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What to Put on the Church Internet Web Site
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Users of the Internet

One of the biggest mistakes in developing a church/ministry web site is not focusing the web site on a particular group of people. This can be corrected by emphasis on maybe "The Golden Years", social security group, men, women, youth, recently married, or divorce recovery or a specialty of the church with people in the know.

As we have already seen, is the web site for local use or developing a church/ministry mission on the internet?

Web demographics are very important in understanding who is using the web and how often. Sounding like the United State Census Bureau, one must consider age, income, occupation, family size, and status. While many of the census bureau's files are on a fee subscription basis, others are free for the downloading (reading and printing in Acrobat Reader format as "Portable Document Files (PDF)". Some U.S. Census Bureau -- http://www.census.gov/prod/www/titles.html -- pages are free for downloading and use. Sections covering general population, population estimates, and population special topics are extremely useful.

  • Listed below are some links to recent statistics on web demographics:

    WHO USES THE INTERNET?

    • 80 million American families are connected to the Internet (that's 42% of the overall U.S. population -- will be 52% in 2002.)
    • The Web is gaining about 1.6 million new users per month - 23% of current users first began accessing in 1997
    • 67% of users are male, 33% are female
    • 60% of surfers are over 35
    • 54% have a college or advanced degree
    • 48% have household incomes over $50,000.00 per year
    • Over 1/3 say they use the Web instead of watching TV
    • Over 23 million people access the Internet from more than one location
    • The average user surfs the Net for 9.8 hours per week
    • There were 8.7 million online buyers in the 3rd quarter of 1997 - their projected spending is $7 billion online annually
    • Over 40% of users report spending over $100.00 in purchases on the Web in the past 6 months
    • Browser popularity: Netscape: 81.13% ( most popular browser in Europe and Asia.), Microsoft: 12.13%, AOL: 2.48%, All Others: 3.92%
    • Europe growing faster than the United States. 98% of Singapore on T1 line at government expense, because of selling in World Commerce.
    • Sources for the above: IntelliQuest Survey, November 18, 1997 (Has been updated from articles in USA Today.)

    • Excite Sells Out!
      http://www.netins.net/showcase/phdss/search/news/excite.htm
    • Demographics and Behavior of the Chilean Internet Population
      http://www.ascusc.org/jcmc/vol3/issue1/mendoza.html
    • Behind the Cybermeals Deals
      http://www.idg.net/idg_frames/english/content.cgi?vc=docid_9-60324.html
    • The Business Case: Microsoft Has Muscle, But Car War Is Tough
      http://www.internetworld.com/print/1998/07/27/ecomm/19980727-carwar.html
    • No Privacy on the Net
      http://www.idg.net/idg_frames/english/content.cgi?vc=docid_9-57964.html

    • Number of web pages
    • Mid 1997 - 125 million
    • November 1997 - 200 million
    • March 1998 - between 275 million and 320 million *High estimate from NEC researchers
    • Source: Alta Vista

    • Growth of the Internet
    • Internet traffic is doubling every 100 days, resulting in an annual growth rate of more than 700 percent.
    • The number of Internet users soared to more than 100 million in 1997 from 3 million in 1993
    • Business-to-business transactions on the Internet could surpass $300 billion by 2002
    • By the end of 1997, 10 million people in the United States and Canada had purchased something on the Web, up from 7.4 million six months earlier
    • Sixteen percent of all new car and truck buyers used the Internet as part of their shopping process in 1997. That figure will grow to 21 percent by 2000
    • Source: U.S. Commerce Department

    • My points to consider after viewing a number of articles
      • Web Demographics -- based on wealth, culture, loneliness, and accessibility.
      • Students, teachers, faculty of educational institutions, home schooling.
      • Teenagers using e-mail.
      • Government and military personnel
      • Library Users -- 37% go to use computers (only 35% go to read or check out books, 2% don't know why they go to the library.)
      • Merchants -- copy companies, Mail boxes, Internet Cafes
      • Portable computers by salesmen in Hotels, Airports
      • Leasure and vacationers use e-mail for checking messages.
      • Large companies and research facilities
      • Affluent households -- phone lines, cable TV modem boxes, and 18" satellite dishes
      • age group
      • browser type
    • Send comments and suggestions to: webminister@webminister.com