Though the term ‘shopping’ relates more to women, when it comes to shopping on Internet, men are miles ahead. In India, 96 per cent of Internet shoppers are men. Also, in Europe and Asia, more than 70 per cent of Net shoppers are men, a survey said.

In the US and Canada the equal percentage of men and women shop on the Net, a global survey by Cushman and Wakefield said.

In Asia, 26 per cent of Net shoppers do the shopping at workplace, significantly higher than 18 per cent in Europe and 15 per cent in America.

However, the gap between genders below 24 years is much less in Asia, US and Europe, suggesting in future, Internet shopping will be practiced by both sexes more evenly.

In three continents, among the products, book is the most popular one bought on Net, followed by music CDs, software games, hotel bookings, rail/air tickets, gifts (flowers, chocolates), cinema, theatre tickets and computer equipment.

Over a quarter of Asian Net shoppers buy equity shares, bonds compared to only 16 per cent in the US, the survey said.

While music CDs are the most favourite item for age group upto 34 years, or 35 years and above book is the most favoured choice.

Over 46 per cent of Net-shoppers once tried to make purchase but failed to do so.

The percentage is highest in Asia with more that 55 per cent in Singapore, India and Japan talked about failure. Transactional issues and technical problems were the dominant reasons for failure to make purchase.

On advantages of Net-shopping, timing (can shop anytime), convenience, discounts/ attractive prices are cited as the dominant reasons. However, in India, the advantage of "compare and then shop" scored over the discount factor.

And, in the US and Hong Kong the speed of shopping was the third main advantage, the survey said.

Among the net-shoppers, there is a preference for (23 per cent) "clicks and mortar companies" (traditional suppliers, stores who also have Internet operations) over dotcom firms (13 per cent) in all three continents.

However, 64 per cent of shoppers have no such preference, it added.

Net shoppers cited the security of payment issue as a major barrier along with the factor of not being able to feel, touch and try the product.

According to the survey, in all the three continents there has been a clear sign of increasing interest over shopping on Net.