Hitwise Intelligence - Robin Goad - UK

Analyst Weblog

Category Archives: Search

Are online discount vouchers on the decline?

July 01, 2009

As we’ve reported a number of times, online vouchers have been one of the recent online success stories. Voucher searches shot up massively in the run up to Christmas as savvy shoppers looked to find a bargain during the recession.... Continue reading...

Twitter sending traffic to online media sites, but not online retailers

June 24, 2009

Thanks to everyone that listened to today’s Twitter webinar - we managed to reach capacity with 200 people logged in!. If you missed it, we’ll be posting the recording soon and will email / blog / tweet the link. In... Continue reading...

Apple iPhone 3G S vs Nokia N97

June 18, 2009

The launches on June 19th of two 3G touchscreen phones from the most searched for mobile phone brands in the UK, Apple and Nokia, have created a buzz in the Hitwise office this week. Hitwise UK’s resident gadget expert, Client... Continue reading...

Local Internet data: Liverpool example

June 15, 2009

Last month I had the pleasure of speaking at the Digital Editors Network forum, an event organized by Francois Nel from the Journalism Leaders Program at the University of Central Lancashire (UCLAN). One of the topics that came up during... Continue reading...

Revision searches and BBC Bitesize

June 10, 2009

One of the fastest moving websites last week was BBC Schools, which experienced a 40% increase in traffic to become the 106th most visited website in the UK. However, as the chart below illustrates, last week’s spike wasn’t the first... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 09:50 AM | (1) | (0)
In Categories BBC | Education | Search

Initial Bing stats

June 08, 2009

Bing, Microsoft’s new search engine, was announced by Steve Balmer on May 28 and officially launched on June 3. I’ve held off putting up our initial UK statistics until now for a couple of reasons. Firstly, I couldn’t think of... Continue reading...

Sims 3, top transactional websites and the latest Experian Insight Report.

June 04, 2009

Not a full blog entry for once, but a list of links to some other great content from elsewhere within Hitwise and Experian. Firstly, a great new blog from Hitwise Client Intelligence Analyst Richard Seymour on the rollercoaster ride of... Continue reading...

ITV.com traffic reaches record high thanks to Britain’s Got Talent

June 01, 2009

The Britain’s Got Talent final attracted 19.2 million viewers on Saturday night, making it the most watched non-sporting television programme since 2003. The ITV show, which was won by dance troupe Diversity rather than favourite Susan Boyle, picked up almost... Continue reading...

Increase in traffic to train, bus and coach websites

May 26, 2009

Despite positive news from Virgin Atlantic today, there is no doubt that these are tough times for the airline industry. UK Internet traffic to websites in our Aviation – Commercial Airlines category (which is dominated by the airline's homepages) was... Continue reading...

Mobile phone recycling searches treble

May 22, 2009

Internet searches related to the recycling of mobile phones have almost trebled over the last 12 months. UK Internet searches for a portfolio of mobile phone recycling search terms – such as ‘recycle mobile phones’, ‘mobile phone recycling’ and ‘phone... Continue reading...

MPs' expenses searches drive Telegraph page views

May 14, 2009

The Telegraph’s MPs' expenses story has dominated the headlines for almost a week now. As the chart below illustrates, searches for a portfolio of terms relating to story increased by 575% last week, and our data will likely show a... Continue reading...

London Marathon: 2010 searches overtake 2009

May 07, 2009

As you would expect, UK Internet traffic to the official London Marathon website spiked last week and was up 25% on the previous year. Searches for the race also increased, but I was surprised to see both ‘london marathon 2009’... Continue reading...

Swine flu searches increase 58-fold

May 05, 2009

UK Internet searches for ‘swine flu’ increased 58-fold last week, making it Britain’s fastest moving search term. Of the 10.9 million distinct search terms we tracked in the UK last week, ‘swine flu’ ranked 20th. As the chart below illustrates,... Continue reading...

Travel industry experiences decline in paid search

April 30, 2009

Last week I highlighted the overall decline in the UK paid search rate over the last 12 months, and focused on the retail sector in particular. I also promised to provide similar analysis for some other industries, so here is... Continue reading...

Online retailers receiving less traffic from paid search, but more from social networks

April 22, 2009

The amount of traffic that online retailers receive from paid search – i.e. from sponsored or paid for links on search engines such as Google, Yahoo!, Live and Ask - has fallen over the last 12 months. During March 2009,... Continue reading...

Interest rates: the relationship between online and offline behaviour

April 15, 2009

The Internet is now a key source of info for the majority of people in the UK. Consequently, search engines are one of the first places people turn to for information on everything from celebrity culture to the global financial... Continue reading...

Shop opening times searches: an SEO opportunity?

April 14, 2009

While perusing this week’s fast moving search terms (i.e. the search terms in each category that experienced the biggest increase in volume between last week and the week before), the list for our Shopping and Classifieds category caught my eye.... Continue reading...

Festival fever and a good week for the NME

April 08, 2009

The sun may be shining, but it’s not quite time for the music festivals yet (it has to start raining for that to happen). However, following the release of the Reading and Leeds Festival line-ups in the NME last week,... Continue reading...

What would a Google-Twitter marriage mean?

April 06, 2009

Last week it was reported that Google is in talks to purchase Twitter. Therefore, now seems like a good time to revisit some of the stats, starting with the top level traffic figures. As the chart below illustrates, UK Internet... Continue reading...

Sales searches drive department store traffic

April 02, 2009

The spring sales have started on the high street, and department stores are the main beneficiaries online. While UK Internet visits to our Shopping and Classifieds parent category increased by just 0.9% last week, a custom category of ‘traditional’ high... Continue reading...

