Online spending`s growth is driven by a small core group and new web users
Despite growth, the web’s penetration into shoppers’ wallets still has far to go, according to findings from the San Diego, CA-based Intermarket Group. Some 51% of those who used the Internet for other purposes didn’t make a single purchase online in 2001, according to Intermarket’s research. And in most months, the percentage of Internet users who bought anything online was fewer that one third of those with access.
“Throughout 2001, the proportion of Internet users who purchased online in any given month continued to bounce around in a fairly tight range of 30% to 35%,” says Intermarket Group’s David Strassel.
While an estimated 84% of current Internet users have made at least one online purchase at some point, the low percentage of those shopping the Internet in any given month suggests that a substantial number of first-timers don’t return to shop regularly, if ever. Yet aggregate spending online has expanded threefold since 1999, while the percentage of users who do buy online continues to increase: from 32% in 1999 to 49% in 2000. That growth, suggests Intermarket, appears to have been driven by a combination of growth in the Internet population and the patronage of a core group of increasingly active consumers.
That dynamic could prove problematic for retailers now that the rate of growth in new Internet adoption is expected to slow. “If online retailers hope to maintain their momentum in 2002 and beyond, additional efforts must be made in converting those individuals for whom online purchasing is merely a novelty into regular customers,” adds Strassel.
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