Americans flocked to online retail and coupon sites in November to take advantage of early deals and promotions as the holiday shopping season kicked off, according to data from the comScore Media Metrix service. Cyber Monday, the heaviest online spending day on record in the US, contributed a strong portion of traffic growth to retail and coupon sites.
Retailers' attractive discounts drove traffic to retail subcategories such as jewelry and luxury goods, toys, and consumer electronics, each growing at least 25% over the previous month.
Coupon Sites Spread Holiday Savings
Services-Coupons—those sites providing promo codes and other discounts to consumers—was the top gaining website category in November with a record 44.7 million Americans visiting such sites during the month, up 40% from October. Groupon was the top coupon site with 10.0 million unique visitors (up 54%), followed by CouponCabin.com with 8.8 million visitors, up 400%. Coupons, Inc was third with 6.4 million, while BlackFriday.info recorded 5.4 million visitors, up nearly 1,000% from the previous month. RetailMeNot.com rounded out the top five with 5.0 million visitors, up 20%.
Online Retail Blitzes Web
An all-time high of 179.5 million unique visitors traveled to retail sites in November. Amazon Sites led the category with 83.9 million unique visitors (up 4% from October), followed by Wal-Mart with 51.8 million visitors (up 44%), Apple.com Worldwide Sites with 40.3 million and Target Corporation with 39.8 million (up 44%). Best Buy Sites ranked No. 5 in the category overall with 28.8 million visitors, up 75%, and ranking as the top gaining property for November.
- Jewelry/Luxury Goods/Accessories was the top growing retail subcategory in November. Some 22.2 million Americans visited such sites during the month, up 36% from October. BradfordExchange.com led with 2.5 million unique visitors (up 82%), followed by Coach.com with 1.8 million visitors (up 47%). Swarovski.com soared to 1.8 million visitors, up from just 142,000 in October, while Zale Corporation drew 1.8 million, up 54%.
- Toy sites attracted 27.0 million visitors in November, up 35% from the previous month. Toysrus Sites led the category with 14.8 million visitors (up 71%), followed by The LEGO Group with 3.4 million (up 33%) and Disney Shopping with 2.2 million (up 19%). AmericanGirl.com ranked fourth with 2.0 million (up 64%), followed closely by Fisher Price with 2.0 million (up 30%).
- Consumer Electronics drew 53.3 million visitors during the month, up 30% from October. BestBuy.com led the category with 27.4 million visitors, up 84% from the previous month. Buy.com ranked second with 4.6 million visitors (up 9%), followed by RadioShack Corporation with 4.6 million visitors (up 68%), eBay Electronics US with 4.3 million (up 21%), Samsung Group with 3.5 million (up 74%), and Sony Electronics with 3.4 million (up 83%).
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Top 10 Gaining Properties
comScore also released November data on the top-gaining online properties, led by Best Buy Sites, ShopLocal.com, and Toysrus Sites:
