Growing numbers of African-Americans use the Internet regularly

Growing numbers of African-Americans use the Internet regularly

The racial digital divide is shortening, with an increasing number of African-Americans going online regularly, according to an eMarketer report. The analytics company estimates that more than 19 million African-Americans, or nearly half of the African-American population, uses the Internet at least once per month. It projects that 56% will be online in four years. This is good news for companies, since the African-American population has strong spending power, estimated at $913 billion in 2008 by the Selig Center for Economic Growth. However, African-Americans made fewer online purchases than other minority groups in 2007, according to The Media Audit. Just 20% had purchased five or more items online that year, and less than 11% bought 12 or more items online.