Retail site categories accounted for 4 of the 10 top-gaining web categories by percentage change in May 2012, as Americans shopped for Mother’s Day and later prepared for Memorial Day barbeques, according to [download page] comScore Media Metrix data. Flowers, gifts, and greeting sites grew 23% month-over-month to 28 million visitors, while traffic to food retailer sites increased 8%, to almost 16 million. Jewelry, luxury goods, and accessories sites drew close to 20 million visitors during the month (up 7%), while mall sites attracted 14.7 million, representing a 5% increase.
The growth of flowers, gifts, and greeting sites is unsurprising given NRF survey results from April indicating that almost 82.7% of Mother’s Day celebrants were planning to buy a greeting card, and roughly two-thirds were planning to purchase flowers.
ProFlowers.com ranked as the category leader among flowers, gifts, and greetings sites with 5.8 million visitors, a 147% month-over-month increase. AmericanGreetings Property came in second with 3.7 million visitors (up 4%), followed by Gifts.com with 3.4 million visitors (up 7%), 1-800-Flowers.com with 2.6 million (up 83%), and PartyCity.com with 2.1 million (up 11%).
Kroger Takes Top Billing Among Food Retailers
With consumers on the hunt for specials, coupons, and grocer recipes, traffic to food retailer sites saw an 8% uptick for the month. The Kroger Co. led the category with 3.1 million visitors (up 21%), ahead of Safeway.com with 1.3 million (up 14%), Berries.com with 980,000 (up 225%), OmahaSteaks.com with 781,000 (up 12%), and DunkinDonuts.com, with 580,000 (up 38%).
Yahoo Climbs Into Second Spot
Google Sites ranked as the #1 property in March with almost 189 million visitors, virtually unchanged from a month earlier. In May, though, Yahoo (167.4 million) overtook Microsoft (163.7 million) for the second spot by virtue of losing a smaller number of visitors from the past month. Rounding out the top 5 were Facebook (158 million) and AOL (110.4 million).
Data also released in June 2012 by Nielsen shows Google with a leading unique audience of 173 million in May, with Facebook (152.7 million) taking the second spot ahead of Yahoo (143 million), YouTube (127.5 million) and MSN/WindowsLive/Bing (126.8 million).
Top 5 Ad Focus Rankings Unchanged
The top 5 ad focus rankings were unchanged in May, as comScore continued to expand the scope of its existing Advertising Networks category. Google Ad Network led the May Ad Focus ranking with a reach of 92.2% of Americans online, ahead of Rubicon Project REVV Platform (88%), AOL Advertising (83.7%), Google (82.5%), and AT&T Adworks (81.1%).
Other Findings:
- According to the Nielsen data, the average American had 64 internet sessions in May, visiting 97 domains and viewing 2,716 web pages.
- In May the average person spent just over 29 hours online.
- Out of the 276.6 million Americans with internet access, roughly 212 million went online during the month.
