Women More Likely to Choose Pharmacy by Location, Convenience

Sixty-eight percent of women choose a pharmacy based on convenience/location compared with only 48 percent of men, according to the Winter 2009 Ad-ology Media Influence on Consumer Choice survey.

Women prefer to fill prescriptions at a grocery store pharmacy, with over twice as many females as males saying loyalty programs and rewards are very important. Overall, the majority (53 percent) of pharmacy customers still prefer to fill their prescriptions at a drug store vs. at a grocery store or online.

Although most customers prefer to refill prescriptions offline, many are influenced by online content. Nineteen percent say that a store/pharmacy Web site provided “significant” or “some” influence on their choice of which pharmacy to use, with slightly more males than females influenced by store/pharmacy Web sites. Social media was also an influence: positive comments/reviews from other shoppers influenced 20 percent of customers.

“Grocery stores have been successful getting women into their pharmacies,” said C. Lee Smith, president and CEO of Westerville, Ohio-based Ad-ology Research. “There’s opportunity for other pharmacies to attract this demographic by highlighting convenience and their own rewards programs -- especially online.”

Other key findings from the survey:

--In the past year, nearly half of pharmacy customers 65 years old and older initiated a conversation with their doctor about a specific brand of medication
--Out-of-pocket costs, knowledgeable pharmacists and availability of generic medications are the most significant factors when selecting a pharmacy
--Hispanics more than other ethnic groups prefer filling prescriptions at drug stores (72.7 percent)
--Slightly more males than females were influenced by store/pharmacy Web sites
--Of traditional media types, newspapers (21.8 percent) and television (20.1 percent) had the most influence on pharmacy choice

The Media Influence on Consumer Choice survey is conducted quarterly by Ad-ology Research to study on- and off-line media influence on buying decisions.
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