More Than 875 Million Consumers Have Shopped Online

More than 85 percent of the world's online population has used the Internet to make a purchase -- increasing the market for online shopping by 40 percent in the past two years -- according to the latest Nielsen Global Online Survey on Internet shopping habits. Globally, more than half of Internet users have made at least one purchase online in the past month, according to Nielsen.

"The Internet is no longer a niche technology -- it is mass media and an utterly integral part of modern life. Almost no aspect of life remains untouched by online media. As our lives become more fractured and cluttered, it isn't surprising that consumers turn to the unrivaled convenience of the Internet when it comes to researching and buying products," says Jonathan Carson, president, international, Nielsen Online.

"When The Nielsen Company conducted its first global survey into Internet shopping trends two years ago, approximately 10 percent of the world's population (627 million) had shopped online," says Bruce Paul, vice president, customized research, Nielsen U.S. "Within two years, this number has increased by approximately 40 percent (to 875 million)."

Among Internet users, the highest percentage shopping online is found in South Korea, where 99 percent of those with Internet access have used it to shop, followed by the UK (97 percent), Germany (97 percent), Japan (97 percent) with the U.S. eighth, at 94 percent. Additionally, in South Korea, 79 percent of these Internet users have shopped in the past month, followed by the UK (76 percent) and Switzerland (67 percent) with the U.S. at 57 percent.

Globally, the most popular and purchased items over the Internet are books (41 percent purchased in the past three months), clothing/accessories/shoes (36 percent), videos / DVDs / games (24 percent), airline tickets (24 percent) and electronic equipment (23 percent).

Among Germany's Internet users, 55 percent say they bought books, 42 percent had bought Clothes/Accessories/Shoes and one in four had purchased Music/Videos/DVD's in the past three months.

During the same period, among Internet users in the UK, 45 percent bought books online, followed by Videos/DVDs/Games (44 percent), Clothing/Accessories/Shoes (38 percent), music (37 percent) and one in four Internet shoppers also purchased and airline tickets/reservations online.

Among U.S. Internet users in the past month, 41 percent bought Clothing/Shoes/Accessories, 38 percent bought books and one in three Internet shoppers bought Videos/DVDs/Games.

The number of Internet consumers buying books over the Internet has increased 7 percent in the past two years but the biggest increase has been in Clothing / Accessories / Shoes which increased from 20 percent to 36 percent. "Some of the biggest buyers of books on the Internet are from developing countries -- China, Brazil, Vietnam and Egypt -- indicating massive growth potential for online retailers that can specifically target these fast-growing markets," says Carson.

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Nielsen Begins Largest Ever Expansion of Its National U.S. Television Ratings Panel

The Nielsen Company says that it will triple the size of its National People Meter (NPM) television ratings panel by 2011, further increasing the precision of its national
television ratings and providing more flexibility for measuring non-traditional television viewing.

Nielsen has been the gold standardfor TV ratings for decades.

Nielsen's NPM panel, which now encompasses about 12,000 U.S. households and 35,000 people, will increase to 37,000 homes and 100,000 people as the company completes the previously announced introduction of Local People Meters (LPM) into 56 local U.S. markets, and integrates these sample homes into the NPM. The sample expansion begins this November when three LPM markets are integrated into the National sample. (For research purposes,
this expansion will result in an "effective" sample size of 17,000 households after weighting for the geographical distribution of the 56 LPM markets is taken into account. The "effective" sample size of the NPM panel is now 10,000 households.)

Larger sample sizes are increasingly important due to the continuing fragmentation of television viewing. A larger sample also supports the more granular measurement that clients are requesting as the television industry moves in the direction of commercial minute ratings. It will further help Nielsen accomplish many of the objectives of its Anytime Anywhere Media Measurement (A2/M2) initiative, which seeks to measure televised video as it moves beyond the television set in the home to the Internet, hand-held devices and to platforms outside the house.

"Nielsen is committed to continuously improving the quality of its television measurement and this expansion will be a major step forward in the accuracy and the flexibility of our national television panel," says Sara Erichson, executive vice president, Client Services Nielsen North
America. "With a panel of a hundred thousand people, we can more precisely pinpoint the viewing of all demographic groups and dig deeper into the audience levels for networks of all sizes."

"This also has implications for Nielsen's A2/M2 initiatives, all of which are built around the concept of 'following the video,' wherever it migrates," says Scott Springer, product leader of audience measurement for The Nielsen Company's Media Segment. "Our plans for out-of-home viewing, streaming video on the Internet, and 'third screen' devices such as cell phones and hand-held video players, are based on integrating these measurements with traditional television measurement. This much larger national sample creates the necessary foundation for an integrated measurement approach."

The National People Meter panel is used to produce ratings for national broadcasting, cable and syndicated television programming. It is composed of randomly selected households that reflect the overall U.S. population. Nielsen uses electronic meters to continuously measure what shows are being watched and who is watching them. Until 2002 the NPM consisted of 5,000
households and about 15,000 people. Since then, Nielsen has installed Local People Meters in the ten largest local U.S. markets. Nielsen has announced plans to introduce LPMs in three more markets in 2007, five in 2008, 12 in 2009, twelve in 2010 and 14 in 2011.

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