Search engines like Google, Yahoo, Ask.com and Microsoft’s Live are the primary driver of traffic to e-tailers. According to Hitwise analyst Bill Tancer, search engines account for 25% of the upstream traffic. That means 25% of the traffic that go to the more than 19,000 online retailers visit search engines first!
Even big-brand retailers rely on search engines for traffic. About 12% of Wal-Mart.com traffic visited Google first, according to Hitwise. But here’s an interesting change and trend Tancer has spotted. Social networks, such as News Corp’s MySpace, are starting to drive traffic to retailers as well. In fact, 5% of traffic to retailers comes from social networks, with MySpace accounting for 2.5% of that traffic.
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