Computer and Library Learning (Archived)

On March 4, 2013, comScore, a company specializing in digital measurement and analytics, released its 2013 Canada Digital Future in Focus report. The report, prepared annually and available for free download after filling out a brief, online registration form, provided an analytical snapshot into the emerging trends in the Canadian marketplace (and future implications) based on web usage, online video, digital advertising, mobile, social media, and e-commerce indicators. In the “Online Visitation and Engagement” section (page 6) of the report, the results, based on the fourth quarter of 2012, showed that Canadians placed second in the world in terms of average monthly hours per visitor at 41.3 hours, just behind the United States at 43 hours. The Canadian results are down from 45.3 hours and 43.5 hours in 2011 and 2010 respectively. However, Canadians did place first in the average monthly pages per visitor and average monthly visits per visitor categories at 3,731 web pages and 101 visits, just ahead of the United States at 3,709 web pages and 97 visits.

In the “Online Video Viewership and Engagement” section (page 9), Canada placed second in both the average monthly hours per viewer and average monthly videos per viewer categories at 24.8 hours and 291 videos respectively, while the United Kingdom finished first in both of those categories at 30.4 hours and 300 videos on a monthly average.

Canadians’ participation in social media/networking increased by 3% in the fourth quarter of 2012 over the same period in 2011 with some 23,921,000 unique visitors in 2012 (page 23). The top 5 social networking sites for Canadians (ranked on the basis of total unique visitors) in 2012 were Facebook in first place (with an 8% increase over 2011), Twitter a distant second (but experiencing a 27% growth rate over 2011), LinkedIn a close third (but showing a 38% growth rate over 2011), Tumblr a very close fourth place (given its 96% growth rate over 2011), and Pinterest clearly in fifth place (but demonstrating a phenomenal 792% growth rate over 2011).

The value of E-commerce activity increased by 10% from the previous year to over $22.3 billion in 2012 (page 30). Smartphone penetration in the Canadian market increased by 17% to 62% of the market in December 2012 (page 17) with Google Android smartphones capturing the lead market share at 40%, 5% ahead of Apple iPhones and 20% ahead of RIM’s BlackBerry (page 18). Display ad impressions increased by 17% to greater than 724 million (page 45).

Please read the Canadian Press’ graphical summary of the comScore report here.

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