Leading User-Generated Content Sites See Exponential Growth in UK Visitors During the Past Year

comScore World Metrix: Wikipedia Sites Ranks as 16th Most-Visited UK Internet Property; MySpace.com Ranks 27th. Analysis of UK Internet users’ activity at the leading sites that feature mainly free, user-generated content (UGC). Significant traffic growth versus year ago propelled several of these sites into the Top 50 UK Web property rankings in July 2006. The top UGC property, Wikipedia Sites, ranked as the sixteenth most visited property in July with 6.5 million visitors (up 253 percent versus year ago). Other UGC sites on the Top 50 UK list include MySpace.com (up 467 percent to 5.2 million visitors), Piczo.com (up 393 percent to 4 million visitors), YouTube.com (3.9 million visitors), and Bebo.com (up 328 percent to 3.9 million visitors).

Selected Properties* Featuring User-Generated Content (UGC) Based on Top 50 UK Internet Properties July 2006 vs. July 2005 Total UK – Home and Work Locations Source: comScore Media Metrix
Property	Rank Among Top UK Properties		Unique Visitors (000)
	Jul-05	Jul-06	Jul-05	Jul-06	% Change
Wikipedia Sites	78	16	1,852	6,545	253
MySpace.com	89	27	913	5,173	467
Piczo.com	91	43	820	4,049	393
YouTube.com	N/A	47	N/A	3,918	N/A
Bebo.com	90	48	912	3,902	328

*eBay is excluded from list of user-generated content sites because it is primarily a retail site.

Web 2.0 is clearly architected for participation, as it attempts to harness the collective intelligence of Web users. Many of the sites experiencing the fastest growth today are the ones that understand their audience’s need for expression and have made it easy for them to share pictures, upload music and video, and provide their own commentary, thus stimulating others to do the same. It is the classic network effect at work.

User-Generated Content Attracts High Engagement among Visitors

While uniformly demonstrating strong traffic growth, UGC sites are also adept at keeping users engaged. As part of its study, comScore analyzed engagement levels among visitors to the top 5 UGC sites and those visiting the remaining sites that comprise the Top 50 Properties in July. The results show that, on average, the top 5 UGC sites exhibit higher levels of user engagement than their counterparts across all engagement metrics. Collectively, the leading UGC sites draw more frequent visits than non-UGC sites (4.2 vs. 3.5 average usage days per month), longer periods of engagement (79.9 vs. 33.2 average minutes per visitor), and more pages viewed (217 vs. 52 average pages per visitor).

Users of the top social networking sites demonstrate particularly high levels of engagement, with visitors to MySpace.com and Bebo.com averaging at least 5 usage days, 2 hours of use, and 300 pages viewed per visitor during July.

Engagement Among User-Generated Content (UGC) Sites vs. Non User-Generated Content Sites User-Generated Content Sites: Wikipedia Sites, MySpace.com, Piczo.com, YouTube.com, Bebo.com July 2006 – Total UK Locations Source: comScore Media Metrix
	Average Usage Days per Visitor	Average Minutes per Visitor	Average Pages per Visitor
Average of select UGC sites	4.2	79.9	217
Wikipedia Sites	2.0	10.1	13
MySpace.com	5.4	122.7	333
Piczo.com	4.8	60.9	238
YouTube.com	2.9	60.9	70
Bebo.com	5.6	145.0	428
Average of non-UGC sites among top 50	3.5	33.2	52

By analyzing a variety of engagement metrics it is clear that UGC sites – and in particular social networking sites – represent potentially fertile ground for advertisers and marketers,. Users on these sites visit more frequently, stay longer, and view more content, which means more opportunities for marketers to communicate key messages. The challenge right now is to determine effective ways to integrate this messaging while maintaining a positive user experience. UK Internet users’ activity