Last year Google integrated tailored health related results into listings to give users specific information about medical conditions quickly. As well as providing a definition, the listings also gave links to a number health related directories, such as WebMD or the search engine’s own directory Google Health. The question at the time however was how Google might make money through online marketing, especially as Google claims to organise content not build it.
Google Health
The answer, nearly 12 months later is a lot clearer. Google have spent a year making sure it’s own health related directory ranks up top by using trusted information from all the medical content listed within the search engine, and now it has done that, it is adding another feather to the Google Health cap; pharmaceutical information. As an already popular place to gather information about a medical condition, Google Health ‘s new offering will make it more attractive to users, where they can view what medication they should be used to treat it, what contraindications medications they have been prescribed for the condition might have; and lo and behold, a sponsored advert placed by pharmaceutical companies and drug stores where the medication can be bought.
Online Marketing
The connection is clearly one of monetary gain for Google though online marketing revenue, despite the fact that a year ago the product manager for Google Health, Roni Zeiger, denied any such correlation. When asked by Search Engine mogul Barry Schwartz about monetization of Google Health, Zeiger told him that it is about getting the answer as quickly as possible to the searcher and that there no current plans or even future plans to add ads to the Google Health property. The new Google Health that has been rolled out in the US is definitely sporting ads by major pharmaceutical companies; and although it is clear Google have been working closely to provide users with medically sound and relevant information in association with the National Institutes of Health; it is also clear that they have found a way to tap into the industry’s $900 million online marketing budget.
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