Information Resources Inc's Healthcare Solutions Group, a leading provider of consumer behavior insights to the healthcare industry, today expanded its RxPulse Patient Panel and healthcare analytics portfolio with the availability of RxPulse BehaviorScan Cross-Market.

Upwards of $2.5 billion is spent on Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) pharmaceutical advertising annually, creating the need for tools to measure advertising impact and effectiveness. This in-market advertising testing service provides the healthcare industry with a unique and comprehensive service, helping pharmaceutical marketers quantify the impact of new DTC TV advertising as well as changes to existing advertising spending using a controlled testing environment.

"DTC advertising is playing an increasingly critical role in helping patients address their healthcare needs, but this is an evolving area, with many opportunities for deeper insights," said Steve Johnson, executive vice president and general manager of IRI's Healthcare Solutions Group. "Prescription drug manufacturers are seeking unique and innovative analytic tools to help them manage and measure their advertising effectiveness. RxPulse BehaviorScan Cross-Market brings IRI's industry-recognized proprietary BehaviorScan testing capabilities to the healthcare space, providing completely new visibility into pharmaceutical advertising impact."

BehaviorScan Cross-Market provides a flexible solution to conduct a variety of TV advertising testing, allowing customers to:
-- Evaluate profit impact of major changes in TV advertising strategy, including ad vs. no ad, increased or decreased media spending, new creative or positioning strategies
-- Evaluate integrated media plans combining TV with other marketing vehicles such as newspapers, radio, or direct mail
-- Conduct in-market advertising tests in regional cities, limiting both costs and exposure, without disruption to national plans

IRI's proprietary TV advertising testing system manages advertisement execution on cable and broadcast channels, providing clients with complete control over regional TV advertisement delivery. The service enables clients to test unique TV advertising plans within the selected BehaviorScan test markets. To measure ROI and impact of the advertising test against actual product sales, the service uses both Rx sales data from outside sources and IRI's InfoScan point-of-sale data of related over-the-counter medications as well as other marketing information.