Canadians Spend Most Time Online in the World

It is well known that the internet and social media are important tomarketing, but there is overwhelming new evidence to underscore what impact an online presence can mean- in particular to Canadian consumers- and to the professionals trying to win their business.

According to a new poll released from marketing survey company comScore, Canada is the global leader in terms of time spent online. Canadians spent more time online than internet users from any other country during Q4 2010.

So then, for business to fully leveragemarketing initiatives, they need to meet Canadians where they are-and that is, overwhelmingly, online.

On average, Canadians reported spending  43.5 hours online per month in Q4 2010, which signals a rise from the  42.2 hours reported in Q4 2009.

That breaks down to the average Canadian internet user visiting 3,349 Web pages over the quarter; they logged in an average of 95.2 times a month. According to the report, “Canada’s total online population grew 2% year-over-year to 24.989 million users at the end of 2010, compared to 24.6 million in 2009.”

Also, interestingly, there was significant growth in the 55+ User demographic the 55+ age demographic, which  increased 12% to 4.7 million. The bulk of Canada’s Web population is still in the  35-54 age bracket, with 8.77 million users.

Looking at provincial activity, Ontario has the most internet users, home to 38% of the country’s internet users; Quebec, B.C. the Parries and Atlantic Canada, with 24%, 13%, 18% and 7% respectively round out the rest.

Microsoft’s Internet Explorer is the most popular browser; Canadian-driven traffic to Social Media sites increased by 13%, year-over-year, supporting the notion that Social Media tools like Facebook and Twitter are becoming increasingly populated, and therefore useful for marketing and distribution of information.