Summer Retail Traffic Increased 10 Percent Compared to Last Year

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Summer Retail Traffic Increased 10 Percent Compared to Last Year

Amazon, Wal-Mart and Target Top the List for Most Visited Retailers This Summer

NEW YORK, NY – October 23, 2007 – Online retail websites saw an increase in traffic during the summer months in 2007 Hitwise reported today. Online traffic to the Hitwise Retail Index, which consists of the leading 100 U.S. retail websites[1], increased 10 percent from June to August in 2007 compared to 2006.

August 2007 saw the largest amount of traffic among the summer months with 11 percent increase year-over-year. July 2007 also saw a double digit increase, growing by 10 percent. The traffic among the Hitwise Retail Index has continued to grow in the fall as U.S. visits in September were up 15 percent compared to September 2006.

U.S.Market Share of Visits to Top 100 Retail Websites*
Month	2007	2006	% Change
June	2.08%	1.90%	9%
July	2.15%	1.96%	10%
August	2.15%	1.93%	11%
Avg. Traffic Percentage	2.12%	1.93%	10%
September	2.51%	2.18%	15%
The data is based on the U.S. market share of visits among a custom category of the top 100 retail websites from a sample of 10 million U.S. Internet users. * indicates that the top 100 retail websites excludes websites from the following categories: auctions, classifieds, subscription services, DVD and video game rental, reward point collecting and coupons.
Source: Hitwise

“As we head into the 2007 online holiday season, the healthy increase in visits to the retail category this year versus last is an indicator that we will be seeing a strong showing for online retail in the fourth quarter,” said Bill Tancer, general manager of global research at Hitwise.

Top Websites

Amazon.com was the most visited website among the top 100 retail websites during the summer months. Amazon’s average market share of U.S. visits from June to August was 11.52 percent followed by Wal-Mart with 5.37 percent. Target received 4.81 percent of visits, Half.com received 4.45 percent and Dell.com rounded out the top five websites with 3.49 percent.

*Top 5 Most Visited Retail Websites Between June - August 2007**
Rank	Name	Domain	Avg. Market Share %
1	Amazon.com	www.amazon.com	11.52%
2	Wal-Mart	www.walmart.com	5.37%
3	Target	www.target.com	4.81%
4	Half.com	www.half.ebay.com	4.45%
5	Dell USA	www.dell.com	3.49%
The data is based on the U.S. market share of visits among a custom category of the top 100 retail websites from a sample of 10 million U.S. Internet users. * indicates that the top 100 retail websites excludes websites from the following categories: auctions, classifieds, subscription services, DVD and video game rental, reward point collecting and coupons.
Source: Hitwise

About Hitwise

Hitwise is the leading online competitive intelligence service. Only Hitwise provides its 1,400 clients around the world with daily insights on how their customers interact with a broad range of competitive websites, and how their competitors use different tactics to attract online customers.

Since 1997, Hitwise has pioneered a unique, network-based approach to Internet measurement. Through relationships with ISPs around the world, Hitwise’s patented methodology anonymously captures the online usage, search and conversion behavior of 25 million Internet users. This unprecedented volume of Internet usage data is seamlessly integrated into an easy to use, web-based service, designed to help marketers better plan, implement and report on a range of online marketing programs.

Hitwise, a subsidiary of Experian (FTS: EXPN) www.experiangroup.com operates in the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong and Singapore. More information about Hitwise is available at www.hitwise.com.

For up to date analysis of online trends, please visit the Hitwise Intelligence-Analyst Weblogs at http://weblogs.hitwise.com and the Hitwise Data Center at www.hitwise.com/datacenter.

[1] The category of websites does not include websites from the following categories: auctions, classifieds, subscription services, DVD and video game rental, reward point collecting and coupons. The Hitwise data is based on a custom category of 100 of the leading retail websites ranked by US market share of visits, which is the percentage of online traffic to the domain or category, from the Hitwise sample of 10 million US Internet users. Hitwise measures more than 1 million unique websites on a daily basis, including sub-domains of larger websites. Hitwise categorizes websites into industries on the basis of subject matter and content, as well as market orientation and competitive context.