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Hitwise Intelligence - Heather Hopkins - North America

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Google Health Launched

May 28, 2008

In January, we predicted that one of Google's next moves would be to launch Google Health and last week, our prediction proved correct.

We made this prediction based on analysis of Google.com's clickstream traffic. Our thinking was that Google might want to fill natural gaps in its portfolio of offerings based on the interests of its users. We looked at which categories are receiving the most traffic from Google in which Google does not have its own property. Entertainment - Games and Health and Medical topped the list. Last week, Google sent 2.93% of its own traffic to websites in the Health and Medical category.

The Health & Medical category is rapidly growing with visits up 31% year on year to 1.09% of all US Internet visits last week. The top Health & Medical sub-category is Information, accounting for 40% of category visits. Google Health falls into this sub-category and to give you an idea of who Google Health will be up against, the following are the top 10 sites in that category last week.
Google Health.png

Google faces stiff competition for attention in this space but their offering is a bit different than the leaders listed in this ranking. We will continue to watch for announcements for a virtual world to fill that other gap (Entertainment - Games) in Google's clickstream.

Posted by Heather Hopkins at 09:02 AM | (1) | (0)
In Categories Health & Medical