Consumers turn to online health information

Doctors may not make house calls, but consumers have found a way to get medical information at home. The Internet. According to recent research from comScore, online health information has shown 12% growth in Q1 2007.

by Kristina Knight

More than 55 million visitors logged on to health sites like WebMD between January and March of this year. That is roughly 30% of the entire online audience and a year over year (YoY) increase of 12% from Q1 2006.

"The category is being shaken up by a few upstarts,” said Carolina Petrini, vice president of pharmaceutical solutions at comScore. “In the past year, both Healthline.com and QualityHealth.com have more than doubled their respective online audiences to nearly 3 million visitors per month, becoming major players in the category."

WebMD had the most traffic with 17 million visitors in Q1 (a 25% YoY increase), followed by NIH.gov with 9.8 million visitors (8% YoY increase) and MSN Health with 8 million visitors (1% YoY increase). Healthline.com, ranking 9th on the traffic list, actually showed the most growth (269% YoY), followed by QualityHealth.com with 114% growth YoY.

In addition to large traffic flow, these websites also generate a large amount of loyalty from consumers, making them a good resource for online marketers. With users visiting not once or twice but several times, there is the possibility for multiple exposures to online ads within the site itself. This could increase brand recognition, pushing sales numbers and even creating brand loyalty among this very loyal group of consumers.