social media: how to harness the power of social media in pharmaceutical emarketing (mini)

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Social Media: How To Harness The Power Of Social Media In Pharmaceutical eMarketing Discover how to accelerate your business © Copyright 2014 Eularis All rights reserved. No part of this report may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical or other means, known now or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission from the publishers. While every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy and integrity of material presented, no responsibility or liability can be accepted by the publisher for its completeness or accuracy. The views expressed in this report are not necessarily those of the publisher. For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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Page 1: Social Media:  How To Harness The Power Of Social Media In Pharmaceutical eMarketing (mini)

Social Media: How To Harness The Power Of Social Media In Pharmaceutical eMarketing

Discover how to accelerate your business

© Copyright 2014 Eularis

All rights reserved. No part of this report may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical or other means, known now or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in

any information storage or retrieval system, without permission from the publishers.

While every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy and integrity of material presented, no responsibility or liability can be accepted by the publisher for its completeness or accuracy. The views expressed in this

report are not necessarily those of the publisher.

For the full report, please visit:

www.eularis.com or email us at

[email protected]

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Eularis ©2014 www.eularis.com

Executive Summary

2

This report examines the

Internet for physicians,

patients and Pharma, and

analyzes how the old

marketing strategies must

change to reflect the times

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Executive Summary

For most of us, the Internet is a fact of life. However, we still flounder when it comes to justifying online marketing to both ourselves and our CFOs. We’re still stumped by the ideas of effectively reaching our audience in the vast reaches of the Internet, meeting their needs while also meeting our marketing objectives, and simultaneously being able to measure our success in financial terms rather than simply ‘activity tracking’ for our CFOs. This challenge can be troublesome enough to prompt some companies and marketers to sit it out apart from the obligatory corporate Website, or to half-heartedly engage in some online activities like a product.com Website, some banner ads and blogs and a Facebook page without a real plan to meet the customer and CFO objectives. New initiatives are started and neglected, or focused entirely on the wrong things. As a result, companies miss out. Potential customers - both physicians and patients - don’t get the message, or feel alienated. That’s what can go wrong. It’s the potential of wasted time, money and opportunity. However, what can go right is even more striking. An eMarketing campaign that is built on strategy and a deep knowledge of an audience, whilst firmly keeping the marketing objectives in mind, can be extremely powerful. An eMarketing campaign that effectively uses the Internet as a platform, a ‘jumping off’ point to create value and relationships, and a means to speak specifically to marketers’ targets and create two-way value, is one that can succeed beyond many marketers wildest expectations. How does it work? In this report, we find out. We examine the Internet as it stands today for physicians, patients and Pharma, and analyze how the old marketing strategies must change to reflect the times.

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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Pharma Internet Marketing, Past and

Present

4

Understand how significant ‘e’

is amongst peers &

customers, how it’s used in

healthcare & Pharma, and

what all this means for the

traditional marketing mix

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To start off our discussion of Pharmaceutical Internet marketing on the right note, we need to understand how significant ‘e’ is amongst our peers and customers, how it is used when it comes to health and Pharma, and what all this means for the traditional marketing mix. INTERNET USE TODAY The Internet has continued to expand at an astronomical pace since its inception, and users are increasing every day in every region of the world. Today, with a total estimated world population of over 6.6 billion, an estimated 1.4 billion are on the Internet. This is a 305% growth in users from the year 2000 figures. North America tops the overall penetration figures, with approximately 73% of the population using the Internet. In Europe, 48% of the population is online; within Europe, the countries with the highest penetration are Germany, England, France, Italy and Russia. In Asia, 15% of the population accesses the Internet, with top user countries China, Japan, India, South Korea and Indonesia. Beyond these key Continents, growth is even more pronounced. While only 5% of the population of Africa is online, this represents a 1,031% growth since 2000. Similarly, in the Middle East, a penetration rate of over 21% doesn’t adequately demonstrate the 1,176% growth since 2000. Demographics and descriptions of Internet users vary widely according to region. In the U.S., for example, the average Internet user spends 2.7 hours per day online, according to a survey from the Research, Development and Evaluation Commission. While women make up approximately 51% of the U.S. population, eMarketer estimated women would make up over 52% of Internet users in 2008. The highest proportion of U.S. users comes from the 35-44 age group.

