing 22 percent to 33.2 million visitors. Also among the top gaining categories were Travel Transactions, Online Travel Agents, and Travel Information. Southwest Airlines, the top ranked site in the Airlines category, achieved particularly strong gains growing 64 percent to 16.4 million visitors and grabbing the #2 position among the top gaining properties.
Online travel agent sites also experienced growth in June, increasing 9 percent to 42.8 million visitors. Expedia led the category with 27 million visitors (up 12 percent), followed by Orbitz with 12.5 million visitors (up 10 percent), Priceline with 11.3 million (up 7 percent), and Travelocity with nearly 9.8 million visitors (up 8 percent).
Americans Say "Game On" in June
Online gaming sites saw a surge in activity in June, as the beginning of summer vacation provided students with more leisure time for such pursuits. The Gaming Information category attracted 50 million Americans in June, up 6 percent vs. the previous month. With school out for the summer, students found ways to spend their free time on sites such as GiantRealm and GameStop, with both sites ranking among the top 10 gaining properties in June. GiantRealm jumped 25 percent to more than 7 million visitors while GameStop grew 19 percent to nearly 5.8 million visitors.
Job-Seekers Make an Effort Online
Rising unemployment during the past year has led to an increasing number of Americans seeking jobs and career opportunities online. Both the Career Resources and Career Training & Education categories ranked among the top ten gaining categories for June as the unemployed, underemployed and recent grads scoured the Web for opportunities. The Career Resources category grew 6 percent to 46.8 million visitors, while Career Training & Education grew 13 percent to 6.7 million visitors.
Top 50 Properties
Google Sites continued to lead as the most visited property in June with nearly 157 million visitors, followed by Yahoo! Sites with 154 million visitors and Microsoft Sites with 127.4 million visitors. Facebook.com moved up two positions to #6 marking its highest-ever ranking. Career Builder ascended 6 spots to #39 with 21.7 million visitors, a reflection of the Career Services & Development category gain. The Mozilla Organization jumped 13 spots to #28 with nearly 27 million visitors, due to the release of Firefox 3.5 which includes numerous new and improved features. June also represented Twitter.com's debut in the ranking of the top 50 properties, coming in at #46 with 20.1 million visitors.
"It's hard to believe that Twitter.com had fewer than a million visitors in June 2008, and now attracts more than 20 million visitors a month and ranks among the top 50 U.S. properties," Flanagan commented. "Twitter has clearly been able to generate wide interest and cultivate a substantial following in a very short period of time. If this momentum persists, then we will continue to see Twitter climb higher and higher in this ranking in the coming months."
Top 50 Ad Focus Ranking
Platform-A led the June Ad Focus ranking, reaching 91 percent of all Americans online. Yahoo! Network ranked second, reaching 88 percent of the population, while ValueClick Networks ranked third with an 84-percent reach. Fox Audience Network and 24/7 Real Media each climbed one spot grabbing the #7 and #8 positions, respectively.
Table 1 comScore Top 10 Gaining Properties by Percentage Change in Unique Visitors* (U.S.) June 2009 vs. May 2009 Total U.S. - Home, Work and University Locations Source: comScore Media Metrix ----------------------------- Total Unique Visitors (000) --------------------------- Rank by Unique May-09 Jun-09 % Change Visitors Total Internet : Total Audience 193,825 193,896 0 N/A NameMedia 2,336 5,975 156 195 Southwest Airlines Co. 10,021 16,471 64 59 Systemax Inc. 2,912 4,625 59 250 TAGGED.COM 6,248 8,373 34 129 The Mozilla Organization 20,610 26,964 31 28 Xacti Corporation 7,810 9,812 26 105 GiantRealm 5,618 7,011 25 157 Disney Online 25,966 31,362 21 24 Sheknows 8,599 10,285 20 100 GameStop 4,874 5,791 19 201 *Ranking based on the top 250 properties in June 2009. Table 2 comScore Top 10 Gaining Site Categories* by Percentage Change in Unique Visitors (U.S.) June 2009 vs. May 2009 Total U.S. - Home, Work and University Locations Source: comScore Media Metrix ----------------------------- Total Unique Visitors (000) --------------------------- May-09 Jun-09 % Change Total Internet : Total Audience 193,825 193,896 0 Travel - Airlines 27,323 33,290 22 Career Services & Development - Training & Education 5,954 6,729 13 News/Information - Politics 11,642 12,977 11 Travel - Transactions 3,980 4,386 10 Travel - Online Travel Agents 39,232 42,863 9 Games - Gaming Information 47,053 49,950 6 Career Services & Development - Career Resources 44,204 46,803 6 Entertainment - News 54,946 57,955 5 Financial