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Vietnamese surf Internet for reading news and chatting
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Yahoo! Vietnam Director Vu Minh Tri announced the survey results.

VietNamNet Bridge – According to a survey released by Yahoo! Vietnam and TNS on April 2, Vietnamese people spend 43 minutes per day and VND174,000 ($10) per month on the Internet. Some 89% use the Internet service for reading news.

According to the survey, 42% of the population in big cities of Vietnam, namely Hanoi, HCM City, Da Nang and Can Tho, had access to the Internet last week, for 43 minutes on average. The time for watching TV has fallen to 233 minutes per day (21% down). The average spending on Internet service is VND174,000 ($10) per month.

Surfing the Internet at home has become a popular trend, with 66% of people interviewed in the last three months saying they surfed the Internet at home. The number of Internet users at café and wifi spots accounted for 53%, mainly teenagers and low-income people.

Up to 90% of surveyed people said they used search engines and read news on the Internet while 73% used chat software and 58% used emails.

Notably, 89% of users read news while 82% used search engines and 67% used entertaining services like music listening, music download and only 4% used banking and shopping services.

This survey was carried out by Yahoo Vietnam and TNS, named Net Index, using direct interviews and questionnaires, with 1,200 people from the age of 15 up in Hanoi, HCM City, Da Nang, and Can Tho in three months, from December 2008 to February 2008.

Yahoo Vietnam’s Director Vu Minh Tri said Vietnam is witnessing the strong development of digital means of media, with 21 million users. This is a big opportunity for Yahoo to develop online advertising.

Yahoo Vietnam predicted that the online advertising market in Vietnam will reach approximately $8 million by 2010, out of the total revenue of nearly $500 million of the Vietnamese advertising market.

VietNamNet/ICTnews