Battle Rages For Website Gold

NZ site hangs on to place in world’s top 25 as sports sites draw strong traffic with foxsports.com growing 73% overnight

AUCKLAND: September 25, 2000 – The two main players chasing ‘online gold’ at the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games continued their close contest yesterday as olympics.com gained a slight edge over nbcolympics.com, according to the Nielsen//NetRatings ‘Web Olympics Index’.

The ‘Web Olympics Index’ provides a daily snapshot of web traffic to approximately 250 official and unofficial Olympics-related sites during the previous 24 hours. The service is provided by ACNielsen eRatings.com, Nielsen Media Research and NetRatings, Inc. and covers 15 countries.

Key findings from today’s Index showed that:

 New Zealanders’ interest in the Games remained intense as local site, nzherald.co.nz hung on to its place in the world’s top 25 Olympics-related websites.

 olympics.com and nbcolympics.com are still locked in a fierce battle at the top of the Index with olympics.com moving into first place after generating 3.3 million Page Views, almost 120,000 more than NBC’s online site.

 The top four sites lost ground in terms of Page Views, with sports.yahoo.com dropping 900,000 Page Views over the previous day - a 26% decrease.

 The biggest mover overnight was foxsports.com which generated a massive 73% increase in Page Views to 746,767. This might suggest US surfers are accessing a broader range of sites for Olympics content rather than relying only on official sites for the latest news.

 Sports-related sites carrying Olympics stories and results were well represented with sportsillustrated.cnn.com, nikkansports.com and sportingnews.com all ranked in the top 10.

 A diverse range of sites appeared outside the top list including the Olympic web sites of Denmark, France, Finland and Sweden, as well as the official IOC site. News and information sites were also well represented with the New Zealand Herald BBC online, the Irish Times, Irish Examiner, and Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet all in the group. Parody site silly2000.com, which takes a tongue-in-cheek look at the Sydney Games, also rated in the group.

Table 1: Most popular Olympics-related domains surfed globally from home:

Web domain

Total Page
Views Sept 23
Total Page
Views Sept 22
% Change

Page Views
per person

1 olympics.com 3,318,361 3,971,585 -17% 13
2 nbcolympics.com 3,199,573 3,980,386 -19% 13
3 sports.yahoo.com/olympics 2,471,875 3,357,197 -26% 7
4 usatoday.com/olympics 1,561,795 1,976,491 -21% 9
5 sports.yahoo.co.jp/sydney 1,060,221 1,060,229 0% 8
6 nhk.or.jp/olympic 775,509 780,228 -1% 13
7 foxsports.com/olympics/2000 746,767 431,713 73% 9
8 sportsillustrated.cnn.com/olympics 700,298 801,977 -13% 5
9 nikkansports.com/olympic 633,935 769,217 -18% 6
10 sportingnews.com/olympics 580,590 767,498 -24% 8

The next 15 most popular Olympics-related domains in alphabetical order were:

Domain Description

aftonbladet* Swedish newspaper featuring Olympics content
dif.dk Danish Olympic Committee site
examiner.ie* Irish newspaper featuring Olympic content
fanmail.olympic.ibm.com Fanmail site for fans and athletes
fr.sports.yahoo.com* French sports site within Yahoo!
gamesinfo.com.au Australian-based transport/schedule site for the Games
ireland.com* Irish Times featuring Olympics content
iltalehti.fi Finnish Olympic Information site
jo.wanadoo.fr French Olympic information site
news.bbc.co.uk* BBC web site featuring Olympics content
nzherald.co.nz* NZ Newspaper Site
olympiaden.nu Swedish Olympics site
olympic.org Official IOC site
opasia.dk Danish site focusing on the Olympics
silly2000.com Parody site of the official Olympics web site

* This site also contains non-Olympics content

Sports Category scores well

 The Portals Category remained solidly at the top of the Web Olympics Category Index, despite a decrease in overnight activity. It is clear Portals remain the “go to” source for Olympics content globally, with the Category still way ahead of all others in terms of both Unique Audience and Page Views.

 The Sports Category performed well overnight, increasing Unique Audience 42% and Page Views 33%.

Table 2: Most popular Olympics-related categories surfed globally from home:

Category Unique Audience % change Total Page Views
% change Time per person
Portal 714,580 -7% 6,709,320 -16% 4 mins
News & Information 501,477 -15% 3,924,043 -8% 4mins
Sports 480,796 42% 5,779,781 33% 7 mins
TV/Broadcast 339,083 -33% 2,294,180 -40% 6 mins
Official 295,698 2% 4,081,256 -10% 9 mins
Miscellaneous 32,168 21% 134,970 -24% 3 mins

The Nielsen//NetRatings Web Olympics Index
The Nielsen//NetRatings Web Olympics Index measures online user activity of more than 165,000 at home panellists across more than 250 key Olympics and related sites in New Zealand, Australia, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, JapanNorway, Sweden, Singapore, UK and the USA.

About Nielsen//NetRatings
Through strategic partnerships between NetRatings, Nielsen Media Research and ACNielsen, the Nielsen//NetRatings audience measurement service collects real-time data from more than 165,000 Internet users around the world. The U.S. panel sample currently consists of 57,000 at-home users and 8,000 at-work users. International panels are under development with over 100,000 at-home users currently being measured. These panels collectively represent the largest media research sample of Internet users in the industry.

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. Nielsen//NetRatings tracks the entire spectrum of Internet user behaviour, leveraging proprietary data-collection technology from NetRatings, Nielsen Media Research's 50 years of expertise in research and audience measurement, and ACNielsen’s international leadership in offering market research information covering more than 100 countries. For more information, please visit www.nielsen-netratings.com.

About ACNielsen eRatings.com
ACNielsen eRatings.com is a venture between ACNielsen (NYSE: ART) and NetRatings Inc. (Nasdaq: NTRT). ACNielsen is the world's leading market research firm, offering measurement and analysis of marketplace dynamics, consumer attitudes and behavior, and new and traditional media in more than 100 countries, and NetRatings is the leading provider of Internet audience measurement technology and analysis. Through the Nielsen//NetRatings service, ACNielsen eRatings.com is creating the first global service for tracking audiences, advertising and user activity on the Internet in more than 30 countries worldwide.

About NetRatings, Inc.
NetRatings (Nasdaq: NTRT) provides Internet audience measurement and analysis services that enable its customers to make informed decisions regarding their Internet strategies. NetRatings delivers accurate and timely information collected from a representative sample of Internet users and augments it with detailed, flexible reporting and in-depth analyses.
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