WebProNews

A recent study from comScore on the global traffic to online properties in the U.K. found that online traffic coming from outside the U.K. outnumbered the domestic visitors to the BBC, The Guardian, The Telegraph, The Times and The Daily Mail.

The Daily Mail received the highest proportion of international visitors, with 69 percent of its 7.6 million visitors originating from outside of the U.K. The BBC grabbed 59 percent of its visitors internationally, while the Telegraph (57%) and the Guardian Media Group (56%) also drew more than half of their respective traffic from outside of the U.K.

Just two of the ten sites studied, British Sky Broadcasting and ITV Sites, has less than a quarter of their visitors originate internationally.

"In recent years, U.K. media companies have been able to acquire significant international audiences by leveraging their brands online," said Bob Ivins, EVP of European Markets for comScore.

"The Internet is a truly global medium, allowing consumers to easily access content from anywhere in the world. It is critical that publishers and advertisers understand their global franchise -- not just their U.K. audiences."

A number of U.K. TV news media saw online growth in the past year. BBC Sites, the largest property in the study, grew five percent compared to a year ago to reach almost 46 million global unique visitors in November 2007. ITV Sites gained 37 percent to 7.7 million, and Channel4 increased 28 percent to 5.2 million.

There were also large increases in visitors to a number of online newspaper sites. The DailMail.co.uk jumped 153 percent to 7.6 million visitors and the Telegraph Group increased 129 percent to 6.2 million visitors.