HITWISE UK SPORTS UPDATE

Visits to Tour de France websites up 4 fold ahead of this weekend’s London start;

Wimbledon suffers from foul weather, but boosts interest in tennis.

London 4^th July  Hitwise, the leading online competitive intelligence service, today reports that the London and Kent start to the Tour de France has led to increased interest in the event, with UK Internet visits to the Tour de France websites (www.letour.com and www.tourdefrancelondon.com) up four fold last week compared with the week before the start of the race last year (week to 24^th June 2006). Internet searches also reflect the increased interest, with UK searches for “tour de france” up three-fold last week compared with the same week in 2006.

In the week ending 30th June 2007, the Tour de France London website (www.tourdefrancelondon.com) ranked #5 among Cycling websites and the Tour de France website (www.letour.com) ranked 7^th. In the week before the race last year, letour.com ranked 13^th.

55+ Internet users made up 44% of visits to the Tour de France London website in the four weeks to 30^th June 2007 and were 12% more likely to be male. Among Experian Mosaic Groups, "Symbols of Success" - the group who are most likely to earn a household income of £50,000+ per year - were 42% more likely to be on the site than average for the online population.

Interest in Wimbledon trumps Tour de France but declines year on year

UK Internet searches for “wimbledon” far outstrip those for “tour de france” by a factor of nearly five. The term “wimbledon” ranked as the 5^th highest volume term sending visits to Sports websites compared to “tour de france” at #18, whilst Wimbledon searches were triple those for “silverstone”, which also takes place this weekend. 

However, with Wimbledon once again dogged by bad weather, interest in the tournament and demand for tickets appear to be down. Comparing the middle week of the championship in 2007 and 2006, UK searches for “wimbledon” were down 19% and searches for “wimbledon tickets” were down by 24%. Contrast that to searches for “wimbledon weather” up seven-fold.

Despite rain hampering play the tournament seems to be fuelling an interest in the sport. Hitwise analysis reveals that searches for “tennis rackets” have been on the rise since Wimbledon began last week and have doubled year on year. UK consumers seem to have adopted the North American spelling, with UK internet searches for “tennis rackets” shooting up last week whilst the term “tennis racquets” remained at 0% of all UK internet searches.

The most searched-for racket brands were Babolat and Wilson, with both brands enjoying a boost in Internet searches in recent weeks. Second seed Rafael Nadal, who is sporting a Babolat, seems to have fuelled demand for the brand. Roger Federer, the top ranked male player and Wimbledon winner for the past three years, has likely contributed to the popularity of Wilson rackets along with Serena Williams, whose recent tirade saw her smash her 22 carat gold leaf inlayed Wilson racket.

Top 20 Terms driving traffic to a Sports website, 4 weeks ending 30th June

About Hitwise:

Hitwise is the leading online competitive intelligence service. Only Hitwise provides its 1,200 global clients with daily insights on how their customers interact with a broad range of competitive Web sites, and how their competitors use different tactics to attract online customers.

Since 1997, Hitwise has pioneered a unique, network-based approach to Internet measurement. Through relationships with ISP’s around the world, Hitwise’s patented methodology anonymously captures the online usage, search and conversion behavior of 25 million Internet users. This unprecedented volume of Internet usage data is seamlessly integrated into an easy to use, web-based service, designed to help marketers better plan, implement and report on a range of online marketing programs.

Hitwise is a subsidiary of Experian (FTS: EXPN) www.experiangroup.com and operates in the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong and Singapore. More information about Hitwise is available at www.hitwise.co.uk.

For up to date analysis of online trends, please visit the Hitwise Intelligence-Analyst Weblogs at weblogs.hitwise.com and the Hitwise Data Center at www.hitwise.com/datacenter.

For media enquiries, please contact:

Jannie Cahill
jannie.cahill@hitwise.com

Tel: 020 7378 3619