Online shopping increasingly popular in Estonia
According to Statistics Estonia, 88 percent of households and 97 percent of enterprizes in Estonia had Internet access, as of beginning of 2015. The share of people who shop online, is showing a considerable increase.
Compared to the same period of 2014, the share of households with an Internet connection increased by 5 percentage points. Practically all households with children (99 percent) and more than three-quarters of households without children (86 percent) had access to the Internet at home, the statistics company reports.
Households without an Internet connection cited lack of interest (70 percent), lack of skills (25 percent), or high equipment costs (25 percent) as the main reasons for not having Internet at home.
Majority of Estonians still have fixed broadband connection (wired or wireless) at home, although an increasing number of people also use mobile internet.
Polls show that slightly more men than women use Internet, althought the difference is just three percentage points. At the same time, the digital gap between the youngest and the oldest age group decreased from 55 to 46 percent, with 54 percent of the 65-74-year-olds now able to go online.
The most popular online activities are Internet banking services (used by 91 percent), reading newspapers and magazines (91 percent), using e-mail (89 percent) and seeking information about products and services (85 percent).
The share of people who also buy things online, has increased by 10 percentage points in just a year.
The products and services purchased online the most were: travel and accommodation services (60 percent of the users of e-commerce), tickets for concerts, cinema, theatre and other events (57 percent), and clothes or sports equipment (52 percent). It's also noteworthy that 85 percent of people ordered products or services from Estonian sellers, 44 percent from the other EU countries, and 35 percent from other countries.
Although more than three-quarters of enterprises with 10 or more employees have a website which is mainly used for presenting products or services, only 19 percent provide online ordering on their website.
At the same time, the use of social networking sites has become increasingly popular – 31 percent of companies have an account, a user profile, or a user license in social networks like Facebook or LinkedIn, which are used as a marketing channel.
Editor: M. Oll