A Holiday for the Internet: Cyber Monday

Cyber Monday, a phrase created by the National Retail Federation's Shop.org online-retail unit in 2005, is the day consumers return to work after the Thanksgiving holiday and start shopping online.

Monday consumers responded enthusiastically to online retailers' promotions setting a record for single-day online retail sales spending $733 million (a 21% gain from last year) according to comScore Inc., a market research company that tracks Internet sales and traffic. Forty-four percent of Internet users shopped online Monday, with 60% of dollars spent online coming from work computers.

The number of Cyber Monday buyers rose 38% from a year ago, although the average amount spent per buyer declined 12%. That decline may be attributed to discounts offered by a number of online retailers, as well as the fact that new buyers tend to spend less online than returning buyers.

Top retail web sites included Amazon.com Inc., Wal-Mart Stores Inc., and Target Corp., to name a few. Click here to view the entire report.