5

Pharma Internet Marketing, Past and Present

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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Pharma Internet Marketing, Past and Present

Activities engaged in on the Web vary widely as technology evolves, but one strong sector is purchasing. Even in a year that saw a fully-fledged recession, the U.S. Department of Commerce said overall online sales would total $137 Billion for 2008. Growth was 7.2% year over year, the first year of single-digit online sales growth since 2000. As a result of the Internet boom and this enormous pool of spenders, companies and advertisers are jumping in. U.S. online advertising spend totaled over $23 Billion in 2008, according to eMarketer, and is projected to grow to $42 Billion by 2013.

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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Building a Trusted Online Pharma

Brand

7

What makes someone

choose one brand over

another?

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Building a Trusted Online Pharmaceutical Brand

Branding is everywhere, and physicians and medical consumers are now faced with more choices than ever before. But what makes someone choose one brand over another? Branding can make things easier for the physician. When faced with many choices, they are more likely to turn to a brand that they know and trust. It serves as something dependable and familiar, saving time and trouble. This means that there is now an even greater need than ever before for companies to create strong brand recognition. Ted Leonhardt of the Leonhardt Group once stated “Branding is an emotional shortcut between a company and its customer”. It is this shortcut that the physician (and medical consumer) is looking for when faced with many choices. This is especially true when marketing Pharmaceuticals as side effects and potentially lethal outcomes make the choice of product even more important than many other product categories.

How do marketers ensure that it is their brand physicians and medical consumers choose repeatedly? By examining the best practices for an effective brand, we can determine how online marketing must be crafted, and how effective online marketing can further create and reinforce this power brand. BRAND MANAGEMENT A brand is not simply the name of a Pharmaceutical product, but rather the value the drug has for physicians and their patients. Brand management can often mean the difference between a successful or unsuccessful venture. However, misconceptions about what branding actually is can stand in the way of effective brand management.

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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Building a Trusted Online Pharmaceutical Brand

The two most common misconceptions about branding are:

(1) Brands and brand images are relevant only when purchase decisions are ‘irrational’ or ‘emotional’. They have nothing to do with markets populated by highly sophisticated and experienced customers, nothing to do with purchase decisions based on benchmarking studies and objective performance data.

Wrong! Any brand that is successful is so because the consumer views it as a promise of receiving a certain type and level of value. This value can be a complex issue and not narrowly defined in terms of quantifiable performance data. Clearly, high-tech and Pharmaceutical brands do clarify exactly what objective (and clinical) performance data is to be expected. However, with most competing Pharmaceutical products, there are usually factors in each drug profile that provide advantages or disadvantages over their competitors – making the product choice not a clear-cut one based on performance data alone. Many ‘emotional’ factors can also be called into play in this arena, making the brand an important part of the overall process. If people know and trust a certain brand name, and it is associated (either quantifiably or emotionally) with high quality clinical data, then it has a strong competitive advantage over unknown brand competitors. No matter how objective physicians like to think they are, there will always be a certain ‘emotional’ bias towards the known branded product. The bottom line is that a rational decision is one based on maximizing value, and value can be based on an objective or subjective decision.

(2) Brand management is best left to the marketing or sales departments; it’s not central to the technical direction of the company. A brand is just a logo, trademark, slogan or ad campaign, and marketing handles those things.

This ignores the fact that the foundation of all marketing is creating and nurturing a promise of value to a customer and delivering that promise. If all functions within an organization are not working together towards the same goal of creating a single promise of value, the customers won’t buy in to the product or brand. This requires much more than an advertising campaign or slogan. Firstly, it requires knowing what to promise to whom, which requires the ability to assess the potential of relevant compounds and anticipate its customers’ needs (before the customers are aware of them). These needs must be fulfilled by everyone involved in the company, as well as the wholesalers and resellers.

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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Where it all began: Websites

10

Does the Website still belong

in a complete eMarketing

strategy?

