Twitter UK Grew 93 Percent in H1 2009

Data released by internet research firm Hitwise show that Twitter's following grew massively in the 12 months to May 2009 becoming the fifth most visited social network in the country.

Twitter is now the 38th most visited website in UK, up from a ranking of 969th. It was also ranked 84th most visited social network (ed: are there really 84 social networking website around?). Traffic to the site grew by more than 2200 percent from May 2008 to May 2009.

Robin Goad, Hitwise's director of research, said in a statement that “Media coverage of the site has escalated significantly this year and high profile celebrity endorsements, by everyone from Stephen Fry to Ashton Kutcher - has occurred during 2009.”

The data set doesn't include figures from peopel who use their Twitter accounts from their mobile phone - like the iPhone - or from third party applications from Twitterdeck.

The site is the 30th biggest source of traffic for other websites in the UK although this depends greatly on the sector. Hitwise also said that Twitter now accounted for one in every 350 visits to a typical website, that's 0.29 percent of the traffic.

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Content providers are the ones benefiting the most from the Twitter tidal wave. Twitpic, the online photo hosting website that accompanies Twiter's rise, is now ranked third in the UK behind Photobucket and Flickr.

Nearly 60 percent of Twitter Traffic goes to content heavy websites like newspapers or televisions. CNN and the BBC for example are the two big media hitters on Twitter. However, only one of every 10 outgoing visits is directed towards retailers.

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