Browser Statistics: Firefox is getting more popular

When you design a webpage, you should not only optimize it for Internet Explorer. Although it is still the most popular web browser, Firefox is getting more and more popular, especially in Europe, and amongst the techie and Macintosh users.

Check out the statistics below, which I obtained from http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.asp, you can see the total market share of Internet Explorer has decreased while the market share of Firefox has increased. The share of Internet Explorer has dropped from 85% in 2002 to below 60% in 2006.

Actually, when looking at the browser used to surf my blog (see chart below, results are in %, up to Nov 2006), it shows a similar trend. You might find an even higher percentage of people using Firefox here as many of my visitors (like you) are techie or e-marketers which are the population more likely to use Firefox.

FireFox has tabbed browsers, advanced bookmark manager system, live bookmarks, and higher security. It is small, fast and easy to use. Moreover, Firefox blocks pop-up and is not Active-X friendly, so spyware and adware will not be installed automatically when you visited certain website. These might lead to its growing popularity while IE is more vulnerable to various security concerns.

Click the download icon on the right panel to download FireFox with Google Toolbar. You will love Firefox once you tried it! It is a much better browser than IE. Try it for a week and be sure to share your experience with me!

Using Google Toolbar with FireFox gives you the following advantages:

1) Enhanced search box - give you suggestions, spelling correction and search history as your type
2) Safe Browsing - Give you warning for webpage that might be unsafe to browse

3) SpellCheck - Check your spelling whenever you type in web forms

4) Autofill - Automatically fill out forms for faster online shopping

5) Subscribe RSS feed with just one click

6) PageRank Display - tell you how Google's algorithms assess the importance of the page you're viewing. I would say this is a very useful feature for e-marketers. You should always check the Pagerank for your site.

Many more features for you to discover. A tool should not be missed. I personally love it! If you are not using it now, try it out today!