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Where it all began: Websites

For at least a decade, the Website was the foundation of Internet marketing strategies. It represented the home base, the ‘never closed’ default for consumers to learn about a company’s product, interact with a brand and engage with a company. However, these days, Websites seem to be waning in importance as the core marketing method. The evolution of the Internet to today’s social media world has had far reaching consequences, especially for marketers. New media and new tools have become so powerful and versatile that the role of a static Web page is lessening. Does the Website still belong in a complete eMarketing strategy? The answer is a qualified “Yes”. However, if the Website is simply an online brochure, then its day has come and gone. Today’s Websites must be dynamic, attractive and ever-changing, a source that grows for and with your consumers. In this chapter, we’ll examine what makes this type of Website powerful, and how it can be used in your marketing strategy.

WEBSITES - PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE Over the last decade, many designers, gurus, analysts and marketers have turned many Websites into a mess. Companies are focusing on Flash intros, creating noise and buzz everywhere, with little substance. What gets lost in the shuffle is the site’s purpose, the site’s audience, meeting the audience’s needs, and still meeting the objectives of the eMarketing. As a result, many Websites are worthless. It pays to think about why people seek out Websites today. Visitors are trying to accomplish something that may seem simple but can be very complicated and frustrating. They’re seeking information, education, interaction (and often shopping), given in a respectful, meaningful way. They want value. They often want to make a purchase decision and feel good about that decision. Instead, what they often get is unclear, unorganized and unattractive surfing sources.

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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Where it all began: Websites

When done wrong, using the same tactics and ideas from the last decade, a Website pales next to other marketing efforts, and can even detract from the overall marketing strategy. But when done right, a Website can be an integral component of marketing efforts for a Pharma brand. To do a Website right, some new thinking is needed. Rather than a simple digital collateral piece, a Website should be considered a presentation medium. Conceived this way, the Website becomes a platform, a means to use text and video to present the message that the audience is seeking in a meaningful way. It allows you to tell your story in a way that feels organic, credible and provides value to audiences. ELEMENTS TO PLAN FOR A WEBSITE This idea of the Website as a presentation medium can be taken quite literally, by creating a well-crafted Web video as the primary means of communication on your site. However, the ideology can also apply to any content you choose to put on your site to spread your message. It all comes down to the old maxim, the phrase that has been drilled into our heads for good reason: ‘Content is King’. Without good content, a Website is a waste of space and time. Without good content, presented in a meaningful way for the intended target audience, your chance to effectively communicate with consumers is lost, and your opportunity to stand out from other companies squandered.

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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Where it moved: eDetailing & eLearning

13

In this chapter, we examine

the theory, practice and

future of these two

eMarketing methods for

physicians

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Where it moved: eDetailing & eLearning

In the last decade, Websites were the primary online means of gathering attention from consumers and physicians. However, as the decade progressed and technology evolved, new Internet tools emerged for very specific and necessary marketing functions: reaching physicians and improving operations. eDetailing and eLearning provide Pharma companies brand building through better interactions with physicians, and more educated and organized companies. Today, these tools still represent powerful methods of pushing past today’s sales gridlock and opening up brand new paths and prospects. In this chapter, we examine the theory, practice and future of these two eMarketing methods for physicians.

PART 1: eDETAILING Today’s Pharma environment is characterized by massive marketing effort put behind detailing, but a dramatically less receptive audience. As a means of maximizing sales force efforts, cutting costs and actually reaching physicians, eDetailing is a popular tool. Simply put, eDetailing refers to a method of detailing using digital technology and interaction with the physician, whether it’s remote live discussion with a sales rep, scripted interactions with a Website, Interactive Voice Response phone calls, or an increasing array of other options. eDetailing is designed to educate the physician about products and interact with the physician to answer questions regarding their individual information needs. It can also be used to offer samples, encouraging product usage and increase prescriptions written.