Daniel Hannan: has social media finally gone political in the UK?

March 31, 2009

It is generally accepted that his campaign team’s use of social media contributed to Barack Obama’s victory in last year’s American presidential election. But over on this side of the pond, politicians have been much slower to grasp the nettle... Continue reading...

BBC F1 and the new England Kit

March 30, 2009

The Formula 1 season kicked off this weekend, with Jenson Button pulling off a surprise victory for the new Brawn team. This year the UK television coverage has returned to the BBC after more than a decade with ITV. In... Continue reading...

Celeb and entertainment searches dominate Google News

March 26, 2009

Last week we revealed that Twitter had overtaken Google News in the UK. However, although everyone’s favourite micro-blogging service receives more UK Internet visits, Google News remains the greater source of traffic for News and Media websites. As the chart... Continue reading...

Fair weather searches

March 25, 2009

Whenever the sun comes out, us Brits flock to parks, beaches and al fresco restaurants to make the most of that most precious of commodities (in the UK at least): sunshine. As you might expect, our online behaviour also changes... Continue reading...

Google Maps visits up 41% following UK Street View launch

March 20, 2009

Following the launch of Google Street View in the UK yesterday (19 March 2009), UK Internet visits to Google Maps UK Increased by 41%. This was the busiest ever day for Google Maps in the UK, and as a result... Continue reading...

Online video traffic up 41%; BBC iPlayer 22nd most popular UK website

March 19, 2009

UK Internet traffic to Video websites has increased by 40.7% over the last 12 months. During February 2009, 1 in every 35 UK Internet visits went to a specialist Video website, up from 1 in every 50 in February 2008.... Continue reading...

Apprenticeships and The Apprentice

March 13, 2009

UK Internet visits to the homepage of The Apprentice, the BBC TV show starring Sir Alan Sugar, have shot up over the last week. Some of this traffic is a result of anticipation for the forthcoming fifth series, but most... Continue reading...

TV and Games are UK's most searched for subjects

March 09, 2009

For our second guest posting on the UK blog, I’d like to hand over to Richard Seymour, Hitwise UK Client Intelligence Analyst, to take us through some of the research he has carried out recently on UK Search Engines. For... Continue reading...

Facebook the most searched for brand in the UK

March 05, 2009

Britain’s favourite social network and the second most visited website in the UK after Google, is also the most searched-for brand by UK Internet users. During the 12 weeks ending 3 January 2009, 1 in every 42 Internet searches in... Continue reading...

What are we scared of?

February 23, 2009

In his book Click (which has just been published in the UK), one of the topics that Bill Tancer discusses is using search data to get an understanding of what people really think about a topic – as opposed to... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 11:40 AM | (5) | (0)
In Categories Click | Search | TV

The Sun and the Baby Father

February 19, 2009

According to Journalism.co.uk, the Sun’s February 13th story about the 13 year old ‘baby father’ Alfie Patten became the newspaper’s most popular online article of all time. As the chart below illustrates, the Sun’s market share of UK Internet visits... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 09:30 AM | (0) | (0)
In Categories News and Media | Search | Social networks

“Money Saving Expert” Martin Lewis the most searched-for personality in the UK

February 18, 2009

Martin Lewis, creator of the “consumer revenge” website Money Saving Expert was the most searched-for personality by UK Internet users during the 12 weeks ending January 3 2009. There were 11% more searches for Martin Lewis than US President Barack... Continue reading...

Searches for e-books double

February 02, 2009

Over the last year UK interest in e-books has grown significantly, with searches for ‘ebooks’ doubling between January 2008 and 2009. There are four main e-book readers currently available: the Amazon Kindle, the Sony Reader, the Borders iLiad, and the... Continue reading...

Searching for the recession

January 28, 2009

Now that the UK is officially in recession, we thought it would be a good time to look at downturn-related searches. The table below charts the volume of searches for 4 key terms over the last 12 months, and of... Continue reading...

eMusic and the Long Tail

January 20, 2009

The online music retailer eMusic has put out some interesting data that, it is claimed, supports the famous “Long Tail” theory of online retail. Chris Anderson, the editor in chief of Wired magazine, coined the phrase in a 2004 article,... Continue reading...

Flight search and travel data update

January 15, 2009

After reporting a decline in flight searches last week in the FT and on our blog, we received a number of comments: on the blog post, via Twitter and elsewhere. Many of the questions have been addressed in the comments... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 11:30 AM | (1) | (0)
In Categories Economy | Search | Travel

Vouchers vs. sales: battle of the online discounts

January 13, 2009

Around this time last year we reported that post-Christmas sales searches had trebled; a couple of weeks ago we noted that this year the increase was just 3.2%. However, if Christmas 2007 was the year that online sales went mainstream,... Continue reading...

Searches for flights down 42% on last year

January 08, 2009

UK Internet searches for flights have fallen by 42% over the last 12 months. January is a key month for the travel industry, as UK consumers’ thoughts turn from Christmas shopping to booking their summer holidays, but the economic downturn... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 11:00 AM | (9) | (0)
In Categories Economy | Search | Travel

Shahrukh Khan and Aishwarya Rai most searched for Bollywood stars

January 07, 2009

Last week UK Internet searches for a portfolio of 100+ Bollywood stars was 68% higher than a year ago. Here is a list of the top 20 most searched for actors and actresses from that portfolio over the 4 weeks... Continue reading...

