USA Spends Record Time Online

Google Sites ranked as the #1 property in January with 187.4 million visitors, followed by Microsoft Sites with 179.2 million and Yahoo! Sites with 177.2 million. LinkedIn.com jumped 8 positions to rank #29 with 36.8 million visitors, while Everyday Health, which helped many fulfill their New Year's resolutions to be healthier, leapt 10 positions to #38.

comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR), a leader in measuring the digital world, today released its monthly analysis of U.S. web activity at the top online properties for January 2012 based on data from the comScore Media Metrix service. Tax sites rapidly grew in January as millions of Americans looked to begin preparing to file. Many Americans also booked travel to escape the winter doldrums, while others resolved to begin the new year by researching new careers and education programs.

“In January, the average U.S. Internet user spent a record 36 hours online, reflecting the growing importance of digital media to Americans’ daily lives,” said Jeff Hackett, executive vice president of comScore. “Among the biggest category gainers in this heavy month of Internet usage were Travel and Career sites, which posted double-digit gains, and of course Tax sites as the non-procrastinators among us decided to get an early jump on getting their refunds.”

Winter Blues Melt at Travel Sites
Several Travel subcategories were among the top-gainers in January, including Transaction sites which grew 28 percent to 3.7 million visitors. TravelPN.com led the category with 798,000 visitors (up 11 percent), followed by Viator.com with 642,000 (up 9 percent), WWTE.com with 442,000 (up 86 percent) and OneTime.com with 278,000 (up 48 percent).

Car Rental sites jumped 22 percent to 6.2 million visitors during the month, led by Enterprise Rent-A-Car Company with 3.2 million visitors (up 14 percent). Avis Budget Group ranked second with nearly 2 million visitors (up 19 percent), followed by Hertz with 1.3 million (up 21 percent), CarRentals.com with 793,000 (up 30 percent) and Dollar Thrifty Automotive Group, Inc. with 790,000 (up 27 percent).

A trip wouldn’t be complete without lodging, so it is not a surprise that Hotels/Resorts also ranked among the fastest-growing Travel sites. The category attracted 33.2 million visitors in January, representing an 18-percent increase. Marriott secured the #1 position in the category with 5.1 million visitors (up 30 percent), followed by Disney Parks & Travel with 4.8 million (up 36 percent), Hilton Hotels with 4.6 million (up 25 percent) and Expedia Hotels with 3.3 million.

Career-Minded Americans Research Options Online
As the new year began, Americans turned their focus to career services and education. Traffic to Job Search sites grew 27 percent in January to 24.2 million visitors. Indeed.com Job Search ranked as the category leader with 13.7 million visitors (up 33 percent), followed by CareerBuilder.com Job Search with 9.8 million (up 27 percent), Monster.com Job Search with 5 million (up 28 percent) and SimplyHired.com with 3.5 million (up 42 percent).

Training and Education sites also gained traction, with a sizeable increase of 23 percent to 14.7 million visitors. LiveCareer.com topped the list with 1.2 million visitors (up 58 percent), followed by AesopOnline.com with 940,000 (up 44 percent), FastWeb.com with 736,000 (up 30 percent) and Learn4Good.com with 599,000.

Tax Sites Spike as Season Begins
Visitation to Tax sites swelled in January as millions decided to get a jump on filing and hopefully getting a refund check from Uncle Sam. More than 30.7 million Americans visited a Tax site in January, up 359 percent to rank as the fastest growing category.

Top 50 Properties
Google Sites ranked as the #1 property in January with 187.4 million visitors, followed by Microsoft Sites with 179.2 million and Yahoo! Sites with 177.2 million. LinkedIn.com jumped 8 positions to rank #29 with 36.8 million visitors, while Everyday Health, which helped many fulfill their New Year’s resolutions to be healthier, leapt 10 positions to #38.

Top 50 Ad Focus Ranking
Google Ad Network led the January Ad Focus ranking with a reach of 92.9 percent of Americans online, followed by AOL Advertising (85 percent), Yahoo! Network Plus (84.8 percent), ShareThis (82.4 percent) and AT&T AdWorks (82.3 percent).

Table 1

comScore Top 10 Gaining Properties by Percentage Change in Unique Visitors* (U.S.) January 2012 vs. December 2011 Total U.S. – Home, Work and University Locations Source: comScore Media Metrix
	Total Unique Visitors (000)
	Dec-11	Jan-12	% Change	Rank by Unique Visitors
Total Internet : Total Audience	220,439	220,154	0	N/A
IRS.GOV	5,044	16,259	222	107
ED.GOV	5,201	9,160	76	185
Pinterest.com	7,516	11,716	56	148
Travelocity	4,869	6,957	43	241
Kayak.com Network	5,851	8,087	38	210
ChaCha.com	9,151	12,279	34	138
Orbitz Worldwide	8,965	11,868	32	141
Info.com	5,883	7,740	32	219
Dominion Enterprises	9,622	12,650	31	131
Indeed	12,928	16,985	31	103

*Ranking based on the top 250 properties in January 2012. Excludes entities whose growth was primarily due to tagging through unified digital audience measurement.

