Latest Stats as at 7/10/2009.
============================

These figures cover the 15-day period 16/9/2009 to 30/9/2009.

==============================================================

Vista Market Share
==================

For period 16th to 30th September 2009, these percentage figures 
are based on visits, and earlier figures are in brackets:-

XP 57.6 (was 58.3, 57.6, 57.1, 58.1, 58.9, 61.6, 62.1, 61.8, 63.6, 64.0)
Vista 25.4 (was 25.6, 25.8, 25.6, 25.3, 25.0, 24.9, 24.6, 24.0, 23.0)
Windows-7 1.2 (was 1.1, 1.0, 0.8, 0.7, 0.9, 0.6, 0.4, 0.4) 
Other Windows 3.4 (was 3.8, 3.8, 4.1, 4.1, 4.1, 4.0, 3.7, 3.3, 3.8, 3.5)
Mac 8.7 (was 8.0, 8.5, 9.0, 8.2, 7.7, 6.3, 6.5, 7.7, 7.0, 7.1, 7.2, 7.4)
Linux 1.2 (was 1.2, 1.2, 1.4, 1.5, 1.4, 1.1, 1.1, 1.0, 0.8, 1.2, 1.0) 
Mobiles 2.5 (was 2.1, 2.1, 2.0, 2.1, 2.0, 1.6, 1.6, 1.8, 1.8, 1.4, 1.5)

Some slow trends continue but XP and Vista are pretty steady.

The percentage of mobiles continues to climb.

The total sample size was 14931 visits by humans.
 
Browser Breakup
===============

Percentages of visits for the period 16th to 30th September 2009.

IE 60.6 (was 62.0, 62.0, 62.3, 62.5, 60.7, 64.2, 62.8, 62.4, 62.7, 63.2)
FF 25.7 (was 24.2, 24.8, 24.1, 23.8, 25.9, 24.9, 25.8, 26.1, 26.0)  
Safari 7.7 (was 7.2, 7.0, 7.5, 6.6, 6.0, 5.4, 5.5, 6.0, 5.9, 5.5, 5.9)
Chrome 2.8 (was 3.3, 2.6, 2.7, 2.8, 2.9, 2.2, 2.3, 1.9, 1.9, 1.8, 1.6)
Opera 1.7 (was 1.9, 1.9, 1.8, 2.3, 2.4, 2.0, 2.2, 1.6, 1.7, 1.5, 1.3)
All Others 1.5 (was 1.4, 1.6, 1.7, 1.9, 2.1, 1.5, 1.5, 1.9, 1.7, 1.5)

This month was the lowest figure ever recorded for IE,
with corresponding (but small) increases in Safari and Firefox.

The total sample size was 11744 visits by humans.

Search Engines Share
==================== 

Percentage breakup of visits coming via search engines 
for September 16th to 30th, 2009:-

Google 88.5 (was 89.4, 88.0, 87.2, 85.4, 86.1, 86.0, 84.8, 85.4, 83.6)
Yahoo 5.8 (was 5.3, 6.3, 7.0, 7.5, 7.4, 6.5, 7.7, 7.8, 10.3, 7.8, 6.7)
Microsoft 2.8 (was 2.3, 2.3, 2.5, 3.3, 3.2, 4.2, 3.3, 3.1, 2.4, 2.8)
All others 2.9 (was 3.0, 3.4, 3.3, 3.8, 3.3, 3.2, 4.2, 3.8, 3.8, 3.8)

The sample size here was 11386.  

The figure for Google has declined slightly from the previous 
high point, with slight increases for Yahoo and Microsoft.  

However, the combined share of Yahoo and Microsoft is now well 
under 10% and this time it even measures less than 10% of Google.

No positive result has been recorded for the advertising 
partnership between Yahoo and Microsoft.  If anything, 
Yahoo's market share has declined, with most recent readings 
under 8%, and the last two figures under 6%.
  
Worldwide Search Engines Market Share
======================================

On the 21st September there was a massive surge of hits from 
Germany and the surrounding German-speaking countries.

It turned out that the hits were made by genuine visitors 
to the Bondi Beach Home Page and not by robots or by 
the usual pictures linking of pictures into chat forums.

Over 200 searches for "Bondi Beach" came from Germany in under 
24 hours.  It's safe to presume a programme about Bondi Beach 
was shown on German television.

Checking these searches showed that Microsoft and Yahoo have 
negligible market share in Germany.  This in turn triggered the 
idea of measuring the worldwide share of the various search engines.

Here are some percentage figures for market share round the world.  
The raw data is hits, but each hit must be a search to be counted,
the four percentages following are Google-Yahoo-Microsoft-Others:-

Australia: 90.5, 4.8, 2.6, 2.1
NZ: 96.6, 1.7, 1.1, 0.6
USA: 83.9, 8.5, 4.3, 3.3
Canada: 90.2, 4.3, 3.0, 2.5
Europe (6 larger countries): 92.4, 3.2, 1.8, 2.6
UK: 90.0, 3.9, 3.0, 3.1
Asia (3 larger countries): 90.1, 4.7, 2.1, 3.1
Rest of the world: 88.8, 7.2 , 1.7, 2.3

World totals: Google 88.5, Yahoo 6.1, Microsoft 2.7, Others 2.7.

Whilst the above breakup into regions is a bit rough, 
the trends are quite clear.

Google is more popular outside the USA. Other published 
figures giving Google a lower market share 
and Microsoft a market share of say 8% are always 
from the USA and should be taken with a grain of salt.  
I have never been able to measure any such percentages.

Yahoo is most popular in USA, China, Russia and the UK. The 
Yahoo figure for Australia is a bit low and is being checked. 

Bing from Microsoft has its best market share in the USA, 
and does OK in English speaking countries.
Bing is certainly not popular in Asia or Europe.

Lesser search engines are in serious decline.

Market Share by Continents
==========================

All webmasters need to know roughly where their hits come from, 
so that the content can be tailored to suit the audience.  
I have always assumed a quarter (or even a third) of my hits 
came from within Australia, but this assumption is incorrect.

Australia/NZ/Pacific:  Assumed 25% Actual 9%
USA/Canada:  Assumed 25% Actual 33%
Europe, including UK:  Assumed 25% Actual 24%
Rest of the world (including Asia):  Assumed 25% Actual 34%

The conclusion is that pages need to be built to suit 
overseas visitors rather that Australians, and perhaps 
content can be simpler rather than more dense.  However, 
this does not mean writing about sidewalks and restrooms. 

============================ =============================