Healthy New Year? Gym traffic up, diet searches down

January 05, 2009

Happy New Year! Many readers - including the lucky ones who got a Wii Fit for Christmas - will be hoping for a healthy new year, and they’re not alone. It’s the time for New Year’s Resolutions, and getting fit... Continue reading...

TVs, Computers and iPods most popular sales items

December 31, 2008

The table below lists the 10 most searched for consumer electronics products last week (which included the key sales days of Christmas Day and Boxing Day) and the week before. Searches for televisions increased by 148% last week, making the... Continue reading...

UK online retail: Christmas round up

December 29, 2008

Given the economic conditions, people are watching Christmas retail numbers like hawks. Below are the key numbers for online shopping in the UK over the last few days. Sales searches up 3.2% Combined, UK Internet searches for the terms ‘sales’... Continue reading...

Traffic to E Cards websites up 11.8%

December 24, 2008

Yesterday I claimed that we’d written our final UK blog post before Christmas, but I thought this data was too interesting not to share! As the chart below illustrates, last week traffic to E Cards websites was up 11.8% on... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 08:30 AM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Christmas | Economy | Search

Simon’s cat, his sister’s dog and the RSPCA

December 19, 2008

Simon’s Cat is an extremely popular animated series created by Simon Tofield. Since releasing his first short film via YouTube at the start of the year, searches for ‘simons cat’ have shot up, peaking in July when a new episode... Continue reading...

Nintendo Wii and DS account for two-thirds of console searches

December 18, 2008

Nintendo’s Wii Console, which accounted for more than one in three games console searches in November, overtook Nintendo’s Wii Fit to become the UK’s most searched-for product in November. The company’s DS Lite was also the fastest growing console online,... Continue reading...

Apple iPhone pulls away from its closest competitors

December 18, 2008

While mobile phones continue to be the most searched-for product in the UK, they have seen a 23% decrease in searches since October as consumers turn their attention to Christmas gifts such as toys, video games and games consoles. Despite... Continue reading...

Retro toys dominate as searches for toys double in the run up to Christmas

December 18, 2008

UK Internet searches for toys doubled during November as the gift buying season began in earnest. Guess Who Extra, an updated electronic version of the classic 1980’s game, was the most searched-for game during November, accounting for one in every... Continue reading...

Property websites and the online house price crash

December 17, 2008

In September we revealed that online House and Garden retailers had overtaken Property websites in terms of UK Internet visits. As you would expect, in the three months since that blog post, the situation has only got worse for online... Continue reading...

Pre-Christmas peaks in online retail traffic

December 16, 2008

In our retail webinar last week I noted that UK pre-Christmas Internet traffic to Shopping and Classified websites has already started to decline from its peak on Sunday November 30th. As the data in the chart below illustrates, the week... Continue reading...

Netbooks account for 1 in every 7 computer searches

December 11, 2008

In the next instalment of Hitwise Client Intelligence Analyst Richard Seymour’s analysis of the consumer electronics market, Richard talks about another fast-growing consumer electronics area – Netbooks, the small to medium sized, light-weight, low-cost, energy-efficient laptops optimized for web usage.... Continue reading...

133% increase in voucher searches

December 09, 2008

A whole online sector has emerged to feed British consumers’ hunger for discount vouchers for everything from supermarket shopping and pizzas to discounts at high end department stores. One in every 200 visits to an online retail website now comes... Continue reading...

Pre-budget report: tax cuts and petrol prices

November 26, 2008

Given the economic conditions and the various rumours last week, the government’s pre-budget report has received a lot of attention online .Looking at the search data up to last week, you can see from the chart below that searches for... Continue reading...

John Sergeant and Strictly Come Dancing online

November 21, 2008

A couple of weeks ago, when we predicted that Diana Vickers will win X-Factor, I opened my blog post thus: ‘Now that we’ve got the American election and the Glenrothes by-election out of the way, we can finally direct our... Continue reading...

Apple iPhone the most searched for mobile phone in the UK…just

November 18, 2008

Last week we reported that the Nintendo Wii Fit video game is currently the most searched for product in the UK. In that post we also identified the Apple iPhone as the third most searched for product, followed by the... Continue reading...

Unemployment, redundancy and Christmas jobs

November 17, 2008

The economic situation has worsened since our post on ‘redundancy’ searches in June, and unfortunately this is having a negative impact on job security. Consequently UK Internet searches for ‘redundancy’ have increased by 83% since August, reaching their highest peak... Continue reading...

Eating out: afternoon tea, listing sites and the MoneySavingExpert

November 14, 2008

Last month we published a blog about recipe searches and promised to follow up with another post about eating out and restaurant websites. Well, here’s the post and there’s a lot to cover, from afternoon tea at the Ritz to... Continue reading...

Nintendo Wii Fit most searched for product this Christmas

November 13, 2008

Wii Fit, Nintendo’s popular video game, is currently the most searched-for product by UK Internet shoppers in the run-up to Christmas. During October there were more UK Internet searches for Wii Fit than the Nintendo Wii, the most popular product... Continue reading...

Interest rate cut: impact on search behaviour

November 10, 2008

Following last week’s shock 1.5% rate cut by the Bank of England, UK Internet searches for ‘interest rates’ reached a three year high. As the chart below illustrates, this also led to a spike in searches for ‘tracker mortgages’ and... Continue reading...

Diana Vickers leading the X Factor pack online

November 07, 2008

Now that we’ve got the American election and the Glenrothes by-election out of the way, we can finally direct our attention to more important voting matters. Last week we showed how ITV’s The X Factor was picking up more online... Continue reading...

