Report on Internet in India

Source: http://www.pluggd.in/2007/06/india-internet-report-google-is-kinghtml

Google has displaced Yahoo! in the Indian online world.

According to JuxtConsult (online research and advisory firm), Google is the most preferred website in India (29.3% prefer G, 26.6 Y!, Rediff 10.9% and Orkut 7.9%).

Infact, the combined Orkut and Google entity stands at a huge 37%!!

Though Yahoo stands second as far as preferred site is concerned, it does beat Google in brand recall (30% top-of-mind recall, while Google follows with 27.2%, Orkut - 4.5%, Rediff-11.5%)
Again, Google + Orkut > Yahoo.
As far as email usage is concerned, Yahoo is still the number one (53%), but it won’t be too long before Gmail eats up into Y!’s shares.

For job searches, Naukri’s share has declined from 50% to 37%! 

Yahoo! leads the mobile war and gaming war too, while new players like Zapak are growing rapidly.

Few interesting findings:

• Only 17% Internet users in this country who come from an IT background as against 21% a year ago
• Accessing Internet from homes are getting more and more popular with the rapid spread of broadband and other technologies
• 59% of Internet users access the Net from their PCs. However, the place of work still continues to be the single largest place for accessing Internet at 78%.
• 37% of the current Net users come from the top 10 metros.
• More than half of the Indian online population comes from outside the eight largest cities. (i.e. tier II and III cities).
• 19-35 year age groups accounted for 76% users last year, they now constitute only 67%.
• 66% users came from SEC ‘A’ and ‘B’ classes in 2006, only 56% come from these classes now.
• 28% Internet users own a car.
• 34% Internet users own credit cards
• 90% of Internet users have mobile phones
• 41% prefer to browse online in English as compared to 59% a year ago
• The India Internet population stands at 30 million.

So, what does this translates into?

• Rise in local content (and hence local search)
• Mobile is the way to go.
• Internet is no more restricted to the young crowd (i.e. no more social nets please!) - There is a demand for mature products.
• E-Commerce is set to rise.