Brits ditching traditional websites for social media
- Added:
- Jun 10, 2008
People are spending less time on communication and content sites and more on consumer generated media, search and entertainment sites, according to a new study.
Internet research firm Nielsen Online examined how Britons are changing the way they spend their time online. It found that, on average, Brits are spending just 4% more time online a month than they did a year ago
Overall, consumer generated media (+47%), search (+13%) and entertainment (+8%) sites have experienced the biggest increases in online time
Communication (-10%), and content sites (-3%) have experienced the biggest decreases
How UK online time is spent by category*: April 2008
|
Rank |
Category* |
Total UK minutes (billions) Apr 08 |
Total UK minutes (billions) Apr 07 |
Change in total minutes |
Change in share of minutes |
|
All categories |
33.3 |
32.2 |
+4% |
n/a |
|
|
1 |
Content |
8.4 |
8.7 |
-3% |
-7% |
|
2 |
Entertainment |
6.8 |
6.3 |
+8% |
+4% |
|
3 |
Communication |
6.0 |
6.7 |
-10% |
-14% |
|
4 |
Consumer-Generated Media |
4.0 |
2.7 |
+47% |
+41% |
|
5 |
eCommerce |
2.2 |
2.1 |
+4% |
0% |
|
6 |
Search |
1.3 |
1.1 |
+13% |
+9% |
Source: Nielsen Online, UK NetView, home & work data, including applications, Apr 2007 – Apr 2008. E.g. Britons spent 8.4 billion minutes on content sites in Apr 08, 3% less than in Apr 07. Content sites share of all online time has decreased 7%
*Custom categories compiled by the UK PR team and don’t necessarily mirror official Nielsen Online categories
Member communities (social networks and blogging sites) have had the biggest increase in total UK minutes over the last year (+1.3 billion) followed by online games (+0.5 billion).
Instant Messaging has had the biggest decrease (-1.0 billion) followed by sports sites (-0.2 billion).
Alex Burmaster, Internet Analyst, Nielsen Online, said: “Consumers aren’t spending significantly more time online than they were a year ago, which means that, if one sector grows, another tends to shrink. As a whole, the communication (including Instant Messaging which has lost a billion minutes) and content sectors (including portals, ISPs and government), have been the ones to suffer most from the exploding consumer generated media phenomenon.”
Subcategories with biggest INCREASE in total minutes: April 2007-2008
|
Rank |
Subcategory |
Total UK minutes (billions) Apr 08 |
Total UK minutes (billions) Apr 07 |
Change in total minutes (billions) |
Category* |
|
1 |
Member Communities |
3.7 |
2.4 |
+1.3 |
CGM |
|
2 |
Online Games |
2.2 |
1.6 |
+0.5 |
Entertainment |
|
3 |
Videos/Movies |
1.0 |
0.7 |
+0.2 |
Entertainment |
|
4 |
Adult |
1.0 |
0.8 |
+0.2 |
Entertainment |
|
5 |
Search |
1.3 |
1.1 |
+0.1 |
Search |
Subcategories with biggest DECREASE in total minutes: April 2007-2008
|
Rank |
Subcategory |
Total UK minutes (billions) Apr 08 |
Total UK minutes (billions) Apr 07 |
Change in total minutes (billions) |
Category* |
|
1 |
Instant Messaging |
2.9 |
3.9 |
-1.0 |
Communication |
|
2 |
Sports |
0.4 |
0.7 |
-0.2 |
Entertainment |
|
3 |
Targeted Portals/Communities |
0.1 |
0.2 |
-0.1 |
Content |
|
4 |
Kids, Games, Toys |
0.4 |
0.5 |
-0.1 |
Content |
|
5 |
Government |
0.2 |
0.3 |
-0.1 |
Content |
Source: Nielsen Online, UK NetView, home & work data, including applications, Apr 2007 – Apr 2008.
E.g. Britons spent 2.9 billion minutes Instant Messaging in Apr 08, 1 billion minutes less than in Apr 07
*Custom categories compiled by the UK PR team and don’t necessarily mirror official Nielsen Online categories.
The leading sites by UK Total Minutes
Despite losing almost a billion minutes over the last year, MSN/Windows Live Messenger narrowly remains the leading UK site by total minutes ahead of Facebook (both 2.4 billion minutes) – the latter increasing by almost 2 billion minutes over the last year
Leading sites by total UK minutes: April 2008
|
Rank |
Site |
Total UK minutes (billions) Apr 08 |
Total UK minutes (billions) Apr 07 |
Change in total minutes (billions) |
Subcategory |
|
1 |
MSN/WL Messenger |
2.4 |
3.2 |
-0.8 |
Instant Messaging |
|
2 |
|
2.4 |
0.5 |
+1.9 |
Member Communities |
|
3 |
eBay |
1.7 |
1.7 |
0 |
Classifieds/Auctions |
|
4 |
Google Search |
0.9 |
0.7 |
+0.2 |
Search |
|
5 |
YouTube |
0.6 |
0.4 |
+0.3 |
Videos/Movies |
|
6 |
MSN/WL Hotmail |
0.6 |
0.6 |
0 |
|
|
7 |
Windows Media Player |
0.6 |
0.9 |
-0.4 |
Software Manufacturers |
|
8 |
iTunes |
0.5 |
0.5 |
0 |
M/C Entertainment |
|
9 |
Yahoo! Mail |
0.5 |
0.4 |
+0.1 |
|
|
10 |
AOL Email |
0.4 |
0.4 |
+0.1 |
|
Source: Nielsen Online, UK NetView, home & work data, including applications, Apr 2007 – Apr 2008.
E.g. Britons spent 2.9 billion minutes Instant Messaging in Apr 08, 1 billion minutes less than in Apr 07
“Instant Messaging has already seen its mantle as the UKs most engaging online sector pass to Member Communities and it seems that the dominance of MSN Messenger as the most engaging brand is shortly to be ended by Facebook. This has been a seismic shift in a relatively short space of time and illustrates how social networks have fundamentally altered the way people communicate online. It will be interesting to see what further effects Facebook’s IM application will have on the current players in the space.”
Source: www.nielsen-online.com