Warmer Weather Brings More Traffic to Travel, Home Improvement and Green Sites
The month of March meant good things for websites that had something to do with the areas outside of our homes, according to the latest figures released from comScore.
For instance, Green websites attracted 19.9 million unique U.S. visitors in March, up 11 percent from the 18 million visitors the category drew in February. “Green sites earned the #1 spot on the top gaining categories ranking in March — a result of Americans seeking ways to cut back on energy consumption beyond Earth Hour amid a backdrop of skyrocketing gas prices,” said Jeff Hackett, executive vice president of comScore Media Metrix.
Planet Green Sites sat atop the category with nearly 2.9 million visitors in March, a 24 percent month-over-month surge. Meanwhile, Care2.com boasted 1.9 million visitors during the month, while Shine Green had 1.7 million visitors, Mother Nature Network had 1.5 million visitors, Matter Network had 985,000 visitors (up 37 percent), EnergyGuide.com had 870,000 visitors and EPA.gov had 833,00 visitors (up 17 percent).
General News sites drew more than 166 million visitors in March, up 10 percent from the 151 million visitors they drew in February.
Travel Information sites drew 61.4 million visitors in March, up 10 percent from the 55.7 million visitors they drew in the previous month. TravelAdNetwork took the top spot with 19.9 million visitors, followed by Yahoo Travel with 12.6 million visitors, TripAdvisor Sites with 10 million and AOL Travel with 6.5 million.
On a related note, Car Rental sites drew nearly 6.0 million unique visitors in March, up 9 percent from the 5.5 million visitors the category drew in February. Meanwhile, Travel Transactions sites drew 3.8 million visitors in March, up 8 percent from the 3.5 million visitors the category drew in February.
According to Hitwise, Google Maps was the top travel website for the week ending April 16, boasting 15.41 percent of visits for the Travel category. MapQuest followed with 6.15 percent of visits, while Expedia claimed 3.04 percent, Southwest Airlines claimed 2.31 percent and Priceline.com got 2.16 percent.
Home Improvement sites also got a nice boost in March, according to comScore, as the category welcomed 49.4 million visitors in March, up 10 percent from the 45 million visitors attracted in the prior month. In this category, eHow Home and Garden took the top spot with 8.8 million visitors, followed by iVillage Home and Garden with 6.8 million visitors, HGTV with 6.1 million visitors and Shelterpop with 3 million visitors.
Zynga.com was the top gaining online property in March, as its audience surged 164 percent to finish the month with 7.3 million unique visitors. USTREAM.TV also gained a lot of additional visitors in March, as it drew 6.2 million visitors in March, up 67 percent from February.
Overall, Yahoo Sites was the top Web property in March, with 179.5 million unique visitors. Google Sites followed with 176.8 million visitors, while Microsoft Sites drew 176.4 million visitors.
Facebook was fourth with 153 million visitors, while AOL was fifth with 118.2 million visitors in March.
Google Ad Network topped the comScore Ad Focus Ranking in March with a reach of 91.7 percent of the total U.S. Internet audience, followed by Yahoo Sites with a reach of 84.4 percent, and Yahoo Network Plus with a reach of 83.9 percent.
According to comScore, the total Internet audience in the U.S. in March was nearly 212.7 million users.
Sources:</strong
http://www.hitwise.com/us/datacenter/main/dashboard-10133.html
