While real estate, finance, and mainstream media (especially print vehicles) are struggling, the online channel continues to grow. Recent data from Nielsen Online show just how robust online is, even in the challenging economic situation. Some highlights:

• The average American surfed 2,554 pages and 111 domains in March 2009.
• Users averaged 2 online sessions per day and spent 56 seconds on each page. Total all that up, that’s about 39 hours on average spent online, or more than 1.3 hours per day.
• Google dominated. More than 137 million home and work internet users visited at least one Google-owned site or launched a Google-owned application during the month.
• Yahoo! and Facebook dominated time per person, as shown in the chart below.

Google also announced that its business model is surprisingly resilient, given the economic downturn.

In a related post, Mitch Joel of TwistImage asks:

Do you find it weird that some companies still question the audience and strength of the online channel?

Mitch hits the nail on the head with his reference to “audience.” Online isn’t a medium — it’s an audience, and a rapidly growing audience, surging both in size and devotion.

Yes, I find it very weird that companies of all sorts, but especially publishers, continue to pursue print strategies without complementary online strategies. It’s a jarring shift, but that’s where the audience is headed — to disposable print, social-content online, and mobile computing.

The numbers don’t lie.