According to eMarketer, Canada ranked first globally in social media penetration as a percentage of population in 2011.  We have slipped to second behind the US in 2012, but not by much.

Canadian still hold the highest worldwide average in average time spent on social networks, according to comScore’s June 2011.  Yes, we Canadians are social media junkies.  Every Canadian age group is above the worldwide average; however the heaviest users are between the ages 18 to 24, to no surprise.  Facebook and LinkedIn are the most popular networks.

When I first started in this business, I had a hard time convincing companies about the importance of Internet Marketing. At the time, it didn’t take much to get to good results from those initiatives – for instance, obtaining the one spot in the search results, but companies just didn’t see the value in it.  Today, the same story is being told with social media. As competition grows in the space and it becomes more mainstream, those companies that didn’t start investing some time into it will end up spending more having to catch up.  The history of a profile or site has a lot of value in determining authority online, and history can only be built after an extensive period of good content and quality work.  Canadian companies need to get social and take the opportunity for their brands to engage with this enthusiastic Canadian audience.

Yesterday Google announced the release of its very own open source browser in beta, called Chrome.

According to research firm Net Applications, IE holds approximately 73% of the market, while Firefox has around 19%, followed by Opera with under 1%.  Apple’s Safari holds about 6%.

Chrome has some similar features to the new IE 8 and Firefox 3, which include, an address bar auto-complete feature, search suggestions, and a privacy mode called “Incognito mode” (similar to IE’s InPrivate feature).  It’s also possible for a user to perform searches within the address bar by typing the URL of the search provider and hitting tab key. The interface is simple and maximizes monitor space to display a website.

According to Google, one of the main goals was to improve the browser’s performance for loading rich web applications faster.  In recent tests, the browsers performance is significantly faster when running JavaScript.  Learn more at http://www.google.com/chrome

Till now IE has helped Microsoft keep their foot in the web pool. If Google’s browser takes the market share that IE currently holds, Google will not just be the king of the search but ultimately reign in as the king of the web.

However, we have already noticed some technical issues with the browser accessing pages, which will likely be corrected before the official release of Chrome.  It will also be interesting to see how long before third-parties start offering Chrome compatible plug-ins.

Total internet sales hit an estimated C$62.7 billion in 2007. That’s a 26% increase from 2006, mostly from the B2C market.

eMarketers’ latest article, Canada E-Commerce Growing Quickly, reports that ecommerce is still only 2% of total operating revenue in Canada and only 8% of Canadian companies sell items online.

We have updated our Online Canadian Statistics, eh! article with these new numbers.

As a website solutions firm, we are pleased to report an increase in requests for Canadian eCommerce website development. The typical attitude of small to mid-sized organizations, up to the first quarter of 2007, was apprehensive. Clients didn’t feel ready for ecommerce and didn’t think it would work. The sentiment is much different now.

In a push to get international, MySpace has introduced a Canadian version of its popular social networking site to focus on local events, talents and classifieds. Within MySpace properties, Canada is the fifteenth localized version.

According to eMarketer, MySpace is the most popular web site in the US, ranked by market share of visits in February 2007. That was above Google – by the way. As a percentage of online Canadians, MySpace is only fourth in social networking compared to Microsoft Corp.’s Windows Live Spaces at 39%, Google’s Blogger 29% and Facebook 28%, according to comScore Canada Inc.

Almost 6 million Canadians log onto the site each month, reports comScore Canada Inc. News Corp., now owner, obviously sees revenue potential in Canada and has even begun a China, Latin America and South American local versions. We have already seen a lot of discussions on social media marketing as advertisers gravitate to where the traffic is. Due to the recent popularity of social networking sites, I foresee all the others doing the same thing, and eventually enhancing city connections. It’s just a natural fit for social networking sites to be local!

Some References:

May 14, 2007 – The Crowded World of Social Networks
http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?id=1004896

May 14, 2007 – MySpace targets Canadian growth
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/…

In 2006, Canadians spent approximately $8 billion online, that value is expected to double to $16 billion by 2009.  Majority of Canadians are still using the web as a research medium, however this is quickly changing as more of us are using the Internet to buy and sell products. According to eMarketer, by 2009, 3 out of 4 adults will become online buyers.

On Wednesday December 13th, our US counterparts hit a new single-day spending record for the fourth time this year of $667 million, according to comScore Networks. It is estimated that the US 2006 holiday season will reach over $19 billion – that’s a 25% increase compared to 2005!

