Financial Performance Scorecard, Third Quarter 2003: Continuing Growth With Growing Disparity

Despite its sixth straight quarter of revenue growth, the Outsell 100 Company MonitorSM is starting to show an uneven performance landscape. This Briefing identifies the current winners and losers among the 100 information content companies whose performance the Outsell 100SM tracks. Three of the top 10 spots were taken by newcomers to the Outsell 100: FindWhat.com, Bankrate.com and eCollege.com. The analysis clearly shows deepening disparities in company performance: Median growth was 8.2 percent for the third quarter, as contrasted with the overall growth rate of 6.3 percent; the top 10 companies grew at a sizzling 30.4 percent in the third quarter; and the 10 largest companies, the inner circle of the old information industry, mustered only 3.3 percent growth in the third quarter. The Briefing also analyzes the Outsell 100 by segment, with General Aggregators, Distributors & Services and Education & Training leading all other segments in growth by a 2:1 ratio. A chart shows the alignment of the Outsell 100 with predictions from our annual Outlook 2004 Briefing. For commercial content vendors, this Briefing provides essential benchmarks and financial trends information going into what we expect to be a year of growth and creativity.