James Bond: Quantum of Solace online

November 05, 2008

Last week saw the premier of the 22nd official Bond film, Quantum of Solace. With the success of Casino Royale in November 2006, Quantum of Solace has been one of the most anticipated films of the year. The chart above... Continue reading...

UK Internet searches for the US Election

November 04, 2008

After months of campaigning, Americans are today finally voting for the 44th president of their country. The US research team have been doing a great job monitoring search behaviour across the pond, so I thought I’d have a look at... Continue reading...

X Factor vs. Strictly Come Dancing 2008

October 30, 2008

The annual pre-Christmas battle for Saturday night tea time TV supremacy is well under way. In the red corner: ITV’s The X Factor, with Cheryl Cole replacing Sharon Osbourne on the judging panel. In the blue corner: the BBC’s Strictly... Continue reading...

Economic downturn benefits budget travel and cruises

October 29, 2008

UK Internet traffic to travel websites fell by 4.6% between September 2007 and September 2008, but certain sectors are thriving despite, or in some cases because of, the squeeze on household budgets. UK Internet visits to a Hitwise custom category... Continue reading...

What comfort food recipes tell us about UK search behaviour

October 28, 2008

Last week Heather Hopkins pointed out that food sites are weathering the financial storm in the US. We like to encourage (internal!) plagiarism at Hitwise, so in that spirit I decided to carry out some similar analysis of the UK... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 03:00 PM | (6) | (0)
In Categories Food | Search

Kerry Katona and YouTube

October 27, 2008

Following her much talked about appearance on ITV’s This Morning show last week, searches for ‘kerry katona’ have gone through the roof. One website that received a lot of traffic from searches for the former Atomic Kitten singer was YouTube.... Continue reading...

Second hand goods, classifieds websites and Freecycle beating the credit crunch

October 22, 2008

The number of UK Internet searches containing the word ‘second hand’ has increased by 22% over the last 12 months, as UK consumers look for new ways to beat the credit crunch online. During the 12 weeks ending 11 October... Continue reading...

Supermarkets continue to grow online

October 17, 2008

While looking at the fastest growing retail sectors for this month’s retail webinar, we noticed that our Grocery and Alcohol has been doing well this year. As the chart below illustrates, its share of Internet visits has been increasing gradually... Continue reading...

Irish banks benefit as UK online banking traffic reaches an all time high

October 06, 2008

The financial turbulence of the last couple of weeks has resulted in a surge in traffic to online banking sites. UK Internet traffic to websites in our Banks and Financial Institutions category increased by 9.2% last week, reaching an all... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 05:00 PM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Economy | Financial Services | Search

Top Ski Resorts

September 24, 2008

UK Internet searches for ski holidays started to take off at the start of September and, if historical activity is anything to go by, they will continue increasing until Christmas, before gradually declining into virtual hibernation by April. One of... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 10:21 AM | (3) | (0)
In Categories Search | Sport | Travel

Credit crunch dominates fast moving search terms

September 22, 2008

Last week’s fastest moving search terms were: 1. ryder cup 2. hbos 3. northern rock 4. hbos share price 5. moto gp 6. share prices 7. aig 8. ftse 9. ftse 100 10. bloomberg As you would expect, the list... Continue reading...

Google Docs benefits from growth in job searches

September 19, 2008

Like Heather Dougherty in the US, we have also been looking at the impact of the credit crunch on employment sites. As the chart below illustrates, UK Internet traffic to Business and Finance – Employment and Training websites has shot... Continue reading...

Has the credit crunch killed ethical consumerism?

September 17, 2008

While the troubles facing the finance industry have picked up the headlines this week, the impact of the credit crunch continues to be felt elsewhere in the economy. One assumption people have made is that consumers will be less inclined... Continue reading...

Fast moving search terms: LHC, big bang, Andy Murray and XL

September 15, 2008

The 10 fastest moving search terms in the UK last week were: 1. large hardron collider 2. hurricane ike 3. lhc 4. xl 5. big bang 6. tour of britain 7. itv f1 8. andy murray 9. black hole 10.... Continue reading...

DIY and furniture retailers overtake estate agents online

September 11, 2008

UK Internet visits to house and garden retail websites have increased by 20.5% over the last 12 months, despite the credit crunch and falling house prices. At the same time, UK Internet visits to estate agents and property websites have... Continue reading...

Paid search rates by industry

September 09, 2008

We launched our New Search Intelligence tool in the UK today and, amongst other enhancements, it includes additional paid / organic search data. One great new feature allows you to measure paid search rates by industry, so I thought I’d... Continue reading...

Top bands / artists: Katy Perry and Kate Nash

September 05, 2008

Here are the top band / artist searches sending traffic to social networks and music blogs during August. Starting with the social networks, Katy Perry, who topped the British and American charts over the summer with her hit “I Kissed... Continue reading...

Google Chrome – initial stats

September 03, 2008

We’ve had a number of requests for Google Chrome stats, so here they are… Yesterday (September 2nd) the homepage of the Google’s new browser was the 130th most visited in the UK, accounting for 0.06% of all UK Internet visits.... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 12:00 PM | (11) | (1)
In Categories Google | Search

Fast moving search terms: Strictly Come Dancing, Pierrepoint, Most Haunted

September 01, 2008

The 10 fastest moving search terms in the UK last week were: 1. strictly come dancing 2. us open 3. bournemouth air show 4. www.bebo.co.uk 5. most haunted live 6. albert pierrepoint 7. most haunted 8. you tube.com 9. euromillions... Continue reading...

Olympics winners: sports sites, bike retailers and sportswear manufacturers

August 29, 2008

Following the success of Team GB in Beijing, we were curious to see who else benefited from the Olympics hype. As the chart below illustrates, the most clear online winners were sports websites, both information and retail sites. UK Internet... Continue reading...

