New Research on Gender of Net Audience

Surprising new research just released by Nielsen//NetRatings shows that North America is unique in having a majority female Internet audience. This is in stark contrast to audiences in European countries, such as Germany, where men form the clear majority.

The research findings indicate that more than 63% of the German net audience is male in 2001. This does mean that the country's online community ranks as the most predominantly male of the 26 countries measured by the new survey. "Germany is an established Internet market with the third-largest Internet universe in the world," said Richard Goosey, chief of measurement science and analytics, Nielsen//NetRatings.

The data details that, in June of this year, German men spent nearly eight and a half hours online during 18 online sessions, while German women spent seven hours online during 14 sessions. "Surprisingly, for an audience so heavily skewed towards men, sites mainly focused on sports were the second least popular category in Germany in June," Goosey said. "Followed only - not as surprisingly - by family and lifestyle sites, which were the least popular category last month."

Goosey also pointed to France, where the Internet audience in June was nearly 62% male. "The time difference in Internet usage between the genders in France was much more pronounced in France last month," he said. "French men spent more than eight and a half hours online across 19 sessions, while French women spent half as much time online - just over four and a half hours across 11 Internet sessions. French women are obviously not as enamoured of the Internet as their male counterparts."

In both Germany and France, telecom and Internet services websites were the most popular category, reaching nearly 80% of the active audience in both markets. In France, despite the heavily male audience, certain categories that would be expected to attract male Internet users, such as sports and automotive sites, ranked very close to the bottom of the category list for June, attracting well under 10% of the active audience.

In comparison, the US and Canada were the only global markets where females comprised the majority of the Internet audience in June. In the US, 52% of the audience was female in June and the time spent online by each gender was more even - ten and a half hours for men and just over nine hours for women. Search engines, portals and online communities were the most popular category in the US.

In addition, the results show that the first category that could be construed as favouring one gender in the US - computers and consumer electronics - ranked sixth on the list of most popular US categories, attracting 24% of the active audience. Family and lifestyle websites, which would be expected to bring in female surfers, was the eighth most popular category, attracting 17% of the active audience. Commenting on this, Goosey has noted that, "Internet usage in the US has reached parity. Men and women are mirroring each other's online activity and even visiting the same types of sites."

All articles 2006-22 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas unless otherwise stated.

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