Defining the Online Health Consumer

While flawed business, sales, and marketing strategies catalyzed consolidation in the online health sector, consumers' negative attitudes toward shopping online for health-related products further exacerbated downward pressures on companies' bottom lines. Strong consumer relationships between consumers and commercial health sites are hindered by issues of trust and privacy, thereby limiting ad revenue possibilities and rendering most current business models unworkable. Enabling doctor-approved content sites will prove to be the key catalyst for consumers to migrate meaningful health management to the Web.