There has never been a better time to do business online in Canada or to target the online Canadian market. According to ComScore’s 2012 statistics, Canadians over the age of 15 continue to lead the world in Internet usage, coming in first place of 11 countries (including the US & China). They spend an average of just over 45 hours/month visiting about 98 websites and racking up 3,781 page views from their PC alone. With 45 per cent of Canadians now carrying around a Smartphone, those numbers could be increased by 45 per cent with reasonable accuracy.
What are Canadians doing online?
That depends on who you ask. Internet surfers with a household income under $60,000/year visited gambling, car, music, dating and travel websites most often. Those earning over $60,000/year visited websites focused on business, online trading, politics, education and books.
No matter how much we make, Canadians love social networking. Facebook was the #1 search query and both men (6.5 hours) and women (8.8 hours) spend a lot of time there. Twitter, LinkedIn and Tumblr are also climbing in popularity with online Canadians.
Video viewing is up a whopping 58 per cent this year, with half of those being viewed on YouTube. Entertainment leads the way in video popularity, followed by news.
Canada as a Market
All of this activity hasn’t gone unnoticed by marketers, with over 2.5 billion spent on targeting the Canadian market over the past year. Canada is a vast, wide-open market with many people located in remote areas who rely heavily on online ordering. These eager shoppers of goods and services are spending when most people in other economies are not, which in turn benefits Canada’s economy as a whole, enabling more people to shop, and so on. If you’ve been holding back due to a lack of confidence in the Canadian market, I suggest you get moving.
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Melody McKinnon is an internet entrepreneur with 25 years of experience in a wide range of online business models, backed by a formal business education and enhanced by training and mentorship. She has owned or managed both educational and ecommerce websites. Her book, 7 Recession Proof Online Businesses to Start From Home, is available from all major ebook retailers.
Melody has worked with many businesses & brands in a multitude of capacities. She can often be found on CanadianDigitalMedia.com, CanadiansInternet.com, CanadianFamily.net, and AllNaturalPetCare.com, as well as other quality digital publications. Her content has earned reference links from highly-respected websites, magazines and university textbooks.
Canadians are taking over the internet world! Great site and great post!
We lead the world in EVERYTHING!!! 😉
I’m excited about the possibilities of our expansion to Canada!!
Spotted your comment and decided to pay you a visit. REally liking the canadian website, great idea.
This is going to be so great. Melody you were made for this, I can’t wait to see what you do for the site.
Great post! I’m looking forward to the new blog, best of luck.
Thanks for the stats & for the website. Canadian entrepreneurs need all of the help we can get.
I just knew Canadians would rule the world…politely!