The 18-34 woman now UK's most prevalent online demographic

The other day on London's Oxford Street , as I was pulled by my fiancee into every clothing store imaginable, I couldn't help but notice that every single one of them dedicated the ground floor to women shoppers. The men's sections were almost always upstairs or downstairs. Mentioning this to my fiancee, she simply stated the obvious - women shop more.

It looks like it's more of the same for online shopping in the UK.nIn a (virtual) world presumably populated exclusively by males, a new study from InternetRetailing.net (excerpt below) reveals that in the UK the 18-34 year old female demographic is now the single most prevalent group online. This group, according to the study, accounts for 18% of all active online Brits; there are 2x as many 18-34 year old women online in the UK than girls under 18 or women over 50, and in comparison the most prevalent male age group online turns out to be those over 50. For every hour spent online in the UK, a woman aged between 18-34 accounts for 13 minutes of that hour. Wow.

My angle on this? Online marketers and retailers are realizing the potential (and if not, should be) of the never-ending shopping quest of the 18-34 year old woman, and the results are looking good. With online shopping now so accessible and clickable, you don't have to be a 14 year old male tech geek to buy online (and feel safe, secure, confident in doing it). What's more, this demographic seems to be taking charge more and growing more confident in their online world, thereby starting a shift in the online marketing and internet landscape that will surely continue to grow. With more statistics becoming available for online advertising and marketing initiatives, 100% gender-based ad serving technology is the next logical step to reach out and interact with these online shoppers.

Article excerpts:

• 18-34 year old women are the single most prevalent demographic group, accounting for 18% of all active online Britons. 18-34 year olds are the most prevalent group, accounting for 32% of all active online Britons.

• The internet isn’t all about the young; one in four Britons online is at least 50 years old - in fact there are 1.7 times more 50+ year olds than children under 18 active on the Internet.

• The UK internet population is split almost equally between males (51.5%) and females (49.5%).

• There are twice as many women aged 18-34 than girls under 18 or women 50+ active online.

• In contrast, amongst males active online, the 50+ age group is the most prevalent; for example, there are twice as many men aged 50+ than boys under 18 active online.

• Women aged 18-34 account for 21% of all time spent on computers by Britons - for every hour Britons spend on computers, 13 minutes are accounted for by 18-34 year old women.

• Under 18s account for just 4% of all UK computer time – or two minutes of every hour Britons spend on computers.