Web users in The Netherlands and UK spent the most time online in 2010, according to a new study looking at digital media use in Europe last year.
The comScore 2010 Europe Digital Year in Review provides an overview of key trends in the European digital media landscape, including market-level data on user demographics, social networking, online video, mobile, and search.
It covers 18 European countries — Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, and the UK.
Social Activities and Mobile Lead Growth Prospects in Europe
In 2010, Europe saw growth in several key areas, in part due to continuing technology adoption across markets and game-changing developments in the digital world, such as the expansion of social networking platforms across existing third-party sites, strong growth of smartphones and mobile media usage, innovations in e-commerce, and rollout of new devices tailored for connected media consumption.
This report provides an in-depth look at various media platforms and usage categories across Europe. Key findings highlighted in the report include:
• The Netherlands and United Kingdom led in engagement, with users in both markets spending approximately 25 percent more time online in a month than the European average of 24.3 hours. Europeans spent the most time on search, social networking, and directory sites, with Facebook garnering the largest share of Europeans’ time (11.7 percent) out of all media properties.
• Europe experienced a 10.9 percentage gain in social networking penetration over 2010 – the highest seen in any global region. Facebook was the leading social networking sites in 15 out of the 18 markets. Local social networks in the Netherlands, Poland, and Russia continued to retain their majority share of the market.
• Display advertising reached 97 percent of users in the UK, France, and Germany in December 2010. In all three markets, Social Networking was the leading publisher category serving display ads.
• The use of online coupon sites in Europe grew by 162 percent in 2010, showing coupon sites emerging as a key driver of online consumer behavior. France, the UK and Italy led local markets in the use of online coupons and deals, with Italy showing the highest gain at a 15 percentage point increase in coupon site usage.
• Although the number of unique online video viewers in Europe held steady overall, there was significant growth in video viewership to TV sites. By the end of 2010, 16.3 million viewers were watching videos on TV sites in Germany – an increase of 14 percent from last year.
• Smartphone penetration in the UK, France, Germany, Spain, and Italy grew in 2010 to reach 31.1 percent of mobile users. This was fueled by high rates of adoption of the Google and Apple smartphone operating systems, with Google Android experiencing a 951-percent gain and Apple experiencing a 115-percent gain.
Search intensity in Europe varied across individual markets, with searchers in Poland exhibiting the highest average searches per searcher across all markets. Google continues to lead the search market in Europe, reaching 9 out of 10 Europeans.
“Europe is currently the world’s second largest digital market behind Asia Pacific and Europeans continue to embrace new online and mobile offerings. The key to tapping into this region is to understand the behaviour and individual market dynamics that contribute to it,” said Wolf Allisat, comScore EVP for International Markets.
“Europe’s digital market is poised to keep expanding in 2011, and understanding where the growth occurs in a region as vast as this will be crucial for marketers looking to drive their business among Europe’s diversified markets.”
To download a complimentary copy of The comScore 2010 Europe Digital Year in Review, click here.
