Top 50 Web Rankings for August Issued; Education, Retail Sports Sites Gain

The top 10 online properties, in terms of visitors, remained unchanged in August, albeit the back-to-school season gave a boost to education sites and retail sports/outdoor sites gained traffic in anticipation of fall sports, according to the comScore Media Metrix monthly analysis of activity at top US online properties, reports MarketingCharts.

Among other trends noted: August traffic increased to lotto/sweepstakes sites as lottery jackpots reached near record highs, and humor sites gained on the strength of Comedy Central’s spike in traffic.

The data released by comScore:

Top 50 Properties

Among the highlights:

• Yahoo Sites topped the ranking with more than 135 million visitors.
• CBS Corporation experienced a 16 percent gain, lifting it six spots to number 24.
• Comcast Corporation also experienced a sizable jump, moving up seven positions to number 26 in the ranking with more than 25 million visitors.
• United Online gained four position, drawing more than 26 million unique visitors in August.

Top 50 Ad Focus Ranking

Among the highlights:

• Advertising.com remained atop the Ad Focus Ranking, reaching 89 percent of the more than 181 million Americans online.
• Specific Media and Google both moved up within the top 10, to numbers six and seven, respectively.
• Adconian media group jumped seven spots to number 21, reaching 43 percent of the US online population, a 7 percent increase from July.
• Interclick also continued its climb in the rankings, gaining four spots to number 18.
• Amazon.com and Walmart.com entered the ranking in August at positions 37 and 43, respectively.

High-Growth Sites/Categories

High-Growth Catagories:

• The humor category grew 8 percent in August, reaching more than 30 million Americans. The increase was largely propelled by gains at Comedy Central from its “Indecision2008″ coverage.
• National Lampoon Humor Network led the category with 5.6 million visitors.
• Comedy Central followed with nearly 5 million visitors (up 105 percent) and Jokeroo Entertainment Inc. with nearly 3 million visitors (up 37 percent).

High-Growth Sites:

• Education sites
  • The training and education category grew 15 percent to more than 12 million visitors, making it the top-gaining category for the month.
  • College resource site Fastweb led the category with 2.5 million visitors (up 13 percent), followed by The College Board with nearly 1.9 million visitors (up 12 percent) and Nellnet, Inc., an education planning and financing company, with 1.4 million visitors (up 11 percent).
  • The education information category increased 8 percent to more than 63 million visitors, as Dictionary.com Sites led the category with 11.8 million visitors, followed by Answers.com (9.3 million visitors) and Pearson Education (8.6 million visitors).
• Retail sports/outdoors sites
  • With the beginning of fall sports and football season, traffic to retail sports/outdoors sites increased 7 percent, to more than 29 million visitors.
  • Foot Locker Sites experienced a 15 percent gain to 4.6 million visitors to lead the category, followed by eBay Sports US with 4 million visitors and DicksSportingGoods.com with 2.6 million visitors.
  • NFL Internet Group, which includes the official NFL team sites, surged 78 percent to more than 14 million visitors, making it one of top-gaining properties in August.
• Lottery sites
  • Multi-state lotteries Mega Millions and Powerball both reached massive jackpots in August causing lotto/sweepstakes sites to rise 8 percent to more than 31 million visitors for the month.
  • Powerball.com surged to 2.3 million visitors (up 123 percent).
  • Megamillions.com traffic swelled to 1.1 million (up 100 percent).