The Christmas spirit is in the air, and this holiday season, it looks like the internet is the place to be for online shopping. American holiday spending is already up this year, Apple products top this year’s online search queries, millions are expected to be glued to their computer screens on Christmas day, and Canadians have – gasp – delayed their Christmas shopping this year in anticipation of big sales closer to Christmas. It’s all part of the online Christmas surge that could be bigger this year than ever before.
US Online Spending Already Up
According to comScore, US online holiday spending has grown four percent during the first 43 days of the holiday shopping season (November and December). This represents a better-than-expected growth; comScore had predicted that the growth this year would be one percent less, at three percent. According to comScore, the positive results can be partly attributed to heavy online promotions from retailers.
Apple Products are Hot Search Terms for this Christmas
The UK’s two most searched for products this holiday season are both Apple products. You guessed it: it’s the iPhone and the iPod Touch. The iPhone accounted for 1.75 percent of all product searches in the UK during the first week of December, and an incredible 14 percent of all mobile searches. The iPod Touch was the second most searched for item with 1.29 percent of all searches.
High Numbers Doing Online Shopping on Christmas Day
Five million shoppers are predicted to do their online shopping on Christmas day in the UK alone, this year, reports the UK’s Daily Mail. This is because all the major High Street stores will begin their sales (featuring incredible discounts of 70 percent and more). Last year, Christmas day was the UK’s third biggest online shopping event of the year, with more than $160 million being spent.
Canadians Delaying Online Shopping to Grab Bargains
Some 43 percent of Canadians are reportedly delaying their online holiday shopping this year, in anticipation of better deals to come as Christmas day approaches. The information came from Maritz Research Canada, in a survey released earlier this month. Indeed, Scotiabank (a Canadian bank) released its 2009 Holiday Spending Study, to reveal that Canadians expect to spend more online this year than last year. It’s not a huge difference, averaging a planned $891 to be spent per person, compared to last year’s $884, but small growth is certainly better than no growth.
Overall, we can expect this Christmas to be full of online holiday cheer – experts say the spending is up and the economy is recovering, and you can bet that Google is going to have some neat design on its homepage for Christmas day.
Kaila Krayewski is a freelance journalist with a passion for all things internet. Having worked for nearly two years as the public relations manager for an internation search engine optimization company, and publishing hundreds of articles (how-to, informational, and otherwise) on SEO, she knows a thing or two about the field. Furthermore, having just started up her own website blondetraveler.com, she is doing her best to keep one step ahead of the search engines in order to keep the traffic flowing.
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