Comments on: Drugstore.com finally is profitable

By: Drugstore.com makes a profit after 10 years –

Drugstore.com makes a profit after 10 years – — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 11:06:28 +0000

[...] for the future of this company, Greg Howlett has some interesting points to make about this on his blog MarketingPilgrim.com, which doesn’t exactly look promising, [...]

By: Dean

Dean — Sun, 16 Mar 2008 13:12:53 +0000

It looks like the online market might be maturing and the cause of their slow growth. Drugstore.com has also been coming out with new products such as toys, food and baby products to expand their market.

Other brick and mortar site like Walmart and Walgreen have a huge advantage in that they can tap into their already large customer base.

By: Jaan Kanellis

Jaan Kanellis — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 18:26:31 +0000

The main reason for the lack of growth is that everyone newscast out there has beaten into our brains that buying any prescrips online is “dangerous”.

By: Greg Howlett

Greg Howlett — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 01:06:46 +0000

To answer the question though, I do not know about their funding.

By: Greg Howlett

Greg Howlett — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 01:05:38 +0000

The problem for the small players are the tight margins. It is hard for them to get products to sell at a reasonable price.

By: Jayson

Jayson — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 05:30:40 +0000

I’d like to know who funds them as well.

I think it’s feasible for the small guys to play with the big boys in certain industries especially if the product/service recognizably has more value.

SlightlyShadySEO brought up the fact that it would be hard for drugstore.com to rank organically for major search phrases which only leaves advertising or word of mouth (but who says I buy these drugs here?) and a need for a large budget. If this was the case, it would be hard to compete with the big boys.

By: Greg Howlett

Greg Howlett — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 19:43:25 +0000

SlightlyShadySEO,

I could not disagree more. Good companies should not build their business around SEO. A strong brand will eventually solve any SEO woes as well as keep a company from being dependent on SEs. Does Amazon really need SEO?

Actually Ty, .1% is a great step for a company that has lost money up until now. Amazon lost money for years but you would not know it now.

By: Ty Brown

Ty Brown — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 18:38:28 +0000

I don’t know that .1% is a step in the right direction. How can this company still be in business? Who is funding them?

By: SlightlyShadySEO

SlightlyShadySEO — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 16:47:07 +0000

I think their doomed long term. Or at least will not be making very much money for a long, long time. The problem is any of the keywords they would profit from, they have a complete inability to rank for(for obvious reasons)…their best bet may be to get the pharmaceutical companies to link to them from their own websites, hopefully boosting them upwards, and getting targeted traffic.
I’m afraid there just might not be room for a legitimate pharmacy right now online. Type in traffic is great, but probably not enough to sustain them.