Holiday Search: A Recipe For Couch-Potatoes

Art imitates life, and vice versa, they say. But in the 21st Century, search behavior may be a better mirror. In the weeks leading up to Thanksgiving - the face-stuffinest holiday - and to Black Friday - the shoppinest one - searches are what you might expect: all pumpkin pie and Playstations. Hitwise drops us a line to say that visits to websites in the Food and Beverage category, which includes recipe sites, increased by 17.5 percent the week ending November 18, compared to data taken a year ago. That week in 2005 belonged to the recipe search, jumping nearly 66 percent, with a strange tilt toward the butternut squash. This year, the most popular recipe-related searches centered on things you can do with Jack-o-lantern guts. Last week, [pumpkin pie recipe], [pecan pie recipe], [pumpkin cheesecake recipe], [pumpkin roll recipe], and [sweet potato pie recipe]. AllRecipes.com, an example of straightforwardness in Web address, controlled this niche, scooping in almost 37 percent of traffic from those terms. Food Network was a far second, pulling in 13.1 percent, followed by Kraft Foods with 8.2 percent. So, what's everybody doing after riding the Type 2 Train on the Diabetes Express? Oooh! Oooh! I know! (raising my hand) "They go jogging!" Sorry, no. If they manage to get their hands on one, they'll be ogling a Playstation 3. While retail visits are up seven percent overall, searches for [playstation 3] spiked 112 percent over the previous week. Together, the Playstation 3 and the Nintendo Wii control 40 percent of product-related searches leading to the Shopping and Classified sites. We saw this last year with the Xmas-box 360, sending eBay prices into the thousands. You can buy a PS3 now for just $4,000. Or you can, like the rest of us playing the poor-man's console, spend up to $600 for the Wii. Tag: Add to Del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit | Furl Bookmark Murdok: