Trinidad & Tobago’s Top 50 Websites

Prompted by a client’s question ‘What are the top websites in the world?’ I took a look a T&T’s top 50 websites, as computed by web-statistics company, Alexa, whose ranking system is based on site visitors and page views.

That Facebook, Google, YouTube, Yahoo and MSN lead the top 50 is expected – they dominate worldwide lists. But Twitter & LinkedIn’s absence from TT’s top 50 list, is unexpected. The lessons learnt:

Sex sells

About year ago, I was proud to learn that my tiny little nation of Trinidad and Tobago was crowned the World’s #1. Yay! I knew we were good at something!

Unfortunately, that ‘something’ turned out to be porn searches. Trinidad and Tobago is the world’s number 1 searcher for the word porn.

Therefore, it should come as no surprise, that 10 out of 50 websites are XXX-related. I’ll let a qualified sociologist determine the exact extent of our moral bankruptcy.

Finally, since we’re always searching for porn, it makes sense that all the search engines rank high – Google (twice), Bing, MyWebSearch, Ask.com and Answers.com

Cars sell

drift11 Following the usual suspects Facebook, YouTube and Google, the very first Trini-centric website, beating out all the TT newspapers is TriniTuner.com (#16). According to the data, people are flocking to the TriniTuner forums.

Tip: As an advertiser, if your audience demographic are college-educated males between 18-24, you would do well to buy ad space at TriniTuner.

Tag, you’re it!

Predictably, Macobook, is ranked #1 in T&T. Despite its best efforts, MySpace (#38), is slowly dying. But Tagged (#11) is an interesting finding, especially as other social networks like LinkedIn, Twitter, Friendster and Hi5 are nowhere to be seen.

Oh! and the essays upons essays I’ve read about Twitter and it’s game-changing, earth-shattering, microblogging effects. But Trinis believe you’ll only hear about breakfast choices and bathroom habits.

Not true – follow industry leaders and you may end up leading an industry yourself.

Tip: If you’re using social networks as a medium for your campaigns – Facebook is a no-brainer. Tagged.com should be high up on your list as well.

Offline rules apply to online

As in life, the Trinidad Express (#17) beats the Trinidad Guardian (#31) to a pulp. Despite the Guardian’s superior newspaper layout, better print quality and vastly superior website.

Tip: If you’re targeting persons 35 and over, women or the educated – advertise with the Trinidad Express.

Shopaholics?

Amazon (#10) and eBay (#20) figure prominently on the list. Do soooo many people have Skyboxes?

Tip: Since we have a clearly established pattern for purchasing online. There’s an opportunity here for a company with a large inventory to step in and sell products online. The trick would be establishing a clearly communicated set of ground rules for credit/debit card processing, memberships & login information, shipping, returns and customer service snafus.