Christmas shopping
Searches for 'Christmas gifts' have increased 62 per cent in the past week

UK Christmas shopping kicks off online

Nintendo Wii likely to be top seller

Will Head

Surfers in the UK have already started their Christmas shopping, according to new figures from web monitoring firm Hitwise

Searches for 'Christmas gifts' have increased 62 per cent in the past week, and are up a staggering 81 per cent over last year.

Advertisement

The market share of UK visits to sites on the Hitwise UK 100 Retail Index, a list of the top 100 UK retailers, was up two per cent last week over the same week in 2005 and up six per cent over 2004.

"Based on our analysis, we expect that visits to retail websites will reach a tipping point this week and will begin their rapid seasonal rise," said Heather Hopkins, vice president of research at Hitwise UK.

"Early signs are good for a strong Christmas online, with retail websites likely to hit the growth rate of eight per cent year-on-year in December."

Video games and consoles are set to be very popular this Christmas. Several of the top product related search terms sending visits to retail websites were for video game consoles.

In particular, 'nintendo ds' was among the top 20 product search terms sending visits to retail websites.

Nintendo's forthcoming Wii console is likely to be a hit this Christmas, with UK internet searches soaring ahead of the console's UK release on 8 December. 

UK internet searches for 'nintendo wii' have increased eightfold in the past three months, more rapidly than for other leading gaming consoles.

UK searches for 'nintendo ds lite' and 'playstation 3' both tripled in the past three months, while searches for 'nintendo ds' doubled.

This in spite of the delays announced for the PlayStation 3, which is due to be released in Europe in March. 

Searches for video games were also popular. 'Casino royale', 'james bond', 'xbox games' and 'spiderman 3' were all among the top terms sending visits to video and games websites last week.

  • Have your say
  • Send to a friend
  • Print
  • Digg
  • Reddit
  • Share

Tags:

Do you agree?

Related whitepapers

Related jobs

Most watched

eu flag

V3.co.uk weekly debrief, 6 Nov 09

This week, Europe decides what to do with illegal file sharers

Intel unveils its micro server platform

Small-enclosure systems take aim at hosting market

Analysis and Reports

Remote access - Three steps to getting connected

3.4 million UK professionals now work from home – is your company equipped?

Cost benefits of a global collaboration network

This white paper is a must read for organisations looking for evidence of the bottom-line benefits of high-definition video and voice communications

Poll

Impact of Information Overload poll

Impact of Information Overload poll

What is the biggest problem your firm faces as a result of the data explosion?

View poll results

Advertisement

White paper library

Keep up to date with the latest products, services and technologies from the world's leading IT companies; IThound.com brings you over 6,000 white papers, case studies and analyst reports.

Advertisement

Newsletter signup

Sign up for our range of FREE newsletters:

Existing User

Newsletter user login:

Enter email address to edit your newsletter preferences

Job of the week

Search thousands of IT jobs :

Search thousands of IT jobs:

Advanced search

Hiring now on ComputingCareers:

Related IT jobs

Search thousands of IT jobs :

Search thousands of IT jobs:

Advanced search

Advertisement

Spotlight

Alcatel-Lucent logo

Summit: Networks swamped by information overload

Alcatel-Lucent's Neal Tilley talks about how enterprises and carriers can...

EU flag

Breach notification laws get green light

Privacy rights strengthened in Europe

Richard Thomas

Summit: Richard Thomas advises on handling the data deluge

Former Information Commissioner speaks out on government databases and data...

oracle sun

War of words escalates between EU and Oracle

Commission comes out fighting after criticism from Oracle and Washington

Primary Navigation