Information/Advice 37,688 39,557 5 Travel - Information 40,509 42,461 5 Table 3 comScore Top 50 Properties (U.S.) June 2009 Total U.S. - Home, Work and University Locations Unique Visitors (000) Source: comScore Media Metrix ----------------------------- Unique Visitors Rank Property (000) ---- -------- -------- Total Internet : Total Audience 193,896 1 Google Sites 156,871 2 Yahoo! Sites 154,097 3 Microsoft Sites 127,454 4 AOL LLC 106,467 5 Fox Interactive Media 84,567 6 FACEBOOK.COM 77,031 7 Ask Network 73,041 8 eBay 71,020 9 Amazon Sites 63,178 10 Wikimedia Foundation Sites 60,692 11 Apple Inc. 56,554 12 Glam Media 54,223 13 Viacom Digital 51,575 14 Turner Network 50,841 15 CBS Interactive 50,341 16 craigslist, inc. 46,832 17 New York Times Digital 44,789 18 Weather Channel, The 41,751 19 Adobe Sites 38,120 20 Comcast Corporation 34,865 21 Verizon Communications Corporation 33,436 22 Wal-Mart 33,358 23 AT&T Interactive Network 31,582 24 Disney Online 31,362 25 Demand Media 28,938 26 Superpages.com Network 28,367 27 Expedia Inc 27,058 28 The Mozilla Organization 26,964 29 Target Corporation 26,284 30 WordPress 26,245 31 Answers.com Sites 26,163 32 Bank of America 25,479 33 Photobucket.com LLC 24,528 34 AT&T, Inc. 24,032 35 Gorilla Nation 24,022 36 United Online, Inc 22,828 37 Everyday Health 22,374 38 Break Media 22,334 39 CareerBuilder LLC 21,704 40 NBC Universal 21,202 41 ESPN 20,984 42 NetShelter Technology Media 20,635 43 iVillage.com: The Womens Network 20,594 44 Weatherbug Property 20,465 45 JPMorgan Chase Property 20,211 46 TWITTER.COM* 20,111 47 Real.com Network 19,918 48 EA Online 19,607 49 Gannett Sites 19,298 50 Time Warner -Excluding AOL 19,293 Table 4 comScore Ad Focus Ranking (U.S.) June 2009 Total U.S. - Home, Work and University Locations Unique Visitors (000) Source: comScore Media Metrix ----------------------------- Unique Visitors Rank Property (000) % Reach ---- -------- ------- ------- Total Internet : Total Audience 193,896 100.0 1 Platform-A** 175,765 91% 2 Yahoo! Network** 169,809 88% 3 ValueClick Networks** 163,369 84% 4 Google Ad Network** 162,834 84% 5 Specific Media** 156,230 81% 6 Yahoo! Sites 154,097 79% 7 FOX Audience Network** 151,078 78% 8 24/7 Real Media** 149,373 77% 9 Google 149,128 77% 10 Microsoft Media Network US** 146,841 76% 11 Tremor Media - Potential Reach 141,677 73% 12 Traffic Marketplace** 138,584 71% 13 Tribal Fusion** 138,520 71% 14 YuMe Video Network - Potential Reach 137,848 71% 15 interCLICK** 134,319 69% 16 Turn, Inc** 133,756 69% 17 Casale Media - MediaNet** 133,398 69% 18 CPX Interactive** 130,826 67% 19 Collective Network by Collective Media** 130,254 67% 20 AudienceScience (formerly Revenue Science)** 128,713 66% 21 Adconion Media Group** 123,284 64% 22 Platform-A Video Network - Potential Reach 122,488 63% 23 Burst Media** 114,695 59% 24 ADSDAQ by ContextWeb** 112,530 58% 25 AOL Media Network 106,340 55% 26 BrightRoll Video Network - Potential Reach 100,042 52% 27 AdBrite** 95,352 49% 28 MSN 93,180 48% 29 YOUTUBE.COM 91,804 47% 30 Pulse 360** 91,252 47% 31 Undertone Networks** 90,130 46% 32 Adify** 84,538 44% 33 Vibrant Media** 81,213 42% 34 Monster Career Ad Network (CAN)** 78,025 40% 35 FACEBOOK.COM 77,031 40% 36 Kontera** 74,814 39% 37 Ask Network 73,041 38% 38 NNN Total Newspapers: U.S. 71,500 37% 39 Centro - Potential Reach 70,861 37% 40 Windows Live 68,531 35% 41 MYSPACE.COM* 68,418 35% 42 ITN Digital - Potential Reach 66,498 34% 43 TattoMedia** 61,180 32% 44 Bing 60,736 31% 45 MSN.COM Home Page 60,526 31% 46 IAC Ad Solutions 56,756 29% 47 EBAY.COM 54,457 28% 48 Glam Media 54,223 28% 49 AMAZON.COM 52,921 27% 50 IB Local Network 51,226 26.4%
Reach % denotes the percentage of the total Internet population that viewed a particular entity at least once in May. For instance, Yahoo! Sites was seen by 79 percent of the nearly 194 million Internet users in June.
* Entity has assigned some portion of traffic to other syndicated entities.
** Denotes an advertising network. About comScore Media Metrix
comScore Media Metrix provides industry-leading Internet audience measurement services that report 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 reports are used by financial analysts, advertising agencies, publishers and marketers. comScore Media Metrix syndicated ratings are based on industry-sanctioned sampling methodologies.
About comScore
comScore, Inc. is a global leader in measuring the digital world and preferred source of digital marketing intelligence. For more information, please visit http://www.comscore.com/companyinfo.
Follow Us on Twitter twitter.com/comScore twitter.com/m_abraham twitter.com/gfulgoni
AP Archive: http://photoarchive.ap.org/
PRN Photo Desk, photodesk@prnewswire.com
comScore, Inc.
CONTACT: Sarah Radwanick of comScore, Inc., +1-312-775-6538,
press@comscore.com
Web Site: http://www.comscore.com/
