Amazon top of the online shopping websites
Findings of the 2009 Online Shopping Survey (OSS)
Wiesbaden, April 24, 2009 – A total of around 16.7 million online shoppers has put Amazon at the top of the list of last year’s most popular online shopping websites, knocking online marketplace eBay into second place. These are the findings of the current Online Shopping Survey (OSS) carried out by ENIGMA GfK. New leaders Amazon were able to improve on their results for the prior year, particularly in their score for the variety of the offering and the despatch costs. However, other online shops also did well compared with the previous year, and Otto.de and Weltbild.de rose in the rankings. How popular a website is with shoppers depends on a number of factors. Trouble-free returns and clearly structured and informative product pages are becoming increasingly important to online buyers.
For the first time, clothes beat books
There were also changes in the product category rankings. Measured in terms of the number of online shoppers, for the first time, clothing (12.6 million online buyers) beat the well-entrenched long-time leaders, books (12.4 million). Next came event tickets (10.3 million), CDs (8.8 million), followed by hotel reservations (8.6 million).
Along with the two latter categories (both of which were up 2.3 million), marked growth was also recorded by DVDs (+1.8 million), flight tickets and medical products (both +1.2 million), clothing (+1.1 million) and face and bodycare products (+1.0 million).
Future online shopper growth potential
Overall, online shoppers accounted for a share of 76% of all Internet users last year. The figure has remained stable for the past two years. How high the future growth potential for e-commerce is also contingent on the various different consumer types. The "experimental shoppers” have embraced online shopping with particular enthusiasm. This is also the only one of the four segments examined by ENIGMA GfK to signal continued above-average potential for the future. Whereas "Smart shoppers” and "Brand and quality conscious shoppers” are currently very important to online shopping, both these consumer types are anticipated to offer lower growth potential for the future.
The situation is different for the "Price conscious” consumer group. This is a group, which generally has less formal education and a lower household income, has made less of a contribution to online shopping in Germany up to now, although it is adept at using the Internet to search for the best offers. However, a trend reversal is indicated here and this consumer group thinks it likely that it will be buying goods and services online more frequently in the future.
The survey
ENIGMA GfK's online shopping survey (OSS) is an annual survey. In January and February 2009, individuals aged between 14 and 69 were surveyed, in Germany online and by telephone, on the Internet and its role in shopping.
Further information: Wolfgang Seubold, tel. +49 611 999 60 38, wolfgang.seubold@enigma-gfk.de
ENIGMA GfK
ENIGMA GfK is part of the GfK Group's Media sector and specializes in the area of media research. The company offers information services for TV, print, radio and online media.
The GfK Group
The GfK Group is the No. 4 market research organization worldwide. Its activities cover the three business sectors of Custom Research, Retail and Media. The GfK Group has a network of 115 companies operating in more than 100 countries. Of a total of approximately 10,000 employees (as at December 31, 2008), more than 80% are based outside Germany. For further information, visit our website: www.gfk.com
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