Google and Facebook among Biggest Winners in 2007
comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR), a leader in measuring the digital world, released a report highlighting the major trends in U.S. Internet activity in 2007, including top gaining properties and site categories, and core search market growth. The biggest winners in 2007 featured some of the top Internet brands, including Google, Facebook, Wikipedia and Craigslist.
Top-Gaining Properties in 2007
A study of the growth in visitors among the top 100 U.S. Internet properties revealed that 2007 was a strong year for several of the largest properties. Social networking giant Facebook.com reaped the benefits of opening registration to all users, jumping 81 percent versus December 2006 to 34.7 million visitors in December 2007. Wikipedia Sites gained 34 percent to reach nearly 52 million visitors, continuing its reign as the Web’s most popular reference hub. Leading classified site Craigslist.org jumped 74 percent to 24.5 million visitors, while AT&T grew 27 percent to 30.2 million visitors boosted by its exclusive deal with Apple as carrier for the iPhone. Yellow Book Network jumped an impressive 137-percent to 10.4 million visitors
Several of the top-gaining properties were driven by the acquisition of Web entities including, but not limited to, the following:
- Everyday Health gained 349 percent driven by its acquisition of several web sites and the addition of Drugs.com to their network.
- Women’s category leader, Glam Media, grew 213 percent during the year, due in large part to the addition of several new entities, including Quality Health Network, MyYearbook.com, and LifeScript.com, among others.
- Yellow Book Network grew 137-percent to 10.4 million visitors, as visitation to Yellowbook.com Sites tripled (up 207 percent to 4.6 million visitors) and one new entity was added to the property.
- iVillage.com: The Women’s Network gained 27 percent with the addition of Sugar Publishing, MakeoverSolutions.com, and iWin.com, among others.
- Demand Media added numerous entities under its Demand Media Knowledge and Demand Media Games media titles, which contributed to its 149-percent growth.
- OfficeMax’s dramatic 199-percent gain was driven primarily by a December 2007 surge in visitation to its popular viral holiday greetings site ElfYourself.com.
comScore Top 20 Gaining Properties by Percentage Change in Unique Visitors* (U.S.)
December 2007 vs. December 2006
Total U.S. Home, Work and University Internet Users
Source: comScore Media Metrix
Total Unique Visitors (000)
| Dec-06 | Dec-07 | % Change | |
| Total U.S. Internet Audience | 174,199 | 183,619 | 5 |
| Everyday Health | 2,690 | 12,073 | 349 |
| Glam Media | 7,994 | 25,028 | 213 |
| OfficeMax | 5,130 | 15,339 | 199 |
| Demand Media | 5,999 | 14,958 | 149 |
| Yellow Book Network | 4,386 | 10,388 | 137 |
| ValueClick Sites | 6,339 | 13,013 | 105 |
| Facebook.com | 19,105 | 34,658 | 81 |
| WorldNow — ABC Owned Sites | 8,714 | 15,474 | 78 |
| Craigslist.org | 14,075 | 24,468 | 74 |
| Experian Interactive | 8,054 | 12,500 | 55 |
| Yellowpages.com Network | 16,168 | 24,453 | 51 |
| AmericanGreetings Property | 11,982 | 18,102 | 51 |
| Comcast Corporation | 18,716 | 26,445 | 41 |
| UGO | 8,450 | 11,912 | 41 |
| The Mozilla Organization | 10,948 | 15,267 | 39 |
| Answers.com Sites | 10,707 | 14,899 | 39 |
| Wikipedia Sites | 38,585 | 51,851 | 34 |
| iVillage.com: The Womens Network | 13,545 | 17,234 | 27 |
| AT&T, Inc. | 23,833 | 30,212 | 27 |
| Internet Broadcasting Systems | 9,894 | 12,394 | 25 |
*Ranking based on the top 100 properties in December 2007.
Top-Gaining Site Categories in 2007
The top-gaining site categories in 2007 reflected trends in both the online and offline worlds. The politics category grabbed the top position, gaining 35 percent, as the 2008 presidential election and primary season kicked into high gear. Women’s community sites also jumped 35 percent, as the top two properties in the category, Glam Media and iVillage.com, saw strong growth. With the ever-increasing coverage of celebrity news, from Britney Spears’ meltdowns to Anna Nicole Smith’s death, entertainment news sites jumped 32 percent. Online classifieds had a strong 2007 growing 31 percent versus year ago, as it continued to impinge on traditional news media’s classified revenues.
comScore Top 10 Gaining Categories by Percentage Change in Unique Visitors (U.S.)
December 2007 vs. December 2006
Total U.S. Home, Work and University Internet Users
Source: comScore Media Metrix
Total Unique Visitors (000)
| Total U.S. Internet Audience | 174,199 | 183,619 | 5 |
| Politics | 6,192 | 8,384 | 35 |
| Community – Women | 51,632 | 69,854 | 35 |
| Entertainment – News | 37,093 | 49,023 | 32 |
| Classifieds | 31,867 | 41,688 | 31 |
| Career — Training and Education | 7,865 | 10,279 | 31 |
| Ga y/L esbian | 1,843 | 2,367 | 28 |
| Retail — Consumer Goods | 28,829 | 35,936 | 25 |
| Finance — News/Research | 43,317 | 52,064 | 20 |
| Teens | 23,313 | 27,979 | 20 |
| Religion | 19,101 | 22,886 | 20 |
Core Search Query Growth in 2007
In 2007, searches at the five major core search engines increased 15 percent to 9.6 billion searches. Google Sites led with 5.6 billion searches in December 2007, up more than 30 percent from the previous year. Yahoo! Sites ranked second with 2.2 billion searches, followed by Microsoft Sites (940 million), Time Warner Network (442 million), and Ask Network (415 million).
comScore Core Search Report*
December 2007 vs. December 2006
Total U.S. — Home/Work/University Locations
Source: comScore qSearch 2.0
Search Queries (MM)
| Core Search Entity | Dec-06 | Dec-07 | Percent Change Dec-07 vs. Dec-06 |
| Total Core Search | 8,348 | 9,636 | 15% |
| Google Sites | 4,317 | 5,629 | 30% |
| Yahoo! Sites | 2,300 | 2,211 | -4% |
| Microsoft Sites | 871 | 940 | 8% |
| Time Warner Network | 465 | 442 | -5% |
| Ask Network | 396 | 415 | 5% |
* Based on the five major search engines including partner searches and cross-channel searches. Searches for mapping, local directory, and user-generated video sites that are not on the core domain of the five search engines are not included in the core search numbers.
More than 113 billion core searches were conducted in the U.S. during all of 2007, with Google Sites accounting for nearly 64 billion, representing a 56 percent share of the market.
About comScore
comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR) is a global leader in measuring the digital world. For more information, please visit www.comscore.com.
