The internet emerged in the 1960s but became widely popular in the 1990s with the development of web browsers. Currently, 4.6 billion people worldwide use the internet via smartphones and other devices. Video content is increasingly popular, making up over 80% of internet traffic by 2022, with platforms like YouTube and social media prioritizing short videos. Online shopping has also grown significantly during the pandemic, especially for clothing, groceries, and home goods.
2. A brief history of internet
The internet (called ARPANET) emerged in the 1960s in the United States, during the Cold War, as a way to interconnect communication between
government research centres.
At that time, computers were large, expensive machines exclusively used by military scientists and university staff. In 1990 a British professor
developed a browser, the World Wide Web. From this point on, the 1990s became known as the "internet boom", as it was when it became popular
around the world, with the emergence of new browsers - Internet Explorer, Netscape, Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, Opera, Lynx - and the
increase in the number of users, internet browsers.
Source Cisco (2021)
3. Access to the internet - 2021
7.7 billion people
(Source: worlddometers.info)
4.15 billion
4.66 billion active internet
users worldwide - 59.5 percent
of the global population
4.32 billion 4.2 billion
World Population Active Internet
Users
Active Mobile
Internet Users
Active Social
Media Users
Active Mobile Social
Media Users
Curiosities: Northern Europe ranking first with a 96 percent internet penetration rate among the population; Countries with the highest internet penetration rate
worldwide are the UAE (99%), Denmark (98.1%), and Sweden (98%); At the opposite, North Korea with virtually no online usage penetration among the general
population; 2020 - Asia was the region with the largest number of online users – over 2.5 billion at the latest count. (Source: Statista.com, 2021)
4. Digital Devices
– Audiences in
UK
“Smartphones have pulled away from laptops
to become the most important device used to
access the internet for close to half of those
accessing the internet in the United Kingdom
(UK) in 2020. In 2020, significantly more
people identified smartphones as their most
important device for accessing the internet,
compared with those that nominated each of
the large display formats combined”. (S
O’Dea, Statista 2021)
5. How customer search for
information
Transactional Queries (DO)
When someone is making a specific search
about something he knows that exists
Navigations Queries (GO)
When you are looking for an answer. Usually,
there is not specific source in mind
Informational Queries (KNOW)
An intent to buy. 80% of the search volume
6. What consumers buy online and
trends
Clothes (including
sports), shoes and
accessories
55%
Deliveries from
restaurant, fast-food
chains or catering
services
32% 28% 24% 22%
Furniture, home
accessories or
gardening products
Computers, tablets,
mobile phones or
accessories
Children’s toys or
childcare items
Goods and services ranked by share of individuals who purchased online in Great Britain in 2020, Statista 2021
The influence of COVID-19 in groceries has grown 30% from 2020 to 2021, being alcoholic beverages the most one. Consumers started stockpiling some groceries like hygiene
products. (D. Tighe, Statista 2021)
7. Online video consumption
• A Facebook executive predicted that their platform would be all
video and no text by 2021.
• YouTube is the second most popular website after
Google
• Users view more than 1 billion hours of video each day
on YouTube
• 65% of people use YouTube to help them solve a
problem
• Mobile video consumption rises by 100% every year
• 75% of all video plays are on mobile devices
• People are 1.5 times more likely to watch video on
their mobile phones
• 92% of users watching video on mobile will share it
with others
• 6 out of 10 people would rather watch online videos
than television
• 78% of people watch online videos every week, and
55% view online videos every day
• 72% of customers would rather learn about a product or service by way of
video.
• One million minutes of video crosses the internet every second
• By 2022, online videos will make up more than 82% of all consumer internet
traffic — 15 times higher than it was in 2017
• 81% of businesses use video as a marketing tool — up from 63% over the last
year
Biteable 2021
8. Conclusion - Overview
The internet emerged in 1960 for political purposes, but it was in 1990 that its "boom" occurred, when more people had resources to access it,
triggering the creation of various navigation systems. In the early 2000s, with the growth of online users, the internet came to be overvalued, being
considered a form of status and important to the business world.
The internet was widely used to access chat rooms, download/listen to music, blogs. among others. Currently we are 4.6 billion people using the
internet and we are in the era of social media, prioritizing content in videos. Almost 2 billion users use YouTube, that's about a third of the internet.
An estimated 71% of people watch more videos than a year ago. Without commenting that, with the influence of COVID, we changed our habits and
customs on the internet. The purchase of online products grew exponentially, the most significant being the purchase of clothing in general, with a
growth of 55%. Another significant growth was in the purchase of groceries, which grew around 30% from 2020 to 2021.
To conclude, this era of videos and social media will continue for at least the next 10 years and more and more people will be more connected,
making less use of social life and interaction between people.
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