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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Where it moved: eDetailing & eLearning

CHOOSING METRICS AND CALCULATING ROI ROI is crucial for a profitable and effective eDetailing campaign. But what metrics can accurately encapsulate eDetailing’s return on investment? The metrics used in calculating ROI will be directly related to the objectives set by planners and marketers. Some of the most common metrics include: Length of detail Number of details per day Effectiveness of each detail Cost per detail Number of increased prescriptions New prescription market share increase

An example used by us in the past is detailed below: pRx = profit from prescriptions written as the result of eDetailing (could also use revenue) Rx = base line profit i = initial investment in eDetailing technologies n = number of eDetails completed c = cost per eDetail excluding initial investment (pRx – Rx) = a (profit attributed to eDetailing) (i / n) + c = b (actual cost per eDetail) b x n = c (cost of campaign) (a / c) x 100 = %ROI In this example, by measuring the incremental profits from increases in prescriptions written as a result of eDetailing, and then dividing these by the cost of the eDetails added to the development of the program, an ROI figure can be reached.

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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Where it moved: eDetailing & eLearning

PART 2: eLEARNING As Internet technology has evolved, Pharma companies have seized the options presented for marketing. However, they’ve also flocked to new technology that improves organizational operations and better enables companies to serve their customers. eLearning initiatives give remote access to training/certification, collaboration and meetings without the need to devote time to travel or organized classes. Drawn by significant cost savings, enhanced technology and improved effectiveness, companies are discovering the potential uses of eLearning in all areas of operations, including clinical development, regulatory, sales and marketing, and corporate divisions. eLEARNING EXPLAINED Simply put, eLearning is the use of digital technologies to equip employees and customers with up-to-date knowledge quickly and effectively. Building on the concepts of Continuing Medical Education for physicians, and eDetailing as a marketing method to reach physicians, eLearning focuses on training sales reps, clinical trial investigators and staff, regulatory compliance teams, new and current employees, and more.

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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A New Concept for Planning eMarketing

17

We want to move the right

people through to the top to

absolutely rave about the

product

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A New Concept for Planning eMarketing

Imagine you go to a city and everything is booked out – the flight was full, the hotels are full, restaurants are fully booked and you wonder what is going on. I would automatically think there was a big conference or tradeshow of some sort in the city. Maybe something bigger? Possibly a religious gathering? Then when you check into your hotel, you notice that the city seems to be filled with a certain type of person – and they all seem to be on a mission. All around you are thousands of worshippers. You think to yourself, “This was a bad time to visit this city – right in the middle of a religious pilgrimage”. Except... you are in Milwaukee, not Mecca. So what is going on? It feels like you are the only one who is not in the know. The streets are lined with people, flags are flying, the crowd is roaring but it is drowned out by a ‘chucka-chucka’ noise of a helicopter in the background….or is it?

At street level you soon see 50,000 (or more) proud Harleys roaring through the street. On these Harleys are CEOs, employees and long time Harley owners. In addition to them, a further 125,000 people are lining the streets for the Harley party. Fourteen years earlier at this same event, only 28 bikers turned up! What changed? HOG or Harley Owners Group. Fourteen years earlier, Harley was in a financial hole with no advertising, and they set up their first HOG chapter. They used newsletters and club magazines to build their subscriber base. From one chapter, HOG has mushroomed to 940 (and possibly more by the time you read this) chapters around the world. Compare Amazon.com to HOG. I use Amazon. I like Amazon. It is convenient and I can find what I want. Sure, they bug me with offers but that’s okay. I go there to buy books. What is the difference between Amazon and HOG? One is a store, and one is a religion – worshipping Harleys. If the Amazon server is down for a day, that is fine; I can go back the next day.

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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A New Concept for Planning eMarketing

According to RIAA certifications, the following is a list of artists who have the most Gold and Platinum Albums (each album is counted only once even if the album was certified Gold, Platinum, or Multi-Platinum):

1. Elvis Presley (80)

2. Barbra Streisand (46) [the female with the most Multi-Platinum titles]

3. The Beatles (39)

4. The Rolling Stones (38)

5. Neil Diamond (37)

6. Elton John (32)

7. Kenny Rogers/First Edition (28)

8. Frank Sinatra(26)

9. Bob Dylan (28) [two with the Band]

10.Willie Nelson (24)

11.George Strait (24) [all 24 have gone Gold and Platinum]

12.Kiss (23)

13.Rush (22)

14.Alabama (22)

So, with this in mind, let’s look at the elements of a ‘religion’ before I take you back to eMarketing planning for Pharma. Let’s start with pilgrimages…What do they have in common?

