Total ownership
Market researcher comScore has released some data on the the global online retail and auction businesses and, predictably, it's dominated by Amazon and eBay.
Amazon sites received over 282 million visitors in June, which apparently accounts for 20.4 percent of the total global online audience (putting that figure at 1.38 billion). Meanwhile eBay got 16.2 percent of all surfers and China's Alibaba group got 11.3 percent.
Coming in at a remarkable fourth in the world, with almost ten percent of all people who accessed the Internet in June, was Apple. Yes, we know Apple is on the verge of becoming the biggest company in the world by market cap (Exxon Mobil was still $7 billion ahead last time we checked), but the fourth largest e-tailer?
This is further evidence of how Apple makes such stupendous profits. At a time when even the champion of the direct model - Dell - has long given up relying solely on that method, Apple is doing a huge amount of direct business. The Mac channel is virtually non-existent, and Apple would probably cut out the mobile operators if it could.
"While retail e-commerce has already grown to become a $150+ billion annual industry in the U.S., it still presents enormous upside opportunity across much of the globe," said Gian Fulgoni, comScore co-founder. "Technology has changed the way consumers behave, and increasingly they are opting for the convenience and pricing advantages offered by the online channel."
Select Retail and Auction Sites Ranked by Unique Visitors (000) |
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|
Total Unique Visitors (000) |
% Reach |
Total Internet : Total Audience |
1,383,098 |
100.0% |
Amazon Sites |
282,233 |
20.4% |
eBay |
223,520 |
16.2% |
Alibaba.com Corporation |
156,780 |
11.3% |
Apple.com Worldwide Sites |
134,296 |
9.7% |
Rakuten Inc |
57,785 |
4.2% |
Wal-Mart |
44,650 |
3.2% |
Hewlett Packard |
38,491 |
2.8% |
MercadoLibre |
33,481 |
2.4% |
Otto Gruppe |
31,779 |
2.3% |
Groupe PPR |
31,686 |
2.3% |
*Excludes visitation from public computers such as Internet cafes or access from mobile phones or PDAs.
When you break down the figures by region you can see that Apple accounts for almost a third of all surfers in North America and 30 percent in Europe. Even in Asia, where Alibaba and Japanese Rakuten dominate e-tail, Apple manages a quarter of the online population. Having said that, HP isn't doing too bad either.
Regional Audience Composition Analysis of Select Retail and Auction Sites |
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|
Percent Composition of Unique Visitors |
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|
North America |
Europe |
Asia Pacific |
Middle East - Africa |
Latin America |
Total Internet |
14.9% |
26.7% |
41.1% |
8.7% |
8.6% |
Amazon Sites |
35.4% |
31.8% |
24.1% |
4.5% |
4.2% |
eBay |
34.6% |
46.9% |
11.7% |
4.0% |
2.8% |
Alibaba.com Corporation |
4.5% |
5.3% |
85.7% |
2.5% |
1.9% |
Apple.com Worldwide Sites |
32.0% |
29.6% |
24.9% |
8.0% |
5.6% |
Rakuten Inc |
5.3% |
19.8% |
72.7% |
1.5% |
0.7% |
Wal-Mart |
83.4% |
8.9% |
0.7% |
0.5% |
6.4% |
Hewlett Packard |
45.1% |
26.4% |
14.3% |
6.7% |
7.5% |
MercadoLibre |
1.7% |
4.5% |
0.4% |
0.2% |
93.3% |
Otto Gruppe |
4.3% |
92.3% |
1.0% |
2.1% |
0.2% |
Groupe PPR |
16.1% |
74.4% |
2.2% |
4.7% |
2.6% |
*Excludes visitation from public computers such as Internet cafes or access from mobile phones or PDAs.