49% Internet Users Search Daily: Everyone reading this does dozens of searches daily

A new high of nearly half (49 percent) of all internet users use search engines on a typical day, up from about one-third in 2002 – and closing in on the use level of email (60 percent of those online use email each day) – according to a new analysis from the Pew Internet & American Life Project.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Umm…only half the people?  I guess there are a lot of grandparents getting on the interwebs to check their email hoping to hear from their chlidren.  -Jeff

http://www.pewinternet.org/

Interesting Ecomm Data

Blatantly stolen from my boss’ blog and edited for my own nefarious purposes.  Just so much good data that is so hard to find normally…WARNING: some ChannelAdvisor horn tooting to follow.

“We spend a lot of time at ChannelAdvisor following the various datapoints and thoughts around e-commerce and today Forrester research (Sucharita Mulpuru is the analyst) came out with a joint report/survey with the great folks at Shop.org (I/we are an active member FYI).

The headlines of the report are good news for internet retailers:

• Forrester sees e-commerce growing at 17% y/y in the US (This is good because comscore is starting to talk about 14% and maybe lower).  I’m an optimist and think that in early 09 the pundits will update the data to be more like 20%
• This puts e-commerce at $208B for 2008, up from $174 in 07
• e-commerce represents 7% of retail.
• search engine marketing (what I call paid-search) drove 35% of sales and is still the top channel for retailers
• 65% of retailers are experimenting with social networks
• Forrester is predicting that growth will be driven by the computer, CE, auto and apparel categories.
• Retailers spend $.50/click on average for paid-search and see $8.47 in incremental revenue (that’s a weird metric)

I downloaded the report and what’s neat is that shop.org/Forrester are finally seeing and reporting on the multi e-commerce channel trends we’ve been talking about for years.  For example, they have this figure from the survey section that covers the top channels for retailers (note these would be larger retailers, primarily with brick-and-mortar operations as well I would assume):

Another interesting datapoint they have from the survey is they asked retailers for a variety of e-commerce channels what the cost per order for the channel is and the average selling price.  I’ve found that most retailers like to look at channel costs either as a ROAS (return on ad spend) or an ‘Effective Take Rate’ (ETR), which is more of a cost of sales kind of model which helps for margin-planning/forecasting.  So I took the Forrester data and splatted it into a spreadsheet to calculate the ETR.  I also added eBay and Amazon as marketplaces with their ETR’s and ordered the channels from lowest ETR to highest and this is the result: (Amazon/eBay are highlighted to indicate I added them)

The only datapoint on here that looks unusual to me is the CSE data, usually we would see this more in-line with paid-search so I’m going to go look at our data and see if there’s anything noteworthy there. ( editor’s note: while that percent does seem high to me, I would expect it to be in the 20-22% range)  Not to toot our own horn here, but my guess is the retailers surveyed aren’t watching their CSE programs very closely or using ShoppingAdvisor to optimize their CSE channel.

If you’d like to learn more, there are several news items out today covering the report:

• InfoWeek
• AP
• CNBC video “

Go Google Yourself

 Nearly half (47 percent) of all Internet users have googled their own name (vanity searches), more than double the number from five years ago.  Half of you are vain bastards, the other half liars. I am both.

Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler,Jeff Buechler

 (keyword stuffing still works right?)

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20071216-googling-oneself-not-as-vain-as-you-think-say-researchers.html

Online Poker Making a Comeback?

By Jeff Buechler:

Poker is an avid interest of mine. I’ve played in hundreds of tournaments and 1000’s of cash games in the past 20 years. I had a brief flirtation with online poker, but found the experience wanting.  Then 6 months ago, GWB, signed a law prohibiting online gambling. (never mind that poker is a game of skill, not chance…and is recognized as such in many jurisdictions) Now, Rep. Barney Frank, a Democrat from
Massachusetts and chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, on Thursday introduced a bill that would replace the current broad prohibition with strict regulations, including criminal background checks and financial disclosure, imposed on companies that seek to offer legal Internet gambling.  Enforcement would be provided by the Treasury Dept.This is a much more reasonable position: ensure the legitimacy of the games and prevent minors from playing. Sounds like a winner to me.