1. Queues of people wanting something

2. Groups of people with a leader

3. Mini-buses and transport taking people there

4. Worshipper’ icons

5. Products for sale

6. Rituals

7. Legend and folklore

All of these were at play at the HOG convention in Milwaukee and also at Elvis Presley concerts. Even at Apple for iPod. I was in 3rd Street, Promenade, in Santa Monica, California, wondering why there was such a long queue down the street… It was to enter the Apple store! Every time I have gone past there since then, I have seen that queue. So, what would you rather have? Someone who comes to you to understand your information and go get it when they want and has little or no loyalty to your store? Or would you prefer a worshipper of your product? Let’s look at how this works with a business and then how it can work in an industry like Pharma.

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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Where are we now: Social Media & New Technologies

20

The tactic for advertising

today and tomorrow is social

marketing powered by social

media

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Where are we now: Social Media & New Technologies

We’ve been told that anyone who’s anyone must take advantage of the blogosphere, online social networking, and the ever-multiplying new options and Web 2.0 technology. We’ve been reminded again and again how companies can boost business, brand awareness and the bottom line through social media. But how? And in our world consumed with ROI, how would we even begin to measure our efforts? EVOLUTION: WEB 1.0 TO WEB 2.0 A decade ago, the Internet was ruled by a set of principles and programs that built off traditional business models. Sites were static and advertisers called the shots, not consumers. Size mattered and the Internet was dominated by top Websites measured by ad scoring companies.

Tim O’Reilly, publishing magnate and an instrumental participant in the evolution of the Internet, breaks out the differences between then and now: It is this last comparison that really drives the point home. While the first iteration of the Internet still focused on the traditional concepts of publishing, controlled by a few, the new Internet is about moving control from the hands of the elite into the hands of many.

“Once every hundred years, media changes. The last hundred years have been defined by the mass media. The way to advertise was to get into the mass media and push out your content. In the next hundred years, information won’t be just

pushed out to people, it will be shared among the millions of connections people have. Advertising will change. You will need to get into these connections.” -- Mark Zuckerberg

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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Where are we now: Social Media & New Technologies

Web 2.0, then, is the Internet as a platform rather than a product. It’s characterized by:

SERVICES, NOT SOFTWARE:- Rather than focusing on developing new software and releasing it in a big splash, Web 2.0 is about services and scalability. A service can be rough around the edges and constantly in flux, but gets better the more people use it. In many cases, services can even be free, a major change from the escalating costs of software. LINKS:- Linking is the foundation of the Internet today. Much like synapses form in the brain, with associations getting stronger with repeated links, the web of connections in the Internet grows as a result of collective activity. The Internet improves and becomes more useful as a result. COLLECTIVE INTELLIGENCE:- The Internet grows and evolves as more users participate. The goal of Web 2.0 is to harness this collective intelligence and to make it truly collective. The purpose is not just to reach the centre of the Internet, but also to reach the outer edges; it’s about the long tail, not just the head. USER ENGAGEMENT:- Web 2.0 is based on the notion that users add value. Amazon grew to be the beast it is today because it made user engagement a science, incorporating more user reviews, activity and real time reflection. The model for today’s Internet use is focused on this idea of engaging users for the betterment of the Internet, and for the benefit of individuals.

Web 2.0 has changed the entire philosophy behind the Internet, and usage has exploded as a result. When it comes to thinking about utilizing Web 2.0 for business and advertising, it’s no surprise that the old models do not apply. It’s a new world today. The tactic for advertising today and tomorrow, then, is social marketing powered by social media.

