Friday, January 12, 2001
Asia Pacific To Outpace US Online Population by 2005
Even though only a quarter of the global Internet population
will reside in the United States by 2005, only one-third
of American online businesses are targeting global markets,
according to Jupiter Research, the worldwide authority
on Internet commerce. Jupiter analysts predict that the
Asia Pacific region will outpace the US within less than
five years and expect it to contain as much as one-third
of all Internet consumers worldwide in 2005.
Other global high-growth regions include Latin America,
expected to double in size from five percent of the world's
online population in 2000, to eight percent in 2005. Jupiter
Research attributes the growth in online populations outside
the US to increased PC penetration and telco infrastructure
improvements and reform in those regions.
"The gap in global Web development will ignite a
fierce battle for leadership in the international Internet
development and service space," said Preston Dodd,
senior analyst at Jupiter Research. "While it is imperative
for sites to gain foothold in these markets, they need
to avoid a 'must build' mentality, and enter these markets
through strategic partnerships such as joint ventures and
franchises."
Additional globalization analysis and forward-looking
insights from the new Jupiter Research Globalization Report
include:
- Jupiter Research predicts that U.S. share of the global
Internet population will drop from 36 percent today to
approximately 24 percent in 2005.
- A new Jupiter Research survey of the top 20 websites
within five categories (shopping, travel, search engine
and portals, news, marketing and corporate) reveals that
two-thirds of US companies have not yet prepared for a
global online marketplace.
- Although American companies are beginning to venture
into smaller, secondary markets, such as France and Italy,
expansion into primary global markets, such as Germany
and the United Kingdom, remains relatively low. In fact,
US domain name registration in Germany and England, traditionally
the most popular destinations for US businesses, increased
very little since last year. Meanwhile, domain registrations
by US companies in France, Japan, Australia, Italy and
Brazil, soared during the same period, according to Jupiter
Research analysts.
Advice For Companies Entering Global Markets
In the absence of local online activities, Jupiter advises
U.S. companies to take basic steps to more effectively
capture potential local interest:
- Align with local companies in each global operation
market to gain a better understanding of local customers'
preferences, local customs and business practices, brands
and fulfillment. Offer local partners advantages that include
more sophisticated technology infrastructure and access
to capital.
- Enter global markets through US and European professional
services firms, translation companies, globalization tools
companies and traditional systems integrators.
- Translate welcome pages for international visitors and
register local domain names.
December Boom in Buying Activity for Top E-tailers
Amazon.com continued its commanding dominance over online
Holiday spending with three times as many buyers and
over twice as many shoppers as its closest competitors,
a recent report on December 2000 web e-tailing by PC
Data Online disclosed.
At the same time, catalog and brick-and-mortar sites demonstrated
a growing presence among the Top 20 December e-tailers,
claiming over half of the top online slots.
With 3.9 million projected buyers and 28 million shoppers
in December, amazon.com easily led barnesandnoble.com at
No. 2 with 951,000 projected buyers and 8.3 million shoppers
and cdnow.com at No. 3 with 942,000 projected buyers and
8.6 million shoppers.
Jcpenney.com was No. 4 with 885,000 buyers, walmart.com
at No. 5 with 739,000 buyers and sears.com at No. 6 with
658,000 buyers. Other traditional offline e-tail sites
in the Top 20 were ticketmaster.com at No. 8, bestbuy.com
at No. 12, gap.com at No. 13, oldnavy.com at No. 15, target.com
at No. 17, landsend.com at No.18, spiegel.com at No. 19
and jcrew.com at No. 20.
“The distinction between pure-play Internet retailers
and the so-called 'click-and-mortar' challengers is quickly
becoming obsolete," said Cameron Meierhoefer, Internet
analyst for PC Data. “In 1999, only four offline
sites were among the Top 20. This year there are 12. Big,
experienced retailers are now a serious presence on the
web. Only one question remains: Can anyone challenge Amazon?”
Posting impressive jumps within the Top 20 was outpost.com
with 259,000 projected buyers at No. 14 from No. 29 and
1800flowers.com with 231,000 projected buyers at No. 16
from No. 23. Drugstore.com registered the highest buy rate
of 16.4 percent, converting the most shoppers into buyers
in December.
Data for the Top 20 Online Retailers is gathered through
a proprietary software tool that tracks “unique visitors” and “unique
buyers” on each web site. Each visitor or buyer is
counted once, regardless of how many times the individual
visits a site or buys from a site. This sample is taken
from over 120,000 home Internet users, who have downloaded
PC Data’s proprietary software. Total home Internet
users are estimated at approximately 90 million.
PC Data Online defines Internet retail sites as web sites
where visitors can actually purchase products. They include
neither shopping domains that provide free downloads, product
reviews, or purchasing incentives, such as coupons, nor
other types of e-commerce sites, such as auction, travel
reservation or financial service sites.
Headquartered in Reston, VA, PC Data was established in
1991 and is a leading provider of technology intelligence.
PC Data Online measures web activity in the U.S., Canada,
Australia, Taiwan, China, Hong Kong and Italy and conducts
real-time Internet surveys through its panel of 120,000
home Internet users.
News Tidbits (appears every day on the front page)
- According to the Wall Street Journal, CNN is prepared
to layoff at least 500 people from its TV and Internet
divisions as part of a reorganization process to become
more profitable. In another sign of the economic downturn
for online companies, the search engine AltaVista has
postponed its planned IPO. Like many other Internet companies
it cites "current market conditions" as its
reason for postponing an IPO.
