Mexico

There were 27,600,000 internet users in Mexico (representing 24.8% of the population) in September 2009, according to Internet World Stats. This was up by 917.5% since 2000. (Internet World Stats, April 2010)

There were 15.5 million home and work internet users age 15 and older in Mexico in March 2010, an increase of 20% from the previous year, making it one of the fastest-growing markets, according to comScore. Microsoft Sites ranked as the top online property in Mexico reaching more than 90% of the online population, followed by Google Sites, Yahoo! Sites and Facebook.

In March, the average internet visitor in Mexico spent 28 hours online (up 7.5%), consumed 1,898 pages of content (up 18%) and went online 49 times during the month (up 18.6%).

Mexico internet market, March 2010 (Total Mexico Internet Audience, Age 15+ (Home & Work Locations):
- Total unique visitors: 15,462,000 (+20% compared to March 2009) 
- Total visits: 758,923,000 (+42%)
- Average minutes per visitor: 1,687.8 (+7.5%)
- Average pages per visitor: 1.898 (+18%)
- Average visits per visitor: 49.1 (+18.6%)  

Among users age 15+, Microsoft Sites ranked as the top online property in Mexico with 14.3 million visitors, up 29% from the previous year, followed by Google Sites with 14.2 million visitors. Yahoo! Sites grabbed the #3 spot with 9 million visitors, followed by Facebook.com with 8.7 million visitors, more than triple the number of visitors from the previous year, as the social networking site solidified its popularity in the market. Online properties native to Latin America including Mercado Libre (5 million visitors), Batanga (nearly 5 million visitors), and Taringa.net (4.7 million visitors) also ranked among the top ten.

Top internet properties based on unique visitors, March 2010 - total Mexico internet audience, Age 15+ (Home & Work Locations):
Total internet: total audience: 15,462,000 (+20%)
- Microsoft Sites: 14,268,000 (+29%)
- Google Sites: 14,218,000 (+32%)
- Yahoo! Sites: 9,003,000 (+23%)
- Facebook.com: 8,736,000 (+224%)
- Wikimedia Foundation Sites: 7,312,000 (+35%)
- WordPress: 5,222,000 (+45%)
- MercadoLibre: 5,044,000 (-18%)
- Batanga: 4,975,000 (+10%)
- Taringa.net: 4,669,000 (+103%)
- HI5.com: 4,197,000 (+2%)
(comScore, May 2010) 

Mexico's tourism board, the Consejo de Promocion Turistica de Mexico, is collaborating with Latino social network Quepasa Corporation for an online initiative. Quepasa will promote Mexico's tourist destinations via online communities, which will index content related to specific destination and facilitate user interaction via blogs and viral tools.  The two entities will also approach online travel agencies, hotels and airlines with regards to sponsoring a broader viral campaign using the Quepasa Distributed Social Media platform.

John Abbott, CEO of Quepasa believes that the word of mouth nature of their social media platform in combination with content relevant to the North American tourist provides the most effective and authentic solution toward re-establishing Mexico as one of the most attractive tourist destinations in the world. (EyeForTravel, November 2009)