Weight Loss Injection Search Growth
Early in 2024, our team was doing keyword research around weight loss injections. We were simply looking at some non-brand terms to understand the amount of UK traffic these keywords were driving. As part of this research, we recorded the average monthly search volume for each keyword. When we went back to update our estimates, we saw some truly impressive growth. In the below chart, we have a handful of the keywords we examined and their search numbers.
The number of people searching for these weight loss injection keywords in the UK went up by at least 124%. That is a massive increase considering it has been less than a year.
Turning to branded keywords, If we look at Mounjaro terms there were around 15,000 searches in the UK in December 2023 and by November 2024 there were 450,000 searches for the same keywords.
This makes it clear that weight loss injections are seeing huge growth but we wanted to dig a bit deeper to understand the size of the potential market.
To do this we used data from the Health Survey For England 2022. The government's numbers show that the average BMI of adults in England was 27.6. This is just above the 27 BMI needed to start prescribing Mounjaro or Wegovy to people with weight-related health problems. The numbers also show that 29% of the adult population of the country has a BMI of 30 or over. This is the threshold for prescribing Wegovy or Mounjaro without other health complications. With these numbers and a bit of maths, we can work out that there are approximately 13 million adults in the UK with a BMI over 30.
We also put together the below chart showing the numbers of adults in the top 30 largest cities in the UK with BMIs over 27 and 30.
Knowing that there were 13 million people in England alone with a BMI over 30 and 450,000 monthly searches for Mounjaro in the UK, we can estimate that there is still a large untapped audience of people who could benefit from weight loss injections.
What Products People Are Searching For
The 3 main weight loss injections we are seeing people search for are Mounjaro, Wegovy and Saxenda. Each of these medications receives plenty of attention from users but their numbers do vary.Mounjaro
People searching for the specific term Mounjaro has been on the rise as you can see from our earlier graph. On average this keyword gets around 165,000 searches each month indicating people are very interested in the product.Saxenda
The number of people searching for the specific term Saxenda has been falling since around May of this year. The average number of monthly searches is around 27,000 but with the product search numbers trending lower, this may be a good product to avoid.Wegovy
The number of people searching for the specific term Wegovy remains high with the average number of monthly searches at approximately 90,000. While people are searching for these drugs, some of the more common searches are telling. For example, we can see thousands of searches each month for things like:- How does Wegovy/Mounjaro/Saxenda work?
- What is Wegovy/Mounjaro
- Wegovy/Mounjaro side effects
How You Can Make Money From Weight Loss Injections
We have seen 3 general models for making money on weight loss injections. While there may be others, these 3 are effective if done correctly.Advertising
If you have ever done a search for weight loss injections, you have undoubtedly seen ads from companies like MedExpress, Lloyds and Numan. These companies offer discounts in their ads, have streamlined signups and have worked very hard to build their brand recognition. Many of the better advertisers also have customers sign up for recurring monthly deliveries of their medication rather than requiring them to reorder. The upside of advertising is it produces an instant effect. You will be driving people to your site or pharmacy from day one and these people will be interested in weight loss injections. The downside is cost and limitations from brand recognition. The cost of someone clicking your ad for weight loss injections can be very expensive. We have seen prices above £13 per click. With costs that high, even if you have a 10% conversion rate, that still means you will pay £130 per conversion (if the sale does not result in repeat purchases). That means to keep costs manageable, you need to run a very well-optimised advertising campaign. Advertising also needs to take into account brand recognition which is a bit trickier. We like to explain it to customers using the following example. Imagine you have been walking past the same pharmacy for a few years. You have seen the same people working there day in, day out and you know a few people that use this pharmacy. You would likely feel very comfortable going in and purchasing medication from them. Now imagine you are walking down the same street and someone you don’t know approaches you and tries to sell you a prescription. You definitely won’t feel comfortable making that purchase. If your advertising audience has never heard of you or your site looks a bit dated or just off, people will be far more hesitant to purchase medication from you. To counter this issue, you need to make sure your site looks professional and modern. Then you need to target people across multiple channels so they start to become more familiar with your brand.SEO
SEO has a lower initial cost and once it starts working, it can produce some of the cheapest conversions. By optimising your site for Google and other search engines, you will be able to rank well in the search results and catch people as they begin their buying journey. The upside of SEO is that it costs less than advertising and you are still able to target your local area. For example, it might be really difficult to rank well across the UK for the term “Buy Mounjaro”. However, you can more easily rank for the term “Buy Mounjaro in Sheffield”. This means you can compete for business in your area where it will be easier to rank. The downside of SEO is it does take time. Depending on the investment and competition, it can take between 3 to 6 months before you start to see increases in traffic to your site. The other issue with local SEO is the size of your market. If you are in a very small town, ranking locally might not allow you to reach a large enough audience.