Kiwis Turn To The Web In Wake Of The US Attack

NEWS RELEASE

Kiwis Turn To The Web In Wake Of The US Attack

Auckland, 16 October 2001 - Kiwis went online to keep informed about events in the aftermath of the World Trade Centre tragedy, with unprecedented numbers seeking out both local and international news sites, according to the Nielsen//NetRatings at-home panel information for September 2001.

In particular, New Zealanders turned to cnn.com, and specifically sought out the news channel of their favourite local site. Almost a four-fold increase of Kiwis visited cnn.com in September, more than 93,000 Kiwis (9.3% of home surfers) compared to the monthly average of 25,000 (2.5% reach of home surfers) from April to August. By comparison, 14% of Americans visited cnn.com in September.

“In total, New Zealand users spent an average of 14 minutes on the site, well over twice the usual time spent on CNN in a given month. The last time there was a spike in CNN’s time online was in April following the downing of the US spy plane in China,” said Kerry Hawkins, sales and marketing director, Nielsen//NetRatings New Zealand.

While the CNN site’s typical gender split has a 60/40 male skew, the September audience was skewed 70% towards males. Viewership of the site was comprehensive; 12% specifically requesting the “America Under Attack” section of the site, 10% of site visitors viewed the World Trade Centre map, while 7% viewed the lists and pictures of those Americans known to be missing.

New Zealanders also accessed their favourite New Zealand news and information sites during September. According to Nielsen//NetRatings, almost 25 % of XtraMSN visitors sought out the XtraMSN News channel compared to 16% in August. Futhermore, one third of visitors to nzoom.co.nz accessed the one news channel, compared to one quarter of visitors in August. The same trends are expected for stuff.co.nz and nzherald.co.nz.

nytimes.com, and time.com were other sites frequented by New Zealanders from September 11th. Both these sites have previously not appeared in the Nielsen//NetRatings New Zealand top 350. In September, over 24,000 Kiwis accessed nytimes.com, spending on average a remarkable 17 minutes on the site. Many of the 18,000 visitors to time .com were driven their from cnn.com, as people linked through to the remarkable and compelling photo essays which documented pictorially the events of the day and beyond.

In the US, 1 million Americans visited the Red Cross site during the week of the 16th alone, with 75,000 US surfers requesting the online form to make a contribution. In contrast, New Zealand home surfers did not visit redcross.org en masse.

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About Nielsen//NetRatings
Nielsen//NetRatings Internet audience measurement service collects real-time data from more than 225,000 individuals with access to the Internet in 28 countries around the world. Nielsen//NetRatings uses unique technology capable of measuring both Internet use and advertising to provide the most timely, accurate and comprehensive Internet usage data and advertising information in the global marketplace. For more information, please visit www.nielsen-netratings.com

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