Visitors returning to a business-to-consumer e-commerce website are eight times more likely to make an online purchase than new visitors, writes Internet Retailer, citing data from WebSideStory. During the first three months of 2006, repeat visitors had a conversion rate of 12.61 percent, compared with a 1.55 percent conversion rate for new visitors.

In the computers and electronics category, return visitors were almost 16 times more likely to make a purchase than new visitors; the conversion rate was 23.12 percent versus 1.49 percent.

At apparel sites, conversion rates for return visitors (7.56 percent) was only about six times greater than for new visitors (1.37 percent).