Catalyst online Search Marketing Blog

Catalyst just finished compiling the Q2-2007 SEO Pharma Analysis Report. As you remember we started this analysis last quarter in our Q1-2007 SEO Pharma Analysis Report (see methodology at end of post).

As a reminder, Catalyst (that’s us) is a search marketing agency with pharmaceutical clients. You can find more about What We Do and who Our Clients are by reviewing our website. Several of the companies covered in this analysis report are clients of ours. Several are not. Sometimes one or more of the company’s top five revenue producing brands (see methodology at end of post) included in determining the company’s overall SEO rank are or have been clients of ours. Sometimes none of the top five brands are clients of ours. You get the idea.

We do this analysis because it’s interesting to us. We hope it is interesting to you too. We’re applying basic search marketing analysis to brands that exist in the highly competitive and intensely regulated pharmaceutical industry. If you follow our methodology you just may come up with the exact same results. Then again, because its’s SEO and we’re dealing with the dynamics of search engines, you may produce different results. Welcome to our world. Our goal with this quarterly analysis, as with most SEO campaigns, is to measure which pharma companies obtain valuable marketing real estate and then sustain those rankings over an extended period of time. Here are our Q2-2007 results.

Catalyst Observations:

• Although it appears Novartis is producing superior SEO rankings, keep in mind that a perfect score is a 6.0. There is plenty of SEO opportunity for even the leaders.
• As Boehinger Ingelhem (BI), as a company, exceeded growth expectations, as did its Q2 SEO rankings. BI experienced the greatest leap in SEO rankings from Q1. It will be interesting to see if they will maintain the progress over the next few quarters. From a search perspective it appears they are investing in brands like Flomax to lead their search marketing charge.
• BMS experienced an SEO rankings bump primarily due to their top producing schizophrenia drug, Abilify. We’ll keep an eye on BMS brands to see if they continue progress across the board in their SEO strategy.
• There has been some industry buzz about AstraZeneca refocusing advertising and marketing budgets to the online world. With popular drugs like Nexium and Crestor nearly non-existent from an SEO perspective, we’re glad that they at least acknowledge the internet.
• As for Merck and Wyeth, we just don’t know. Anybody??

As always, please share you comments and observations. We’ll always respond to your questions, concerns and inquiries.

Methodology:
Using the simple, yet time consuming methodology below, gleaned from the most recent publicly available financial information, you too could produce similar results.

1. Data compiled between April 1 and June 30, 2007
2. Examined top 5 brands based on revenue from most recent financial statements provided by each company
3. Searched 4 keyphrases for each brand:”[indication]” and “[indication] treatment” and “[indication] medication” and “[indication] symptoms”
4. Recorded brand’s website rankings per each keyphrase on Google, Yahoo!, MSN and Ask and scored by defined Search Ranking Score (below)
5. Applied the formula Index = (search ranking score*search engine market share)/11
6. A perfect score = 6.0

Search Ranking Score:
Top 5 Rankings = 15
First Page Ranking = 10
Second Page Ranking = 3
Third Page Ranking = 1
Not Listed on First Three Pages = 0