Tsunami News, Search Engines and Blogs Lead Traffic to Humanitarian Sites
With relief coming in from all over the world, U.S. citizens are embracing the Internet to support relief efforts for victims of the Asian Tsunami disaster. According to Hitwise, the world’s leading online competitive intelligence service, the market share of U.S. visits to humanitarian Web sites skyrocketed 180 percent the week ending Jan. 1, 2005 versus the prior week.
Humanitarian sites peaked on Dec. 30, 2004, when visits accounted for .096 percent of all daily Internet traffic. The top 2 charity websites for the week ending Jan. 1, 2005 were America Red Cross (up 1,285 percent) and United Nations Children’s Fund (up 2,034 percent).
News and Blog Sites Play Instrumental Support Role – News sites directly referred 17.1 percent of traffic to Humanitarian sites for the week ending Jan. 1, 2005, compared to 5.5 percent during the prior week. Search engines and directories provided the most referrals at 29 percent (up from 20 percent the week prior).
The blog site Tsunami Help (tsunamihelp.blogspot.com) was the 10th most visited site in the Humanitarian Category, indicating that blogging is capable of expanding its influence into the realm of online fundraising. This site experienced an increase in market share of visits by 1,926 percent between Dec. 27 and Dec. 31, 2004.
