Use of the Internet

Toronto -- Analysis on a recent Angus Reid Group poll is the first to chart the fastest growing phenomenon in the world of communications: the Internet

In the first definitive findings of its kind to date, the poll, which involved telephone interviews with a staggering 5,256 Canadian adults, indicates that 17% of the Canadian adult population or 3.4 million Canadians have access to the Internet from home, work, school or some public facility such as a library or community centre, of which 6% - or approximately 1.3 million Canadian adults - currently surf the Internet from within their homes.

This national Angus Reid Poll was conducted by the Angus Reid Group's Information Technology & Telecommunications division as part of its ongoing research data bank. The poll was undertaken by telephone between February 15 to 27, 1995 among a representative cross-section of 5,256 Canadian adults and then re-confirmed and explored in detail by research undertaken with 1,503 Canadians between May 15th and June 4th, 1995. The data has been analysed over the past three months and recently expanded upon by the Angus Reid Group's Information Technology & Telecommunications department.

Other findings from this benchmark poll indicated the following:

• nearly three quarters (74%) of users are male and more than half of them are less than 35 years old
• almost half the Internet users have a university degree and approximately one-in-five has a post-graduate degree
• over one quarter )27% of users earn over $80,000 per year compared to just 111% of non-Internet users. In fact, where 20% of non-users make over $65,000 per year, almost half (43%) of Internet users earn that much

An sure sign of how quickly a household adopts new technologies such as the Internet is to identify how much gadgetry they have in their home. For example:

• 80% of all Internet users have a personal computer at home compared to just 41% of Canadians in general
• while it is obvious that one cannot access the Net without a modem, this fact is further supported by the finding that 37% of users have at least a modem at home which 63% have a fax/modem at home, whereas the numbers for household modem incidence among non-Internet users are 12% for modems alone 165 for fax or fax/modems.
• other huge discrepancies between users and non-users exist in CD player ownership (74% for users versus 15% for non-users), voice-mail service (35% versus 11%), and PDA or personal digital assistant incidence (35% versus 13%).

The media has paid great attention to this exciting new media and to its potential to reshape our world. At this moment, Canada has yet to reach a point where everyone has both access to and use of the Internet. Consequently, companies considering marketing and communications on the Net should be aware of its current limited penetration. At the same time, it is very clear that this niche medium has a strong foothold in Canadian society and has the potential to become as prevalent a medium as television, radio and print.

The findings indicate that the Internet represents a strong niche market, presently confined to highly educated, high income, males under 35 years old. The potential for marketing on the Net then lies in how quickly it grows from a niche to a mainstream market, a question the Angus Reid Group will be tracking and reporting over time.

If you would like more information about any of our internet research, or either of the 1995 or 1996 studies entitile Canadians And The Internet, or if you would like to subscribe to the new study please contact:

Anu Bhalla
Business Development Manager

610 - 160 Bloor Street East
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
M4W 1B9
Tel: 16 24 2900
Fax: 416 324 2865