SmallBusinessNewz

comScore recently released its Q1 2010 U.S. retail e-commerce sales estimates. The firm found that online retail spending neared $34 billion for the quarter, a 10 percent increase compared to last year.

Are you finding new ways to reach customers online? Comment here.

This is the first time growth rates actually reached double-digits since the second quarter of 2008, according to comScore. Take a look at this table of growth rates:

"The first quarter returned the U.S. retail e-commerce market to healthy double-digit growth rates," says comScore chairman Gian Fulgoni. "While these spending gains provide reason for optimism, we should note that upper-income households are currently shouldering much of the growth. Should the economy falter in the second half of the year and upper-income consumers return to a savings mode, we could still see growth decelerate. But for the time being, this momentum is encouraging."

Other highlights among comScore's findings include:

- Growth in the first quarter was predominantly driven by upper-income consumers, with spending among the $100,000+ household income segment up 14 percent.

- Pureplay (online-only) retailers continued to gain e-commerce spending market share from multichannel retailers.

- Larger online retailers continued to generate higher growth rates than smaller retailers, but the smaller retailers are finally beginning to see positive growth once again.

Businesses have more ways than ever to reach consumers online to increase sales, and this only appears to be increasing. Just yesterday Amazon, for example, launched its new WebStore e-commerce product, which lets businesses take advantage of the Amazon platform and design sites around it, while minimizing the Amazon branding itself, but utilizing its trusted checkout process.

Of course Facebook is looking to play an increasingly great role in online shopping. There are already numerous apps catering to this, and Facebook itself is closing in on 500 million users.