Table 2

comScore Top 10 Gaining Site Categories by Percentage Change in Unique Visitors (U.S.) January 2012 vs. December 2011 Total U.S. – Home, Work and University Locations Source: comScore Media Metrix
	Total Unique Visitors (000)
	Dec-11	Jan-12	% Change
Total Internet : Total Audience	220,439	220,154	0
Business/Finance – Taxes	6,685	30,715	359
Retail – Computer Software	41,616	54,081	30
Travel – Transactions	2,913	3,730	28
Career Services & Development – Job Search	19,098	24,209	27
Career Services & Development – Training and Education	11,979	14,679	23
Travel – Car Rental	5,079	6,197	22
Travel – Hotels/Resorts	28,035	33,213	18
Career Services & Development – Career Resources	46,145	54,398	18
Entertainment – News	100,121	116,229	16
Travel – Ground/Cruise	12,164	14,097	16

Table 3

comScore Top 50 Properties (U.S.) January 2012 Total U.S. – Home, Work and University Locations Source: comScore Media Metrix
Rank	Property	Unique Visitors (000)	Rank	Property	Unique Visitors (000)
	Total Internet : Total Audience	220,154
1	Google Sites	187,368	26	Twitter.com	38,410
2	Microsoft Sites	179,220	27	ESPN	38,296
3	Yahoo! Sites	177,249	28	Technorati Media	38,227
4	Facebook.com	163,505	29	LinkedIn.com	36,848
5	Amazon Sites	109,997	30	NetShelter Technology Media	34,954
6	AOL, Inc.	107,085	31	Tribune Interactive	34,517
7	Ask Network	93,954	32	AT&T Interactive Network	33,780
8	Glam Media	90,895	33	Disney Online	32,708
9	Wikimedia Foundation Sites	88,527	34	iVillage.com: The Womens Network	31,942
10	Turner Digital	84,041	35	Alloy Digital Network	30,782
11	CBS Interactive	81,631	36	Yelp.com	30,668
12	Apple Inc.	81,536	37	Fox News Digital Network	30,283
13	New York Times Digital	80,161	38	Everyday Health	30,208
14	Viacom Digital	76,254	39	Netflix.com	29,777
15	eBay	71,554	40	Superpages.com Network	28,971
16	Federated Media Publishing	70,260	41	Break Media	28,252
17	Demand Media	61,344	42	The Washington Post Company	27,602
18	VEVO	59,000	43	Scripps Networks Interactive Inc.	27,580
19	Weather Channel, The	58,643	44	Verizon Communications Corporation	26,763
20	craigslist, inc.	53,431	45	NBC Universal	26,546
21	Comcast Corporation	52,890	46	Target Corporation	26,142
22	Gannett Sites	46,620	47	Cox Enterprises Inc.	25,529
23	Answers.com Sites	44,377	48	Discovery Digital Media Sites	25,265
24	Wal-Mart	41,462	49	Internet Brands, Inc.	25,263
25	Adobe Sites	41,451	50	Myspace	25,124

Table 4

comScore Ad Focus Ranking (U.S.) January 2011 Total U.S. – Home, Work and University Locations Source: comScore Media Metrix
Rank	Property	Unique Visitors (000)	% Reach	Rank	Property	Unique Visitors (000)	% Reach
	Total Internet : Total Audience	220,154	100.0
1	Google Ad Network**	204,468	92.9	26	CPX Interactive**	124,089	56.4
2	AOL Advertising**	187,109	85.0	27	Adconion Media Group**	120,144	54.6
3	Yahoo! Network Plus**	186,587	84.8	28	Undertone**	118,198	53.7
4	ShareThis	181,372	82.4	29	Traffic Marketplace**	116,903	53.1
5	AT&T AdWorks**	181,247	82.3	30	AOL, Inc.	107,085	48.6
6	Google	179,685	81.6	31	Meebo	98,130	44.6
7	Yahoo! Sites	177,249	80.5	32	Technorati Media**	97,287	44.2
8	ValueClick Networks**	176,229	80.0	33	Bing	95,661	43.5
9	24/7 Real Media Global Web Alliance**	176,227	80.0	34	Smowtion Ad Network**	95,226	43.3
10	Microsoft Media Network US**	174,276	79.2	35	Ask Network	93,954	42.7
11	Tribal Fusion**	170,715	77.5	36	Glam Media	90,895	41.3
12	Facebook.com	163,505	74.3	37	Amazon.com*	90,774	41.2
13	Casale Media – MediaNet**	162,269	73.7	38	Rocket Fuel**	89,373	40.6
14	AdBrite**	162,088	73.6	39	Wikipedia.org	88,224	40.1
15	PulsePoint**	154,100	70.0	40	Kontera**	86,005	39.1
16	Specific Media**	153,336	69.6	41	Monster Career Ad Network (CAN)**	78,243	35.5
17	Collective Display**	151,427	68.8	42	Windows Live	74,579	33.9
18	AudienceScience**	149,336	67.8	43	Federated Media Publishing	70,260	31.9
19	Cox Digital Solutions – Network**	146,632	66.6	44	Dedicated Media**	67,243	30.5
20	Vibrant Media**	143,793	65.3	45	About	62,480	28.4
21	interclick**	139,508	63.4	46	Demand Media	61,344	27.9
22	Burst Media**	133,900	60.8	47	Weather Channel, The	58,643	26.6
23	YouTube.com*	126,279	57.4	48	MTV Networks Music	53,932	24.5
24	MSN	125,561	57.0	49	Redux Media Network**	52,684	23.9
25	AdBlade Network**	125,421	57.0	50	Apple.com	49,689	22.6

Reach % denotes the percentage of the total Internet population that viewed a particular entity at least once in January. For instance, Yahoo! Sites was seen by 80.1 percent of the 220 million Internet users in January.

* 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.

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Posted by Shayne Heffernan on Feb 18th, 2012and filed underLatest News, Research, Retail & Consumer, Shayne Heffernan, Technology, USA.You can follow any responses to this entry through theRSS 2.0Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.

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