Top 50 Web Rankings Issued for March - Yellow Book Network, MLB.com Gain

Yahoo beat back Google in the neck-and-neck race for top U.S. web property honors, as traffic increased to online radio, gambling and retail-healthcare sites, according to a comScore Media Metrix monthly analysis of U.S. consumer activity at online properties in March, MarketingCharts reports.

Top 50 Properties (Unique Visitors)

See table of top 50 properties, March ‘08.

Among the highlights:

• The top 10 properties maintained their positions from February with Yahoo Sites continuing to lead as the top property with 139.5 million visitors, followed by Google Sites with 137.5 million visitors and Microsoft Sites with 121 million visitors.
• ESPN jumped 12 spots on the popularity of March Madness and anticipation of the 2008 Major League Baseball season.
• Gains were made by AT&T (up 8 spots to No. 18 with 31.3 million visitors), Target Corporation (up 5 spots to No. 20 with nearly 30 million visitors), and CBS Corporation (up 6 spots to No. 24 with 28.6 million visitors).

Top 50 Ad Focus Ranking (Advertising Reach)

See table of top 50 ad focus rankings, March ‘08.

Among the highlights:

• The top 10 Ad Focus properties also maintained their February rankings with Platform-A, the ad network combining Advertising.com, Tacoda, AOL, and Quigo, leading the ranking in March, reaching 91 percent of Americans online.
• interCLICK gained 9 spots in the ranking to position 14, reaching 58 percent of the 188 million Americans online.
• Real Cities Network and YuMe Video Network both entered this month’s rankings in positions 38 and 43, respectively.

Top-Gaining Sites and Categories

Top-Gaining Sites (see table)

• Yellow Book Network secured the top-gaining site position for the month, with a 54 percent gain to 13.5 million visitors, due in part to a new partnership with addresses.com.
• Baseball spring training and fantasy team drafts prompted a flood of earnest fans to MLB.com, which jumped 50 percent to 9.8 million visitors.
• Bankrate.com Sites witnessed a 46 percent increase to 5 million visitors with the addition of the InsureMe.com entity in March.

Radio Site Visits Surge

• Radio sites underwent a sharp increase in traffic in March, with the category growing 27 percent to 61.8 million visitors, making it the top-gaining category for the month.
• AOL Music led the category with 21.9 million visitors (up 5 percent), following by Yahoo Music with nearly 20.8 million visitors (up 4 percent) and Clear Channel Online with 11 million visitors (up 2 percent).
• Other significant increases occurred at Pandora.com (up 9 percent), Citadel Broadcasting Corporation (up 11 percent), and Disney Music (up 17 percent).

Top-Gaining Categories (see table) - Online Gambling Traffic Takes off

• The NCAA basketball tournament attracted a flurry of online bettors, prompting a 14 percent gain in visits in the online gambling category.
• Sportingbet PLC increased 35 percent to 975,000 visitors, UPICKEM.net jumped 174 percent to 396,000 visitors, SportsBetting.com rose 114 percent to 145,000 visitors.

Walgreen Co. Leads Retail - Health Care Category

• Retail - Health Care sites underwent a 12 percent increase in March to 26.3 million visitors, as Walgreen Co. led the category with 5.4 million visitors (up 10 percent).
• Drugstore.com, Inc. captured the second position with 3.7 million visitors, followed by CVS with nearly 3 million visitors.