Subservientchicken.com - corporate promotions mean clicks in US

Along with the familiar internet giants, some lesser known sites have made it onto comScore Media Metrix's ranking of top web properties for April 2004.

Online promotions proved big winners. Burger King's SubservientChicken.com saw nearly 1.5 million users during the month. The site is part of a campaign that features a person in a full chicken suit dancing around a living room.

Also, General Mills' 'Box Tops for Education' promotion contributed to a 37 per cent traffic increase to the food manufacturer's sites.

NationalGeographic.com was the top-gaining property, seeing an 86 per cent increase in unique visitors from March to April. The site received attention for articles on near-Earth meteors and this summer's arrival of cicadas.

Craigslist.org, a grassroots community and classified site, garnered mainstream attention. It came in at number 10 on the top-gaining sites with a 29 per cent rise in visitors.

Started by one man, Craig Newmark, in San Francisco in 1995, Craigslist now offers location-specific sites for 35 cities in the US, Canada and the UK. It's working on an additional 30 sites, which will include international locations such as Amsterdam, Bangalore, Paris and Sydney.

As for the top 50 US online properties, online ad company Gorilla Nation Media came in at number 21 with 17.2 million unique visitors. Weatherbug.com, where users can download free software that delivers local weather reports to desktops, ranked at number 38.

A dating site, Tickle.com, appeared at number 32, proving the continued popularity of social networking services. IRS.gov squeaked in at number 48 - not generally what you'd think of as a page turner but the ranking makes sense given that 15 April is the deadline for filing income tax in the US.

The top five spots were filled by the usual suspects - Yahoo!, Time Warner, MSN/Microsoft, Google and eBay - which saw no change from March to April.

The site of CNET Networks, the publisher of silicon.com, came in at number 12.