Olympics – Aussies vs. Poms and most searched for athletes

August 21, 2008

I must admit that I wasn’t very excited about the Olympics before it started, but like lots of other Brits I’ve become a shallow fair weather fan following the success of Team GB. Apologies to our colleagues in Melbourne and... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 10:00 AM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Olympics | Search | Sport

Car hire / rental – search habits and top destinations

August 20, 2008

Summer is the busiest time for car hire companies, and this applies to their websites as well. We’ve recently carried out some analysis of car hire search behaviour in the UK, and I wanted to share some of the key... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 04:00 PM | (1) | (0)
In Categories Branding | Search | Travel

National Express: using the web to monitor a rebranding campaign

August 15, 2008

Yesterday we reported than almost nine in ten searches for the top 2,000 search terms in the UK are currently navigational / branded in nature. In our new Managing Your Brand Online report we show that a popular brand will... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 06:57 AM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Branding | Search | Travel

9 in 10 UK searches are navigational / branded

August 14, 2008

We’ve just updated our data on navigational / branded search in the UK for our new research report, Managing Your Brand Online. During May 2008, 88% of searches for the top 2,000 search terms in the UK were branded in... Continue reading...

Football: transfers and fantasy

August 12, 2008

Never mind the Olympics, football websites remain the post popular sport sites in the UK, currently accounting for a third of visits to our Sports category. As you can see from the chart below, by last week traffic had already... Continue reading...

Fast moving search terms: Olympics, celebrities and exams

August 11, 2008

No prizes for guessing what event dominated the fast moving search term list in the UK last week. Here’s the top 10. 1. beijing 2008 olympic games 2. olympics 3. craig jones 4. morgan freeman 5. olympics 2008 6. bernie... Continue reading...

Top bands / artists online: August 2008 chart

August 07, 2008

Here are this month’s lists of the top 20 band / artist searches sending traffic to social networking sites (e.g. MySpace, YouTube, Last.fm, etc.) and the most popular music blogs for the 4 weeks ending August 2nd. First up social... Continue reading...

Fast moving search terms: British Gas fallout, Beatrix Potter and diamond geezers

August 04, 2008

The 10 fastest moving search terms in the UK last week were: 1. beatrix potter 2. diamond geezer 3. southern electric 4. play.com uk 5. bbc cricket 6. u switch 7. carol vorderman 8. racing post 9. currys uk 10.... Continue reading...

Movie & TV sequels: search behaviour and the retail gap

July 29, 2008

Yesterday we highlighted the appearance of four Batman-related terms this week’s top 10 fast moving search terms chart. A couple of weeks ago we posted about the relationship between searches for the recently released film Adulthood and its predecessor, Kidulthood.... Continue reading...

Fast moving search terms: Batman, Now Compilations, Festivals, Runescape

July 28, 2008

The 10 fastest moving search terms in the UK last week were: 1. now 70 2. christian bale 3. global gathering 4. heath ledger 5. batman 6. dark knight 7. womad 8. shipwrecked 9. runehq 10. hamfatter Four of these... Continue reading...

Knife crime searches: statistics, prevention and geography

July 24, 2008

At Hitwise we believe that our search data provides an unprecedented insight into what people are thinking. This information has a huge number of uses, from spotting the latest hot band to measuring the popularity of any number of products,... Continue reading...

Twitter UK traffic: up 485% this year, 70% higher than USA

July 16, 2008

The two Heathers (Hopkins and Dougherty) have both written about the growth of Twitter in the US recently, so here is some UK data on the micro-blogging service. As you can see from the chart below, the site’s growth has... Continue reading...

Branded borrowing on the increase

July 11, 2008

Searches for key borrowing related terms such as ‘mortgages’, ‘credit cards’, and ‘loans’ are in decline thanks to the credit crunch. They haven’t dried up completely, but the shrinking of the pie means that search marketers need to be even... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 08:00 AM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Branding | Financial Services | Search

Hottest bands on the social networks and music blogs

July 10, 2008

A few months ago we posted a list of the top 10 band / artist searches sending traffic to MySpace, the primary destination of searches for new artists. We’ve decided to expand the list to cover our whole Social Networking... Continue reading...

How to save money in a recession

July 09, 2008

Earlier this week I was talking with Bruno Rost, a colleague from Experian Integrated Marketing who was looking for interesting Hitwise data that he could use in a BBC TV interview discussing the effects of the economic downturn on peoples'... Continue reading...

Apple iPhone, O2 and the purchasing cycle

July 08, 2008

O2 started taking orders for Apple’s new 3G iPhone yesterday, and as you would expect it experienced a spike in traffic to both its homepage and online shop. Unfortunately the surge in demand caused the carrier’s site to crash, although... Continue reading...

Adulthood and Kidulthood: sequels and the halo effect

July 04, 2008

As we highlighted a couple of weeks ago when discussing Google’s holiday logos, one of the delights of Hitwise search data is when it reveals something expected. Seeing the phrase ‘kidulthood’ appear in our list of fast moving search terms... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 09:30 AM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Movies | Search

Summer sales and email marketing

July 01, 2008

The summer sales are now in full swing, as you’ve probably noticed when walking around your local shopping centre / high street. As the chart below illustrates, UK Internet users continue to look for a bargain. Searches for both the... Continue reading...

Redundancy searches: employee and employer behaviour

June 26, 2008

Recently we’ve looked at how internet behaviour has adapted a number of ways to meet the challenges of an economic downturn, including consumer spending, inflation and house prices. However, until now we haven’t touched on the most worrying aspect: unemployment.... Continue reading...