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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Social Media Principles & Building

Communities

23

Take a look at the principles

behind social media and

marketing, and tips for using

these principles of

community in action

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Social Media Principles & Building Communities

In our previous chapter, we described the growth of social marketing and the social media tools that companies are using to create connections and relationships. However, we also noted one fact that can throw many a well-intentioned marketer into cold sweats: Social media is ever-changing. The pace at which new technologies develop and grow is mind-boggling. What’s hot and effective today may grow out of favor in a short time. What was once pronounced to be eternal has faded into oblivion; witness the rise and fall of AOL, Excite and Prodigy as examples. It’s the principles behind these tools, the ideas behind blogs, Facebook, podcasts, text messaging, micro-blogging and more, that are important. The cool tools will evolve, change and disappear, but what is behind them will persevere - principles that are focused on the notion of community.

In the next chapters, we will talk tools, diving into the specific social media that are dominating the marketing scene today. But before we do that, we need to take a step back. We need to emphasize that tools change, but principles stay the same. Let’s take a look at the principles behind social media and marketing, and tips for using these principles of community in action. SOCIAL MEDIA PRINCIPLES Social media is based on the notion of community and relationships. That’s a big change in perspective from traditional marketing techniques. It necessitates a new handbook, a new marketing operating manual. Geoff Livingston, author of ‘Now is Gone’, offers guidance in his writings on the new world of social marketing. He encourages marketers to focus, looking away from the pretty and fun new tools to concentrate on the universal principles behind their usage.

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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Maximizing the Use of Blogs

25

In the last decade, the growth

of blogs has been

astronomical

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Maximizing the Use of Blogs

In the last decade, the growth of blogs has been astronomical. Since 2002, Technorati (http://technorati.com/) has indexed over 133 million new blogs. At the same time, the influence and types of blogs has also exploded. Over 346 million people across the globe read blogs, ranging from personal journals, sources for news, in-depth discussions of certain topics, trend-spotters, and even business analysis. Blogs have become the omnipresent and accepted form of Internet communication. How do blogs fit into today’s business world and, particularly, the prickly world of Pharmaceutical marketing? BLOGS AND BUSINESS Over 77% of active Internet users today read blogs in at least 81 different languages. In a 24 hour period, an average of 900,000 blog posts are created and sent out into the blogosphere. It’s a hustling and bustling world of ideas, conversations, and even marketing.

As we mentioned earlier, a blog is a publishing method that allows the quick, easy addition of new content, usually on a weekly or daily basis. Bloggers can let their readers leave feedback on their posts in the form of comments; these comments often lead to discussions that expand upon the topics raised by the blogger in the original post. In the world of Fortune 500 Companies, 15% maintained some sort of blog as of July 2008. The business world inside and out of this higher echelon is increasingly open to blogging, and excited about the potential blogging holds for marketing products and services. However, there is a catch. Corporate blogs rate low on the scale of consumer trust, with only 16% of online consumers that actually read corporate blogs trusting the information they glean, according to Forrester Research. The blogging world, just like the rest of the social media and networking world that we explore in-depth in later chapters, is fairly insular and protective. No one wants to be sold to, and that goes triple for users engaging in online connection and communication. Bloggers, and even those that read blogs, are highly suspicious of overt selling activity.

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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Maximizing the Use of Blogs

While this could be seen as a major reason to avoid blogging, companies shouldn’t be scared off. The fact is, many companies enter into blogging without a real concept of audience, goals and effective ways to communicate. They do it wrong. Done right, a blog can be a unique and successful way for companies to interact with customers, generate real feedback, and build genuine relationships with physicians and patients… all in a wonderfully cost-effective way. HEALTH AND PHARMA BLOGS For patients, blogs are an ideal way to share experiences and communicate with others going through similar illnesses and hardships. They can be primarily personal, general and information-driven, community creating, and much more. Patient blogs take two basic forms: Several services have popped up recently that host mini-blogs from the bedside. CarePages Inc. provides patients and family members a personal

page (http://m1.2mdn.net/1709265/icontact_interstital.htm?t=10&cT=) through a link from the hospital’s site ; any patient at any hospital can use the site to set up a page that includes a profile, updates, photo gallery and space for notes from family and friends. Patients can be in the hospital for a short time or for long-term. The pages can serve as a way to keep people updated without numerous, and often agonizing, calls and can be kept within a small network or made public to connect with other patients. CarePages has been used by over 1 million families worldwide, and approximately 45,000 patient sites have been created. PatientsLikeMe (http://www.patientslikeme.com/) is a similar site, focused specifically on a few key longer-term diseases. Family and friends, and other patients with similar conditions, can track the clinical progress of patients with Lou Gehrig’s, MS and Parkinson’s.

