Search engine, Yahoo.ie has emerged as the most popular of 19 Irish websites, according to a survey by the Joint National Internet Research (JNIR) which was published today.
The website came out top with 28 per cent of people questioned about their internet usage between July and December 2007 saying they had visited it in the last year.
The next most popular site was eircom.net with 22 per cent and ticketmaster.ie was in third with 20 per cent. Property website myhome.ie, which is owned by The Irish Times group, had 11 per cent.
Among media websites RTE came out on top with 12 per cent visiting its site compared to 6 per cent for the Irish Times website, ireland.com. The website for the Irish Independent was third with 5 per cent.
The JNIR research uses a similar audience measurement research approach to the JNLR and JNRS used for newspapers and radio was conducted by Behaviour & Attitudes and Amas.
The research is the first of its kind and aims to profile the people visiting different websites.
However, the fact that it was limited to just the 19 Irish websites that paid to be included – and ignores airlines and social networking sites – limits its findings.
Another factor is that 51 per cent of the 5,185 people surveyed do not use the internet.
Top 10 sites for weekly coverage in Ireland:
Yahoo – 560,000
Eircom – 393,000
RTE – 167,000
Ticketmaster – 147,000
Irishjobs.ie – 115,000
Golden Pages – 104,000
Entertainment.ie – 90,000
Ireland.com – 87,000
Myhome.ie – 87,000
Loadzajobs.ie – 72,000
Top 10 sites for abc1 internet users in Ireland:
Yahoo – 335,000
Eircom – 250,000
RTE – 116,000
Ticketmaster – 106,000
Golden Pages – 72,000
Ireland.com – 68,000
Myhome.ie – 63,000
Irishjobs.ie – 62,000
Entertainment.ie – 56,000
Independent.ie – 51,000
Source – JNIR July- December 2007