Online retailers see significant growth in 2008
It has been confirmed that the top 10 online UK retailers saw their visitor numbers increase by an average of 37% year-on-year in 2008. The figure is an enormous boost to a sector which has been the victim of a number of false dawns in the past but appears finally to have broken through. So what next?
Why the headline figures suggest that the reduction in the UK economy has pushed more and more consumers online, there is also a confidence factor to take into account. Security issues with online sites have been very prevalent over the last few years but substantial investment into new technology and new security systems appears to have paid enormous dividends.
When you consider that the likes of Amazon was receiving 15.6 million unique visitors a month between October and December and Play.com received an average of 5.7 million users during that time, is easy to see why sales figures have also moved higher. We also saw the likes of Argos come forward with 8.2 million viewers a month and Tesco with 7.3 million viewers. These are significant increases from past figures and while the growth rate may not be as large once the economy starts to recover an upward trend would appear to be in place.
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