Even though Canadians are world leaders in broadband usage, time spent online and purchasing services like travel and event tickets, only 38% of Canadians where projected to do their shopping online, according to a recent study. Compared to 46% in the US.  The Canadian Speaks survey also found those wanting to buy online gifts do so because it is less of a hassle or they’re looking for online deals.

Clearly there are many potential opportunities that lay ahead for Canadian etailers.  This is a good time for eCommerce sites to reflect on how their site did for the year. Reviewing your website statistics/analytic tools to look for trends, opportunities and threats could reveal insights for the coming year. Work with your website solutions company on your findings to help improve shopping conversions.

Help Increase Sales with Web Visitor Confidence.

Internet Usage:

• Canada spends more time online than the U.S., as of 2006 (Marketing Sherpa)
• Canada ranks 8th for online population by country, with 18.9 million people over the age of 15 online as of May 2006. 23 million Canadians access the Internet each month, that’s over 70% of the population. Individuals spend roughly 38.4 hours a month online. In Q1 2006, for any given month, Canadians conducted on average 55 searches vs. 41 in the U.S. (comScore Networks)
• Canadians send the most time online (40.8 hours per month), Americans ranked fifth in the world (29.6 hours) (ComScore Media Metrix, November 2006)
• French Canadians have a higher rate of net usage. 65% French-speaking vs. 58% English (Networld Media)
• 80% penetration of household Internet broadband subscribers (comScore Networks)

eCommerce:

• 32% of 1,312 Canadians who had made online purchases in the past six months had purchased five or more times while 68% had made one to four purchases (survey by J.C. Williams Group)
• Ecommerce sales were $39.2 billion CAD in 2005, up 38.4% from 2004 for both private and public sector sales over the Internet. (Statistics Canada)
• In 2007 Internet sales hit an estimated C$62.7 billion, up 26% from 2006. B2B sales accounted for 62% of online sales in 2007, e-commerce sales climbed to 38% from 32% in 2006. (Statistics Canada)
• The percentage of Canadian retailers with a website grew to 42% in 2005 from 38% in 2004 (Statistics Canada)
• Overall ecommerce sales increased by 38% last year (2006). Note that Statistics Canada defines an ecommerce sale as an order made online, which may or may not have been paid online (Statistics Canada)
• eCommerce still represents a relatively small fraction of total economic activity, at about 2% of total operating revenue (2007). Only about 8% of Canadian private sector companies sell goods and services online. (Statistics Canada)
• 38% of respondents in the past six months had bought online and picked up their purchase in a retail store (J.C. Williams survey)
• 2005 had 18.5 million Internet users (person aged 3+ who accessed the Internet at least once per month) with a penetration of 56.4% of the population. 2006 should hit 19.3 million with a penetration of 58.3% and 2007, 20.3 million and 60.8% respectively (May 2006 Marketing Sherpa)
• Credit card safety was the top barrier to online shopping (J.C. Williams survey)

Search Engines:

• Canadians perform 33 million search engine queries every day vs. 405 million performed by Americans (Harris Interactive)
• 80% of Internet traffic starts at search engines
• Major Canadian portals include; Canada.com, Canoe.ca, Sympatico.ca
• Major search engines and directories include; Google.ca , Yahoo.ca
• Major French language search engines and directories include; Toile.com
• WebsideStory (US, Feb. 2006) reported that MSN Search commanded a 6.03% conversion rate, higher than the conversion rates of Yahoo! (4.07%) and Google (3.83%)

Social Networking:

• Over half of Canadian Internet users have visited social networking site according to TNS Canadian Facts.

References & more resources:

June 18, 2007 – Social Networking in Canada
http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?id=1005044&src=article2_newsltr

October 20, 2006 – Happy 300 Millionth, USA
http://www.emarketer.com/Articles/Print.aspx?1004219

June 29, 2006 – E-Commerce Thrives in Canada
http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?1004047

May 31, 2006 – How to Market to Canadians Online – Advice, Data, Legal Info and Useful Hotlinks
http://www.marketingsherpa.com/article.php?ident=27474

May 4, 2006 – 694 Million People Currently Use the Internet Worldwide According To comScore Networks
http://www.comscore.com/press/release.asp?press=849

April 15, 2005 – Canada’s E-Commerce in Earlier Stage Than U.S.
http://www.dmnews.com/cms/dm-news/catalog-retail/32509.html

If you have any other stats that you think will contribute to the value of this page, please email me. This page will be updated on a regular basis.