home

careers

press center

contact us

Boston MA –  ( Marketwire - June 30, 2011) -  Kantar Media's Compete today released data for May showing the Celebrity Gossip Enthusiast category hit its highest point in two years, grossing 55.6 million unique visitors (UVs), a monthly increase of 20.24 percent and a yearly rise of 39.21 percent for the category as a whole.

Residual royal wedding coverage, marital indiscretions of former California "Governator" Schwarzenegger, finales of Oprah and American Idol and all things Kardashian fueled the Celebrity Gossip Enthusiast behavioral category in May.

Omg.yahoo.com, a Yahoo! subdomain, led the category, attracting 25.8 million UVs in May for 26.89 percent month-over-month (M-O-M) and 100.97 percent year-over-year (Y-O-Y) increases. Other sites with web-only celeb gossip content cracking the top ten were Popeater.com (+21.96 percent M-O-M), Wonderwall.msn.com -- a subdomain of Msn.com (+11.64 percent M-O-M), Gossipcenter.com (+63.39 percent M-O-M), Celebuzz.com (+21.76 percent M-O-M), Mediatakeout.com (+4.19 percent M-O-M) and Celebrity-gossip.net (+44.26 percent M-O-M).

Celeb gossip sites affiliated with network television programs also flourished throughout May. Eonline.com, Tmz.com and Accesshollywood.com spiked 22.18 percent, 50.56 percent and 87.5 percent respectively.

Websites associated with celebrity gossip magazines also did well in May. People.com had nearly seven million UVs hit in May, a monthly gain of 16.71 percent, and Usmagazine.com shot up 48.89 percent for the month, which was just over four million new UVs. Lastly, Okmagazine.com accounted for 1.3 million UVs, a M-O-M rise of 40.35 percent.

The sites included in the Celebrity Gossip Enthusiast behavioral category have a high rate of referrals to one another. For instance, many users who visit People.com will subsequently visit Usmagazine.com or Tmz.com. Advertisers could likely get more bang for their buck by investigating the referral patterns between these sites so they can try to optimize ad placement for optimal reach.

Brightcove.com, an online video platform, received 0.53 percent of traffic referred from the Celebrity Gossip Enthusiast category in May -- an increase of 321.64 percent for the month. This makes perfect sense when one considers that Brightcove.com distributes video content for companies like Time Inc., Yahoo! and MSN, which own many of the sites in the Celebrity Gossip Enthusiast behavioral category. This may be an indicator that such sites, including People.com and the two major Yahoo! and MSN gossip subdomains, used an increased number of videos distributed by Brightcove.

Information regarding aggregate web categories is drawn from the Compete PRO Enterprise edition on Compete.com. For more information on the enterprise offering, please contact Lauren Streisfeld at lstreisfeld@compete.com.

About Compete

Compete, a Kantar Media company, helps the world's top brands improve their marketing based on the online behavior of millions of consumers. Leading advertisers, agencies and publishers rely on Compete's products and services to create engaging online experiences and highly profitable advertising campaigns. Compete's online panel -- the largest in the industry -- makes the web as ingrained in marketing as it is in people's lives. Compete is located in Boston, MA, with offices throughout the U.S. For more information, please visit http://www.compete.com/.

About Kantar Media

Established in more than 50 countries, Kantar Media helps clients master the world's multimedia momentum through analysis of print, radio, TV, internet, cinema, mobile, social media, and outdoor worldwide. Kantar Media offers a full range of media insights and audience measurement services through its global business sectors -- Intelligence, Audiences, TGI and Custom. Kantar Media companies also include Compete, Cymfony and SRDS. Drawing upon the deepest expertise in the industry, Kantar Media tracks more than 3 million brands and delivers insight to more than 22,000 customers worldwide. www.KantarMediaNA.com/.