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Social networks overtake adult websites
January 26, 2009
Last week we provided the BBC with some interesting data illustrating how UK Internet visits to Social Networks and Forums have overtaken Adult websites. As the chart below illustrates, social networks overtook last October and have remained ahead since.
The BBC News article further discusses some of the trends relating to days of the week and video sites, but not demographics. As you would expect, Adult sites are notably more popular with men but almost 55% of visitors to our Social Networks and Forums category are female. Looking at the data by region, there isn’t a huge variation in the popularity of either adult sites or social networks.
In the US social networks first overtook adult sites in mid 2007, but since then the two categories have been battling it out with no clear winner emerging. Looking at the chart above, we may be in for a similar situation in the UK; social networks have stayed ahead of adult sites since overtaking them, but the gap hasn’t widened much in the last couple of months.
Adult sites and social networks are two of the topics discussed in “PPC – Porn, Pills and Casinos”, the first chapter “Click” by Bill Tancer. The book, which draws heavily on Hitwise data, is released in the UK next month. Over the next few weeks I’ll be highlighting some other topics that Bill discusses in his book, so keep an eye on the blog for more teasers.
Posted by Robin Goad at 10:00 AM
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In Categories Adult | Demographics | Social networks
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- Internet comes of age - social networks more popular than porn sites in the UK (Tech Digest)
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- Social networks overtake porn sites (BedroomPublishing.com)
I think Hitwise is great tool that can provide valuable information within the online space. I tend to follow the Hitwise blog which always posts informative and current research based on current Internet usage. Came across a story by Robin Goad in reg... [Read More] - Social networks overtake porn sites (BedroomPublishing.com)
I think Hitwise is great tool that can provide valuable information within the online space. I tend to follow the Hitwise blog which always posts informative and current research based on current Internet usage. Came across a story by Robin Goad in reg... [Read More] - Social networks overtake porn sites (BedroomPublishing.com)
I think Hitwise is great tool that can provide valuable information within the online space. I tend to follow the Hitwise blog which always posts informative and current research based on current Internet usage. Came across a story by Robin Goad in reg... [Read More]
[Read More]Comments
Nothing wrong with a bit of pedantry...
The hardback is the US edition, which you can buy as an import via Amazon Marketplace, etc...
The proper UK edition is published in February.
Thanks, Robin
Posted by Robin Goad | January 26, 2009 12:18 PM
I think this is a good indicator how people use the internet
Posted by Arab E-marketing | January 27, 2009 01:26 PM
Just goes to show you that all we want is a little attention. Friends and social networks finally bring back that joy in life. I cannot believe more people are not yelling HORAH!
Posted by Steven | January 27, 2009 02:36 PM
You guys are so wrong - what sites are in the adult index? I guess you haven't noticed how multiple adult video sites rank in the alexa top 50. Yes, people are searching less for adult because they don't need google for it - there's tons at sites like youporn.com.
Posted by spanky | January 27, 2009 06:17 PM
The data is based on visits to websites, not searches. We currently have 60,000 sites in our Adult category and 9,000 in Social Networks and Forums. Here are the top 10 Adult websites in the UK, ranked by share of visits to the category w/e 24/01/09:
1. RedTube (1.95%)
2. Pornhub (1.95%)
3. WWW.LIVEJASMIN.COM (1.44%)
4. YouPorn (1.33%)
5. xHamster (0.87%)
6. Tube8 (0.78%)
7. XNXX.com (0.64%)
8. RealityKings.com (0.54%)
9. StreaMate.com (0.50%)
10. promo.ulust.com (0.47%)
Regarding Alexa, here are the social networks included in their current top 50 for the UK:
- Facebook (2nd), YouTube (5th), Bebo (11th), MySpace (12th),
And here are the porn sites:
- Pornhub (22nd), RedTube (29th), YouPorn (35th)
Based on those lists, I would assume that their data is telling a similar story to ours.
Thanks, Robin
Posted by Robin Goad | January 27, 2009 06:38 PM
This could be because of the nature of the social networking sites?
Also, if the men in the Hitwise sample originally went to adult sites and are now moving to social networking sites, does that indicate why they are moving to the SNS sites? i.e. is it predominantly dating / match-making that drives the traffic ?
Conversely, if amongst the sample size, men go to the Adult sites and women go to the social sites, does the trend indicate that over time there are more women than men coming online? i.e. how has the sample size changed since Dec 06?
Posted by Mahesh | January 28, 2009 01:38 PM
Just to let you know that "Click" has now been published in the UK and is available at all good book shops!
Posted by Robin Goad | January 29, 2009 08:22 AM
very nice'In the US social networks first overtook adult sites in mid 2007, but since then the two categories have been battling it out with no clear winner emerging. Looking at the chart above, we may be in for a similar situation in the UK; social networks have stayed ahead of adult sites since overtaking them, but the gap hasn’t widened much in the last couple of months.
visit:http://www.free.eonlinetask.com
Posted by tutul | February 1, 2009 07:06 PM
nb.'Click' is already out in hardback...
...sometimes comments are just so petty!
Posted by David | January 26, 2009 12:06 PM