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Hitwise Intelligence - Robin Goad - UK

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BBC iPlayer overtakes Myspace

July 16, 2009

BBC iPlayer has overtaken MySpace to become the 20th most visited website in the UK. The online video service has been ahead of the social network for three consecutive weeks now, and last week (w/e 11/07/09) it received 26% more UK Internet visits. iPlayer was joined in the top 20 last week by three other BBC properties: the BBC Homepage (8th), BBC News (11th) and BBC Sport (16th). iPlayer was also the second most popular video website in the UK last week, picking up 13.3% of visits to our online video category (which remains dominated by YouTube, with a 65.1% share).

Last week was iPlayer’s busiest this year, with market share of UK Internet visits equalling that of Christmas week (w/e 27/12/08). The top 5 TV programme search terms driving traffic to the iPlayer site last week (w/e 11/07/09) were:
1. ‘bbc iplayer eastenders’
2. ‘iplayer eastenders’
3. ‘bbc iplayer torchwood’
4. ‘bbc iplayer top gear’
5. ‘torchwood’

MySpace’s UK popularity peaked in June 2007 when it was the eighth most visited website in the UK, picking up 1 in every 70 Internet visits in the country. Since then its market share has clearly declined, but MySpace remains one of the 25 most visited websites in the UK (last week it ranked 24th). However, it is interesting to compare MySpace’s demographics with iPlayer’s. The chart below highlights the Experian Mosaic lifestyle groups where the latter is better represented than the former.

There are two key areas where iPlayer is picking up more traffic than MySpace, and these go some way to explaining the differing growth rates. The first are the Urban Intelligence and Symbols of Success groups, both of which are Internet savvy, relatively wealthy (particularly Symbols of Success) and influential early adopters (particularly Urban Intelligence). The second area that iPlayer is performing well in is picking up older users from groups such as Grey Perspectives and Rural Isolation. While these ‘silver surfers’ may use the Internet less than their younger counterparts, they are the fastest growing group online.

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