Researchers Solve Mystery of Increase in Home Net Usage

[London, ENGLAND] European market research company
NetValue revealed
Friday that there were 10.15 million home Internet
users in the U.K. in June, an increase of a quarter
of a million on the previous month.

Why this sharp increase in early summer?

One answer given is the effect of soccer tournament
Euro 2000. But far from suggesting that soccer fans were
busy looking up information about their favorite teams,
NetValue has another finding.

While men watched football on TV, women in their millions
logged onto the Internet instead.

In the U.K., there are now 4.4 million female Internet users
who log on from home. In France the figure is 2.2 million,
up by 0.35 million since May. While in Germany the 3.8 million
female users account for 37 percent of all home Internet users.

There are other factors, too, that account for the increased
use of the Internet in the U.K., not least of which has been
access to free music. Recently doomed Napster.com, condemned by
the courts, had over half a million unique visitors from the
U.K. in June, up by over 0.3 million since May.

NetValue observes that the appearance of Napster.com in its
top 50-popularity list (it was 42nd) “may herald a shift in
popularity in the U.K. towards those sites that can deliver
their products/services instantly via the Internet.” Clearly,
these users will now shift their attention to other, similar
sites.

Of greatest interest to e-commerce managers are the trends
revealed by NetValue in online shopping.

The number of female users visiting e-commerce sites in June
grew by over 0.4 million users over the previous month,
reaching 2.8 million users. Of these 2.3 million went
on to make a secure connection with the apparent intent
on making a purchase — an increase of 56 per cent since
May.

The top two e-commerce sites for men and women alike in the U.K.
are streetsonline.co.uk,
way out in front with 0.82 million women visitors out of a total of
1.69 million, followed by amazon.co.uk
with 0.51 million women visitors out of 1.14 million.

NetValue uses a technology that records and tracks all applications
available on the Internet, measuring not only the Web but
e-mail, FTP, audio, video. It operates in the U.K., France,
Germany, Sweden and the U.S., and has plans for expanding
to 14 other countries by the end of 2000.