Tuesday

'Tis January, so off
to web's fat farms

Spurt in traffic to sites for shedding holiday lard

By Toni Fitzgerald

    When the new year dawns, figure-conscious Americans take a vow of hunger and rededicate themselves to losing the unwanted pounds, this time for sure.
   In what’s becoming as predictable as the weight-loss resolutions themselves, more and more dieters head to internet to help them lose.
   Traffic to the major diet and workout sites spiked during the past two weeks. In fact, many users suffering from post-Christmas bloating began frequenting diet sites the week before the new year.
   More than 3.5 million home internet users logged on to health sites during the week ending Dec. 29, according to Nielsen//NetRatings. The swell continued into last week, when ad impressions for the most popular of the group, eDiets.com, also rose.
   That’s a jump similar to last year, when traffic to health and diet sites increased 64 percent during the first week of the new year.
   AOL Health led the pack with 805,000 unique users during the week. WebMD had 521,000 while eDiets.com recorded 480,000. The latter registered a 29 percent improvement versus its traffic from the week before.
   EDiets was well ahead of another popular diet site, WeightWatchers.com, which registered 302,000 visitors. Still, Weight Watchers did manage a 24 percent week-over-week growth.
   According to data from comScore Networks’ Media Metrix, men and women differ in their online approach to weight loss.
   First, many more women look to the internet for assistance. Data from November 2002 found that women outnumber men nearly two to one when it comes to weight loss or fitness sites, representing 59 percent of the audience.
   Second, men are more interested in workout information than dieting. There’s a pronounced imbalance between the sexes regarding which sites they frequent.
   Media Metrix found that men’s most-preferred health and fitness site was Ballyfitness.com, home of Bally’s gym. Bally’s and Bowflex.com, a home gym site, both recorded more male than female users in November.
   Women, on the other hand, frequent diet-centric sites such as Slimfast.com and Atkinscenter.com, making up more than 69 percent of the traffic to both.
   Men represented just 31.7 percent of the traffic to Weight Watchers, and 42.7 percent of visitors to eDiets.
   Diet site differences aren’t just limited to sex; age plays a factor, too. Internet users between the ages of 35 to 54 represent 47 percent of all surfers to Media Metrix’s top 10 diet and fitness sites.
   Those 18-34 had the second-highest concentration, with 31.9 percent. Not surprisingly, older folks who’ve come to terms with their bodies (ages 65 and above) and those too young to care (ages 2 to 17) make up just 10.7 percent of the diet and fitness audience.
   Most diet sites are also profit-driven, and the top three charge for much of their content. Between them, eDiets, Weight Watchers and Trimlife.com had more than 8 million paying users by the end of 2002. EDiets leads the category with 5.3 million.
   The company still found reason to advertise last week, however. Compared to the week before, eDiets nearly doubled its ad impressions for the week ending Jan. 5. It was the web’s seventh-largest advertiser with nearly 420,000 placements.
   Internet usage as a whole rose last week following the holiday lag. Time spent on online surged by more than 13 percent versus the very slow previous week. Reflecting perhaps the need to do in-depth diet research, time spent per internet session also jumped by nearly three minutes, or 5.31 percent.

Top 25 parent companies Through Jan. 5, 2003
	Parent	Unique Audience (000)	Reach %	Time spent per person (hh:mm:ss)
1	AOL Time Warner	50,843	61.5	2:05:11
2	Microsoft	44,764	54.2	0:38:46
3	Yahoo!	39,395	47.7	0:48:03
4	Google	13,748	16.6	0:08:10
5	eBay	12,857	15.6	0:44:51
6	Amazon	10,351	12.5	0:09:29
7	Terra Lycos	9,163	11.1	0:12:24
8	RealNetworks	9,079	11.0	0:09:37
9	About-Primedia	8,339	10.1	0:10:27
10	U.S. Government	8,207	9.9	0:11:43
11	Sharman Networks	7,971	9.7	0:54:25
12	USA Interactive	6,269	7.6	0:12:17
13	Viacom International	6,046	7.3	0:14:12
14	Walt Disney Internet Group	5,965	7.2	0:12:08
15	eUniverse	5,269	6.4	0:07:46
16	Landmark	5,194	6.3	0:07:22
17	AT&T	5,130	6.2	0:13:54
18	The Gator Corporation	5,088	6.2	0:02:07
19	EarthLink	4,985	6.0	0:45:48
20	WhenU	4,795	5.8	0:05:58
21	CNET Networks	4,793	5.8	0:06:23
22	United Online	4,669	5.7	0:55:03
23	Electronic Arts	4,359	5.3	1:24:57
24	Apple Computer	4,304	5.2	0:03:59
25	Excite Network	4,231	5.1	0:31:19
Source: Nielsen//NetRatings