TV spoilers and Digital Spy

June 25, 2008

Anyone who uses Wikipedia or IMDB frequently will be used to the ‘spoiler warning’ notification when reading an entry on a book or film. While notifications in these and similar websites are designed to help you avoid spoilers, there are... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 10:30 AM | (2) | (0)
In Categories News and Media | Search | TV

Festivals and band searches

June 23, 2008

Glastonbury - festival of mud and music – officially starts on Friday, and the fastest moving search term sending traffic to our Music category last week was ‘glastonbury line up 2008’. It’s likely that some of these searches relate to... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 04:00 PM | (1) | (0)
In Categories Music | Search

22% increase in paid brand search rates following Google’s trademark changes

June 19, 2008

The top online brands in the UK have significantly increased their rate of paid brand search following the recent changes to Google’s trademark policy on May 5th. Before Google’s changes took effect (4 weeks ending 12/04/2008), 9.2% of the search... Continue reading...

Blackberry benefits from iPhone hype

June 18, 2008

A lot of the iPhone launch coverage last week included references to the alternatives to Apple’s latest mobile phone. It looks like the competitor that benefited most from these comparisons in Britain was Blackberry – ironic, considering that many are... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 02:00 PM | (4) | (0)
In Categories Gadgets | Mobile phones | Search

Google holiday logos and Wikipedia growth

June 17, 2008

When looking at our Fast Moving Search Terms list a few weeks ago, I was surprised to see the term ‘walter gropius’ at the top of the list for All Categories. Why the sudden interest in the founder of the... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 12:00 PM | (1) | (0)
In Categories Education | Google | Search

Mortgage calculators up, 100% mortgages down

June 16, 2008

When Abbey last month became the last big bank to abandon 100 per cent mortgages, it did so in the face of the credit crunch and falling demand from buyers. As the graph below shows, the volume of UK internet... Continue reading...

The Apprentice and BBC iPlayer

June 12, 2008

That’s what I’m talking about! Like nine million other Britons, the Hitwise UK office has been slightly obsessed with The Apprentice over the last few months. We were pleased to see peoples’ choice Lee McQueen crowned winner last night, although... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 10:00 AM | (1) | (1)
In Categories Search | TV | Video

Euro 2008 and British Football fans

June 11, 2008

Most of the rest of Europe is in the grip or football fever, but how excited is the UK considering that none of the home nations are taking part? ‘euro 2008’ was the most popular search term sending traffic to... Continue reading...

Blog traffic reaches all time high

June 10, 2008

UK Internet visits to weblogs reached an all time high last week. As the chart below illustrates, Blogs and Personal Websites accounted for 1.19% of all UK traffic, equivalent to one in every 84 internet visits. Taking the slightly longer... Continue reading...

iPhone website reaches a new high as rumour mill goes into overdrive

June 09, 2008

Apple is expected to launch a new version of its iPhone at the Apple World Wide Developers' Conference in San Francisco this afternoon (UK time). As with all such events, the speculation amongst Apple fans and foes has almost reached... Continue reading...

Online vouchers prove popular in bargain-hungry Britain

June 06, 2008

With the economy slowing and prices rising, everyone is on the lookout for a bargain. Vouchers have become a popular way of promoting discounts, particularly around Christmas time. In fact, they have become some popular that price sensitive shoppers are... Continue reading...

Postcode searches and SEO

June 03, 2008

One of the more curious and unexpected fast moving search terms that we spotted on Monday was ‘b78 3tw’. As you can probably guess, this is a postcode. Specifically, it is the postcode of Drayton Manor Park, a popular theme... Continue reading...

UK house prices: searches and sales

June 02, 2008

Heather Hopkins recently identified a correlation between house searches and house sales in the US. She compared searches for the term "homes for sale" with actual sales data from the American National Association of Realtors, and found that there was... Continue reading...

Chelsea: flowers or football?

May 29, 2008

Flowers were more popular than football in the UK last week, as the Champions League final in Moscow coincided with the annual Chelsea Flower Show in London. Searches for ‘chelsea flower show’ tripled during the week ending 24 May and... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 03:35 PM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Football | Search | Sport

Petrol prices searches reach an all time high

May 28, 2008

UK Internet searches for ‘petrol prices’ reached an all time high last week in advance of yesterday’s fuel protests in London and Wales. As the chart below illustrates, searches for the term have been increasing since Christmas, and have shot... Continue reading...

SATC more popular in UK than USA

May 27, 2008

The decision to hold the world premiere of the new Sex and the City movie in London has led to a surge in online searches in the UK. American interest in the film is yet to take off, although this... Continue reading...

Game cheats: GTA4, Mario Kart Wii and Halo 3

May 20, 2008

Following the recent launches of two popular video games, Grand Theft Auto IV (GTA4) and Nintendo's Mario Kart Wii, we noticed an interesting search pattern. As you can see from the chart below, searches for the game itself peak during... Continue reading...

Freesat proves popular online

May 14, 2008

The launch of Freesat, the free satellite TV service provided by the BBC and ITV in the UK, proved popular with online consumers during its launch week. UK Internet traffic to www.freesat.co.uk, the service’s online homepage, increased by 627% between... Continue reading...

All inclusive holidays popular in a weak economy

May 13, 2008

The combination of a weakening economy, falling house prices and a rising cost of living thanks to inflation mean that many British consumers are looking for ways to cut their expenditure. Add in the impact of a strong Euro (although... Continue reading...

