Studies: Women spend more time online, but men spend more money

Women spend the time

Woman account for roughly half of all internet users worldwide, but tend to spend more time online—8% more, according to a report titled “How Women Are Shaping the Internet.” The only region in the world where men are found to spend more time online than females is actually here in North America, although the difference is less than 3%.

Social networking sites reach a higher percentage of women than men globally, according to other comScore study results. The report indicates that more than three-quarters of all women online visited a social networking site in May, compared to just two-thirds of men. Globally, women demonstrate higher levels of engagement with social networking sites than men. Although women account for less than half of total unique visitors to the social networking category, they account for nearly 57% of total minutes spent on these sites. Women spend significantly more time on social networking sites than men, with women averaging 5.5 hours per month compared to men’s four hours, demonstrating the strong engagement that women across the globe share with social sites.

Men spend the money

55 per cent of Canadian online shoppers will look to the internet for their back-to-school shopping preparations this summer—with males indicating that they will spend almost twice as much as their female counterparts online.

The survey, commissioned by Visa Canada, revealed that consumers are turning online for better prices (48 per cent), convenience (40 per cent) and better sales and promotions (35 per cent). Additionally, nearly one-third of Canadian online shoppers between the ages of 18 and 34 will use blogs to research product reviews and price comparisons, while older adults being the least likely to surf blogs and other online resources.

And the French Canadians are keeping it recession-cheap this year, planning to spend only half of what Atlantic Canadians or folk from Ontario plan to.