Search continues to grow as an online channel and as the biggest source of traffic to websites in the UK we thought it would be a good idea to encapsulate some of the cool search stats that we use on a daily basis into an infographic. Check out my efforts below with search according to Experian Hitwise: You can read more about the most recent search stats in our monthly search press release or you can follow us on Twitter for the latest trends and data.

Love is in the air with Romeos seeking out their Juliets and declaring their passion for one another. Valentine's Day is also a huge commercial opportunity and as brands go into romantic marketing overdrive, I thought we would look at some of the more interesting online trends around Valentine's Day: 1. 6.7 million UK Internet visits were made to Flowers & Gifts shopping category last week )week ending 11 February 2011(.

UK Internet users made 2.3 billion visits to search engines in January 2012, up from 2.2 billion in January 2011. Visits to search engines are up by 4.5 per cent year-on-year with nearly 100 million more visits in January this year than last year. Google remained the steadfast market leader with over 90 per cent market share of UK search. In our latest search engine analysis Google Sites accounted for 90.64 per cent of all searches conducted in the UK in January 2012.

With the Facebook IPO announced yesterday interest has surged in the world's most popular social network. Here are the top 10 things you need to know about Facebook: 1. There are over 1.3 billion visits to Facebook a month from the UK Internet population - making Facebook the second most visited website in the UK after Google. 2. 1 in every 6 page views in the UK is to a Facebook page. The social network accounted for 15% of all UK Internet page views in December 2011. 3.

This week we released our quarterly Hot Shops List in association with IMRG which saw Apple become the second biggest online retailer in the UK for the first time ever. Since its inception in 2006 the top of the Hot Shops List has been dominated by Amazon UK and Argos. A number of retailers have .

Yesterday )5 December(, millions of consumers went online for Cyber Monday to do their Christmas shopping. We predicted last week that there would be 85 million visits to online retail websites on Cyber Monday and yesterday we monitored 84.6 million visits, 18% up on last year's figure of 72 million visits. In total, 14 million hours were spent shopping online by UK Internet users yesterday, spending an average of 10 minutes per visit to each retail website.

It's December and as people crack open the first windows on their Advent calendars we thought we would make some predictions for Christmas 2011. In true festive fashion we've plumped for the 12 Insights of Christmas, and not a gold ring or partridge in sight. The 12 Insights of Christmas 2011 1. This December 350 million hours will be spent shopping online by the UK Internet population.

We're quite excited here in the Hitwise office and not just because it's nearly Christmas. We're always looking to improve our core product and make the data we supply accessible and easy to understand. We have some really exciting developments in the pipeline which are going to change the look and feel of Hitwise dramatically, but today I wanted to introduce our new Dashboards 2.0 product.

Today we released the twelfth issue of the Experian Hitwise Financial Services Quarterly report, which looks at the top online trends in the finance and insurance markets. It's amazing to think that the report is three years old, and to highlight some of the insight that the report provides our clients every quarter I've dug out some of the findings from the Motor Insurance section. Motor insurance is by far the biggest type of insurance that is searched for online,

The Experian Hitwise quarterly Automotive review is now three issues old! The report takes into account the latest trends in manufacturers, dealerships, classifieds and motor insurance online. This quarter KIA was the fastest mover in our Automotive Brand Index thanks to the launch of the new KIA Rio.

Earlier this week Zoopla and Digital Property Group announced a merger which will bring together the collective online strength of Zoopla, FindaProperty and Primelocation. The deal will create a new consolidated force in the online property market to take on Rightmove. Currently Rightmove is the lone dominant brand in the online property space, accounting for almost 29% of all visits to property websites from UK Internet users. FindaProperty,

With kids going back to school next week parents have been searching and shopping online to get their children clothed and equipped for the new term. Looking at all searches for back to school terms last week, the indications are that this year will be a record breaking year for online sales in this period.

After three nights of unrest in London and other cities, the UK Internet population has been tracking the progress of the London riots by visiting News and Media sites and Twitter. The News and Media category saw its highest spike in visits so far this year, with a 14% increase in UK Internet visits between Monday 7 August and Tuesday 8 August. Within the News and Media category, the BBC has been the biggest recipient of traffic,

For most of us, Christmas is still a long way off and something that can be happily ignored until December, but for marketers and retailers Christmas planning sessions are already in full swing. Two of the biggest products which are going to be filling stockings this Christmas are Apple's iPad and Amazon's Kindle. We've blogged previously about the Kindle and how it dominates the ebook space,

YouTube had its biggest ever month of traffic in July, accounting for 1 in every 35 UK Internet visits during the month. The video site recorded its best ever performance in the Hitwise Social Networking and Forums category in July, in part due to strong growth of visits to YouTube from mobile devices. YouTube accounted for 22.54% of all visits to social networks in July, making it the fastest growing social network in the UK for the fifth consecutive month.

This week news emerged of a digital merger between online printers PhotoBox and personalised card company Moonpig.com with the latter being acquired for £120 million. Moonpig.com has carved a niche for itself in the online card industry, as the number one website in its category it receives nearly 11% of all visits to Flowers and Gifts websites. Not only is Moonpig.com the number one website in Flowers and Gifts, it is also the 90th biggest online retailer in the UK.

Series 7 of The Apprentice draws to a close on Sunday 17 July with the much anticipated interview round, where the final four candidates will be grilled by Lord Sugar's toughest interview panel yet. If popular opinion is anything to go by, then the UK Internet population want Tom Pellereau to win. Looking at the top search terms driving traffic to the BBC Apprentice website over the last 12 weeks,

Each month here at Hitwise we look at the top players in the search and social markets and benchmark the top websites against each other. Google has been dominant in the UK search market for many years now but in June 2011 Google Sites achieved an unprecedented 92% market share of all searches conducted by UK Internet users. What's interesting is that although Google is increasing its dominance within search,