Mobile broadband searches increasing

May 08, 2008

It’s hard to open a newspaper at the moment without seeing an advert for mobile broadband services - from both carriers, such as Three, Vodafone and T-Mobile, and independent retailers such as Carphone Warehouse and Phones4U. The advertising seems to... Continue reading...

Google delivers over a third of all UK traffic – trademark changes will have a significant impact

April 28, 2008

The top 100 Google Internet properties sent over one third of all Internet traffic to websites in the UK during March 2008. A custom category consisting of the 100 most visited Google-owned web properties in the UK accounted for 36.55%... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 11:00 AM | (11) | (1)
In Categories Google | News and Media | Search

London Mayoral elections: what does the Internet data say?

April 22, 2008

A lot has been made about how the candidates and voters for the London Mayoral elections on May 1st have embraced the Internet like never before - at least in British political terms, as this is one area where the... Continue reading...

Apple iPhone UK price drop

April 21, 2008

Last week Apple and 02 announced that they had cut the price of the 8GB iPhone by £100 in the UK until June 1st. As always with Apple, the announcement generated a huge amount of media interest – including speculation... Continue reading...

How long does it take to recover from a Google ‘blacklisting’? (GoCompare update)

April 16, 2008

A couple of months ago we highlighted the fate of GoCompare, the insurance comparison site that was ‘blacklisted’ by Google after the search engine discovered irregular linking activity. Just to recap: for the first few weeks of 2008, ‘car insurance’... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 10:00 AM | (7) | (0)
In Categories Financial Services | Google | Search

Google Book Search on the rise

April 15, 2008

Recently, Google announced that it has released an API which enables websites to link to the books within its Google Book Search functionality. This allows users to preview the book in question in a similar way to the ‘search inside’... Continue reading...

Top 10 UK search terms: social networks dominate the list

April 14, 2008

We have just announced the winners of the Hitwise UK Online Performance Awards 2007, so congratulations to all of the websites that placed within their industry top 10. In addition to the top websites, we also announced the top 10... Continue reading...

The Independent gains online market share in the UK

April 09, 2008

Earlier this year we highlighted the growth of newspaper websites in the UK. As the chart below illustrates, the market share of the UK Independent, which has traditionally lagged behind most of its rivals online, has more doubled over the... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 02:52 PM | (6) | (1)
In Categories News and Media | Search

Google UK trademark changes and navigational search

April 07, 2008

Google has announced that it will allow non-trademark owners to bid on trademarked terms in the UK and Ireland from May 5th, thus bringing the British and Irish markets in line with the US and Canada. This announcement has sparked... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 02:00 PM | (3) | (0)
In Categories Google | Search

UK DIY and Screwfix

April 03, 2008

Apparently, Good Friday is the busiest DIY day of the year, so I wasn’t surprised to see that traffic to our Shopping and Classifieds: House and Garden category increased noticeably during the Easter week. Slightly more unexpected, however, is the... Continue reading...

How popular is Google's "pages from the UK" search option?

April 02, 2008

Have you ever wondered what proportion of people searching on Google UK (www.google.co.uk) choose the ‘pages from the UK’ option? Following on from our recent analysis of the local search market in the UK, we were certainly interested in answering... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 05:00 PM | (16) | (1)
In Categories Google | Search

Miss Bimbo: who is visiting?

April 01, 2008

The ‘virtual fashion game’ Miss Bimbo has picked up a lot of press - Google News UK was the second ranked site receiving up traffic from the search term ‘miss bimbo’ last week. The website allows users to create a... Continue reading...

Online video traffic up 178% in a year

March 26, 2008

UK Internet traffic to online video websites increased by 178% between February 2007 and 2008. A Hitwise custom category of the top 25 video websites in the UK accounted for 2.22% of all UK Internet visits in February 2008, equivalent... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 11:00 AM | (7) | (5)
In Categories Search | Social networks | Video

Retail price index and organic food

March 20, 2008

The Office of National Statistics (ONS) has just announced the latest round of changes to the basket of goods it uses to calculate the UK retail price index (RPI). In addition to providing inflation figures, the make up of the... Continue reading...

Plural or Singular search terms?

March 11, 2008

One of the interesting conclusions that we drew from working with Steve Johnston for our latest Hitwise University Live session and webinar was the importance of plurals. The specific example we went through at the SES conference analyzed the difference... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 10:34 AM | (11) | (2)
In Categories Retail | Search

Local search in the UK

March 04, 2008

Whereas the 'general' search market is dominated by a limited number of players (the combined market share of Google, Microsoft, Yahoo! and Ask in the UK was 97% in the January), the market for local search is much more open.... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 10:00 AM | (2) | (1)
In Categories Search

Brits more interested in US presidential race than domestic politics

February 29, 2008

UK Internet users are more interested in the United States presidential race than politics at home. Senator Barack Obama is the most searched for political figure in the UK, receiving three times as many searches on his name last week... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 03:00 PM | (0) | (0)
In Categories News and Media | Politics | Search

SEO for Mother’s Day

February 26, 2008

Mothering Sunday falls early this year, but searches for the term ‘mothers day’ have been on the rise for a few weeks, and last week were 6% higher than the equivalent week last year. The screenshot below illustrates the results... Continue reading...

Eduardo injury and YouTube

February 26, 2008

The horrific injury sustained by Arsenal’s Brazilian-born Croatian striker Eduardo da Silva has led to an outpouring of sympathy from football fans, and not just supporters of Arsenal or Croatia. Searches for ‘eduardo’ increased almost forty-fold last week, and ‘eduardo... Continue reading...

