About Hitwise

Hitwise is the leader in online competitive intelligence. Contact Hitwise to maximize your online marketing programs.

Hitwise Intelligence - Robin Goad - UK

Analyst Weblog

Category Archives: TV

X Factor receives four times more UK Internet visits than Strictly Come Dancing

November 16, 2009

The X Factor and Strictly Come Dancing have become staples of the pre-Christmas television schedules. The ITV and BBC shows rely on the reality TV show format, but appeal to quite different audiences. While Strictly is most popular with older... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 02:15 PM | (1) | (0)
In Categories BBC | TV

Google Doodle: Sesame Street vs. Wallace and Gromit

November 10, 2009

Last week Google replaced its traditional logo with two Google Doodles. The first celebrated the twentieth anniversary of Wallace and Gromit, the second Sesame Street’s fortieth birthday. The chart below illustrates the increase in searches for the terms ‘wallace and... Continue reading...

Ukraine vs. England: a success for online video and Bet365

October 12, 2009

By most accounts, the screening of the Ukraine vs. England football match online was a success. The live video stream picked up an estimated audience of half a million and there were few technical complaints. The website that screened the... Continue reading...

Record week for Google News

September 21, 2009

A while ago we highlighted how Google News UK picks up more traffic from searches for celebrities than any other type of news. Last week was a bumper week for celebrity news stories (unfortunately for sad reasons in many cases),... Continue reading...

Top 100 student websites in the UK

June 02, 2009

Yesterday I received a call from Sridhar Venkatapuram of the London Business School asking me about the online behaviour of students in the UK. I mentioned on Twitter that I was pulling a list of the 100 most popular websites... 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...

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...

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...

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

“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...

Twitter traffic increases 10-fold in a year

January 21, 2009

Following Heather’s post yesterday on Twitter overtaking Digg in the US, here is some UK data on the most talked about website of the moment: UK Internet traffic to the site has increased 10-fold over past last 12 months. For... Continue reading...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

TV and US media websites big election winners in the UK

November 06, 2008

The US presidential election was a global media event, and Barack Obama’s historic victory caused a spike in traffic to news websites in the UK. Here is a list of the 10 most visited in the News and Media websites... 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...

Fast moving search terms: Google Chrome, cautious investors, football and flooding

September 08, 2008

The 10 fastest moving search terms in the UK last week were: 1. google chrome 2. man city 3. bestival 4. environment agency 5. chrome 6. manchester city 7. burghley horse trials 8. nsandi 9. ns&i 10. setanta sports The... Continue reading...

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...

Fast moving search terms: Olympics, BBC iPlayer, UCAS and fantasy football

August 18, 2008

The 10 fastest moving search terms in the UK last week were: 1. ucas track 2. bbc olympics 3. fantasy premier league 4. dream team 5. michael phelps 6. tom daley 7. the sun dream team 8. joules 9. last... 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...

Food websites grow as self-sufficiency gains popularity

July 18, 2008

Almost a year ago we investigated the seasonality of popular recipes. Recent analysis for 2008 reveals a similar pattern, with searches for cake recipes featuring heavily again this summer. However, it was interesting to note that visits to the Food... 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

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

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...

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...

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...

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...

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

Lyrics, X-Factor and Christmas number one

December 11, 2007

Until recently, people used to complain that the traditional Christmas number one race had been hijacked by novelty records from the likes of Mr Blobby (1993) and Bob the Builder (2000). In fact, novelty records seem to make it about... Continue reading...

Alesha Dixon to win Strictly Come Dancing?

December 07, 2007

A couple of weeks ago we posted about the rivalry between the BBC’s Strictly Come Dancing and ITV’s The X-Factor, including a promise to make some predictions as to who would win the shows based our search data. Well, Strictly... Continue reading...

X-Factor vs. Strictly Come Dancing

November 15, 2007

The annual battle for Saturday tea time supremacy between ITV’s The X-Factor and the BBC’s Strictly Come Dancing is well under way. It seems that the Bruce Forsythe fronted show has the edge when it comes to TV ratings, but... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 03:00 PM | (1) | (0)
In Categories TV

Control, Manchester and Factory Records

October 09, 2007

Last week I was in Manchester for the excellent Manchester Digital conference. As a music fan, the city is forever linked in my mind with the Factory Records and the late Anthony H. Wilson. There have been a number of... Continue reading...

Bratz the most popular toys in the run up to Christmas

October 05, 2007

Following a charity interlude, here is the penultimate Christmas shopping 'hot products' list. Analysis of the top search terms sending traffic to top 100 UK online retailers shows that the most popular girls' toys, dolls, are 29% more popular than... Continue reading...

High School Musical dominates in the year of the downloads

September 28, 2007

Following yesterday's post on the top gadgets in the run up to Christmas, today I reveal the most searched for entertainment products. The most noticable trend is the massive increase in searches for entertainment downloads, which currently outstrip searches for... Continue reading...

Big Brother searchers prefer blondes

September 04, 2007

Bill is a huge fan of American Idol, although I think that it’s using search data to predict the results that appeals to him more than the music itself. As he points out, the use of search data for such... Continue reading...

Posted by Robin Goad at 06:20 PM | (0) | (0)
In Categories TV

Robin Goad

Research Director, Hitwise UK.