Top 25 brands Through Jan. 5, 2003
	Parent	Unique Audience (000)	Reach %	Time spent per person (hh:mm:ss)
1	AOL	40,748	49.3	2:26:47
2	Yahoo!	39,391	47.7	0:48:02
3	MSN	37,060	44.9	0:37:33
4	Microsoft	30,906	37.4	0:11:08
5	Google	13,748	16.6	0:08:10
6	eBay	12,562	15.2	0:45:25
7	Amazon	10,079	12.2	0:08:36
8	Real	9,060	11.0	0:09:36
9	Lycos Networks	8,295	10.0	0:13:14
10	KaZaA	7,971	9.7	0:54:25
11	Netscape	6,718	8.1	0:11:34
12	eUniverse	5,269	6.4	0:07:46
13	About Network	5,264	6.4	0:10:02
14	AT&T	5,130	6.2	0:13:54
15	Gator Network	5,088	6.2	0:02:07
16	WhenU.com	4,795	5.8	0:05:58
17	Weather Channel	4,783	5.8	0:06:55
18	EarthLink	4,623	5.6	0:48:40
19	EA Online	4,359	5.3	1:24:57
20	Apple	4,304	5.2	0:03:59
21	Classmates.com	4,223	5.1	0:05:49
22	CNN	4,221	5.1	0:09:38
23	CallWave	3,565	4.3	0:04:43
24	MapQuest	3,440	4.2	0:07:27
25	MusicMatch Jukebox	3,154	3.8	0:23:51
Source: Nielsen//NetRatings

Top 25 advertisers (excludes house ads) Through Jan. 5, 2003
#	Company	Impressions (000)
1	Classmates Online, Inc.	1,010,416
2	The Estee Lauder Companies Inc	793,751
3	Amazon.com, Inc.	766,748
4	CoolSavings, Inc.	711,613
5	NetFlix.com, Inc.	554,645
6	USA Interactive	505,111
7	SBC Communications, Inc.	473,652
8	eDiets.com, Inc.	417,261
9	Barnes & Noble, Inc.	407,998
10	Bank One Corporation	378,480
11	Scottrade, Inc.	301,908
12	Sabre Inc.	301,388
13	The Charles Schwab Corporation	289,125
14	X10 Wireless Technology, Inc.	266,872
15	Ameritrade Holding Corporation	264,742
16	AT&T Wireless Services, Inc.	259,383
17	Netstock Corporation	229,395
18	Dell Computer Corporation	226,424
19	1-800-FLOWERS.COM, Inc.	187,193
20	Florists' Transworld Delivery	176,607
21	Colonize.com	170,798
22	AOL Time Warner Inc.	170,394
23	eBay, Inc.	161,349
24	Bank of America Corporation	160,441
25	Hewlett Packard Company	157,950
Source: Nielsen//NetRatings AdRelevance

Top 25 advertising sites (excludes house ads) Through Jan. 5, 2003
#	Company	Impressions (000)
1	Yahoo!	5,409,631
2	MSN	2,550,637
3	AOL.com	1,531,766
4	iWon	809,840
5	Netscape	463,575
6	eBay	427,217
7	CBS MarketWatch	338,813
8	CompuServe	294,892
9	MSNBC	287,750
10	The Weather Channel	279,586
11	ESPN.com	251,098
12	Classmates	224,399
13	Prodigy	193,345
14	AT&T Worldnet	168,039
15	CNN	156,300
16	The Weather Underground	155,010
17	Excite	154,273
18	NetZero	114,677
19	iVillage	100,841
20	The New York Times	92,499
21	MapQuest.com	90,815
22	Juno	89,194
23	NFL.com	88,613
24	CBS SportsLine	86,370
25	Expedia	80,740
Source: Nielsen//NetRatings AdRelevance

Average use
	Values	Current Week	Last Week	% Change
	Number of Sessions/Visits per Week	9	9	0.00
	Number of Domains Visited per Week	19	17	11.76
	Time Spent per Week	7:45:30	6:49:35	13.65
	Time Spent During Web Visit	0:50:17	0:47:45	5.31
	Active Digital Media Universe	93,922,675	90,872,139	3.36
	Current Digital Media Universe Estimate	168,131,851	168,131,236	0.00
	Number of Sessions/Visits per Week	9	9	0.00
	Number of Domains Visited per Week	19	17	11.76
Source: Nielsen//NetRatings,

-Toni Fitzgerald is a staff writer for Media Life.

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