More than half of businesses in Latvia have a website

63.5% of enterprises in Latvia had a website at the beginning 2016, which was 4.5 percentage points more than in 2015. Similarly to previous years, at the beginning of the present year a website was set up by most of the accommodation service and information and communication service providers (95.6% and 93.6%, respectively).

In turn, retail enterprises (48.4%) and enterprises of the transportation and storage sector (42.9%) did not have as many websites, according to information from the Central Statistical Bureau of Latvia.

The availability of a website depends on the size of the enterprise, and it most often set up for large and medium enterprises. At the beginning of 2016, a website was set up by 96.3% of large enterprises, 84.2% of medium enterprises and 58.8 % of small enterprises. Over the past three years, the most rapid increase in the number of websites may be observed in the group of small enterprises – of 8 percentage points.

Most often (60%) enterprises maintain a website in order to ensure access to their product catalogue and price lists – such an option is used by 90.7% of large enterprises, 78.8% of medium enterprises, and 55.7% of small enterprises. In addition, every sixth enterprise offers the possibility to carry out online ordering or reservation. At the beginning of 2016, 18.9 % of enterprises included links to their social media profiles (Facebook, Twitter etc.) on their websites. This was done by 51.4% of large enterprises, 27.7% of medium enterprises, and 16.4 % of small enterprises.

The number of enterprises selling goods or services on the internet is gradually increasing – there were 9.3% of such enterprises in 2013, whereas their share had grown to 10.2% in 2015.

In 2015, goods and services were sold on the internet most frequently by large enterprises (22.8%), however, the largest turnover was recorded among medium enterprises – EUR 1 519 million or 12.7% of the total turnover of enterprises. The respective enterprises operated in the following sectors: repair of computer and communication equipment (54.4%), travel agency, tour operator reservation services (52.6%), and accommodation (47.9%).

The share of enterprises that have made purchases on the internet or other computer networks has almost doubled during a period of five years – reaching 41.1% in 2015. A similar trend may be observed in the breakdown of enterprises by their size – in 2015 online purchases were carried out by 67.0% of large enterprises, 50.8% of medium enterprises and 38.7% of small enterprises. Online purchases were made most frequently by enterprises with the following main kinds of economic activity: repair of computers and communication equipment (88.6%), computer programming, consultancy and provision of information service activities (81.0%), provision of telecommunication activities (74.0%), travel agency, tour operator reservation services and provision of related services (70.4%).

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