VideoJug: video search and 'how to' queries

February 21, 2008

With the ongoing popularity of video sharing websites like YouTube and information sharing websites such as Wikipedia, it was only a matter of time before the two were combined. The latest phenomenon gaining interest online is ‘videopedia’, a range of... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 01:50 PM | (2) | (0)
In Categories Search | Video

UK Polish Internet usage on the rise

February 20, 2008

Estimates as to the number of Polish people in the UK range from half a million to over a million. Mass immigration from Central and Eastern Europe has led to a rush for the ‘Polish Pound’, with everyone from multinational... Continue reading...

Brit Awards, MySpace and the top new bands

February 19, 2008

The Brit Awards take place tomorrow evening and there are three awards up for the public vote: best British Breakthrough Act, best British Live Act, and best British Single. The latter is tricky to analyze using search data, but I... Continue reading...

Paid and organic search trends

February 14, 2008

One of the most powerful Hitwise tools is our paid and organic search data. We’ve been analyzing this and have come up with some interesting trends for the travel and retail industries. Before I get into the analysis; a quick... Continue reading...

What happens if your site gets 'blacklisted' by Google?

February 13, 2008

What is the impact on a website of being ‘blacklisted’ by Google? Recently the insurance comparison website GoCompare.com faced precisely this dilemma after the search engine picked up on irregular inbound links to its site, causing it to plummet down... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 02:30 PM | (22) | (6)
In Categories Financial Services | Search

Amy Winehouse: the benefits of good and bad publicity

February 12, 2008

“Camden Town is burning down” claimed Amy Winehouse during her Grammy acceptance speech and, unfortunately, parts of it actually were. The fire that ravaged through Camden Market at the weekend received a lot of coverage in the press, and as... Continue reading...

Group Recipes: social networking for the hungry

February 11, 2008

Since publishing our social networking report last month, people have been asking us to identify successful niche social networking / web 2.0 sites. Wel,l here’s one that saw a real jump in traffic last week: Group Recipes. The site operates... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 04:50 PM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Food | Search | Social networks

Moonpig.com, Valentine’s poems and romantic breaks

February 07, 2008

Online card delivery company Moonpig.com is currently experiencing its highest ever level of UK Internet traffic in the run up to Valentine’s Day. For the week ending 2 February 2008, UK Internet visits to the website have grown six-fold by... Continue reading...

Yahoo! and Microsoft: UK perspective

February 05, 2008

Following on from Bill’s and Heather’s posts, I wanted to share some UK data on the proposed Yahoo! and Microsoft deal. First up: webmail services, and as the chart below illustrates, Microsoft has a dominant market share with its Hotmail... Continue reading...

How important were final Christmas order and delivery dates?

January 31, 2008

One of the biggest challenges that online retailers face is delivering goods, particularly during the busy Christmas period. Many consumers (myself included) have had their fingers burnt when ordering online, only to find that presents for loved ones turn up... Continue reading...

UK Internet traffic to newspaper websites reaches a new high

January 29, 2008

UK Internet traffic to newspaper websites reached its highest level in over two years last week off the back of a number of big news stories. For the week ending 26 January 2008, 1.48% of all UK Internet visits went... Continue reading...

UK job searches and Linkedin

January 24, 2008

I wanted to expand on Sandra’s excellent post comparing job searches in the UK, USA and Australia. The table below lists the top UK searches containing the word ‘jobs’ for the 4 weeks ending 12 January 2008 for three types... Continue reading...

Football: transfer traffic and the Kevin Keegan effect

January 21, 2008

We’re currently in the middle of a seasonal peak in traffic to our Sports – Football category. As the chart below illustrates, football (soccer) websites are receiving their highest level of traffic since the season started last summer, and slightly... Continue reading...

Top Ski destinations

January 18, 2008

There were worries that recent storms in Scotland might cause the snow to melt too quickly for the country to have a viable ski season this year. However, looking at Hitwise data this doesn’t seem to have deterred ski enthusiasts... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 02:49 PM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Search | Sport | Travel

Scrabulous, Facebook and Scrabble

January 16, 2008

You may have heard that Hasbro, which produces the popular board game Scrabble, is asking Facebook to remove its Scrabulous app. As the name suggests, Scrabulous is an online version of Scrabble that has become one of the most popular... Continue reading...

Act on C02 campaign an environmental success

January 11, 2008

A lot of new years’ resolutions will have included a promise to reduce carbon footprints. Therefore it was a shrewd move by the Department of Transport to choose this time of year to launch Act on CO2. As the chart... Continue reading...

BBC iPlayer traffic increases 14-fold in a month

January 10, 2008

UK Internet traffic to the BBC’s iPlayer website increased 14-fold between the week ending 8 December 2007 and the week ending 5 January. The online catch-up TV service ranked as the 80th most visited website in the UK for the... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 10:00 AM | (1) | (0)
In Categories Search | TV

Long-haul travel searches increase

January 04, 2008

With Christmas over and the weather getting worse, at this time year UK thoughts turn to holidays in warmer climes. As you can see from the chart below, this leads to a seasonal boost for travel websites in January. And... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 04:00 PM | (0) | (1)
In Categories Search | Travel

Sales searches trebled in 2007

January 03, 2008

The number of UK consumers searching for post-Christmas sales online more than trebled during the 2007 holiday period. There were 249% more UK internet searches for the term ‘sales’ for the week ending 29th December 2007 than for the comparable... Continue reading...

Top UK gift vouchers this Christmas

December 21, 2007

There a just a few shopping days left before Christmas and many people – most of them men - will be panicking about those last minute gifts. Vouchers are always a popular option and, as we pointed out earlier in... Continue reading...