Online shoppers snapped up bargains, and Web retailers found reason to cheer Monday as traffic to many of the largest shopping Web sites soared 37 percent over last year’s so-called Cyber Monday, says Akamai Technologies, which helps online retailers handle large crowds.
The National Retail Federation says cybermonday.com, a Web site it set up for store promotions, had three times as much traffic the Monday after Thanksgiving as it did last year.
Driving the online push: More than 70% of retailers surveyed by BizRate Research planned to offer Cyber Monday promotions this year, up from 43% last year. There were discounts on products from toys to digital cameras to flat-panel televisions and computers.
So many people rushed to the Web sites for Costco, Toys “R” Us and CompUSA that slowdowns hampered the sites starting Monday morning, says Matt Poepsel, vice president of performance strategies for research firm Gomez. Yahoo’s payment processing for retailers also experienced periodic outages. But unlike last year, when overwhelming traffic shut down sites for Wal-Mart and Amazon, no major outages were reported.
Even with the boost this year, Cyber Monday — started by the retail federation in 2005 as the ceremonial kickoff to the online shopping season — was not likely the biggest shopping day. Internet market research firm ComScore reports that last year Dec. 13 took that honor. Dec. 12 was the busiest in 2005.
Cyber Monday is really just “symbolic,” says Internet Retailer magazine editor Kurt Peters. The notion that people wait until they get to work Monday to shop online “is somewhat outdated, especially given that at least two-thirds of American homes now have broadband Internet access.”
Debbie Virgin Shook of Chicago had never even heard the term “Cyber Monday” until Monday, while listening to a radio promotion. Still, Shook bought several things online, though not at any of…