Then there are blogs created by individuals or groups to serve a wider audience, creating a place for Health Care support, information, story swaps and more. The best of these blogs subscribe to the Healthcare Blogger Code of Ethics, which says bloggers must have clear representation of perspective, confidentiality, disclosure of any commercial vested interest, reliability of information, and courtesy in communication.

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Maximizing the Use of Facebook,

MySpace & LinkedIn

28

With these sites, you and

your company have the

capability to advertise

specifically to your select

target market

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Maximizing the Use of Facebook, MySpace & LinkedIn

Major corporations are flocking to Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/) as a legitimate advertising platform. The same holds true for Facebook’s social media cousins: MySpace (http://www.myspace.com/) and LinkedIn (http:// www.linkedin.com/). Why? No matter if you fully understand social networking or just subscribe to social networking and this powerful trio of sites, a major change is happening that will affect the way all businesses advertise. Facebook, MySpace and LinkedIn are offering the holy grail of marketing – the most targeted, most powerful advertising platforms ever created. With these sites, you and your company have the capability to advertise specifically to your select target market. You can show ads to a specific type of user based on sex, age, education, relationship status, profile keywords, and even political views. It’s the promise of true one-on-one marketing come to life. In this chapter we take a look at this trio.

FACEBOOK Facebook has established itself, in a few short years, as the most popular and social-networking site with the most traffic in the world. Today, Facebook claims over 200 million users and each week a million new members are added in the United States. Globally, which includes people in every continent, including Antarctica, that number jumps to five million each week. In January 2009, nearly 69 million unique visitors found Facebook. Mark Zuckerberg initially founded Facebook in 2004 as a platform for his fellow university students to connect and interact. While younger participants still dominate the site, a large and growing percentage of Facebook users are over the age of 23. In the U.S., users over 26 now make up 45% of the total Facebook population. Recent research indicates that the fastest growth segment is age 35 and over.

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MYSPACE What was once the dominant social media channel has now been eclipsed by Facebook in general membership. My- Space still powers on, however, on the strength of connecting friends and promoting artistic endeavors. In the U.S., MySpace boasts over 76 million members, with a growth rate of 0.8% per month. While Facebook has a significantly larger user base, MySpace maintains an edge with unique visitors and time spent on the site. The average MySpace user now spends 266 minutes (4.4 hours) on the site every month. MySpace says its users spend nearly 100 minutes more per visitor than Facebook. MySpace users span all economic classes, geographic locations and age groups, but tend to show a concentration with the age 16-30 crowd, and a majority of their members are based in the United States. For all types of artists and performers, MySpace has become the default venue for being seen and for reaching fans. Like Facebook, MySpace is a platform that brings people together for conversation and entertainment. A user creates a personal profile, sharing as much information as he or she prefers. .

Maximizing the Use of Facebook, MySpace & LinkedIn

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LINKEDIN Another big player in the social networking world, with name value and increasing membership, is LinkedIn. Carving out a niche as a professional social network, providing a space for job seekers, the happily employed, networking professionals and researchers, LinkedIn presents the business world with some interesting options. For the past several years, LinkedIn has held firm in membership, hovering around the 15 million mark. However, due to a worsening economy and growing unemployment, the site has experienced a recent boost. In March 2009, the site hit 36 million members and is currently adding them at a rate of about one member per second. From about 3.6 million unique monthly visitors in early 2008, the beginning of 2009 saw 7.7 million unique monthly visitors. Compared to Facebook and MySpace, LinkedIn is highly similar in format. Where it differs is in the professional niche, and the very adult membership. Users create a profile that focuses on their employment, past and present. Users can connect with colleagues and friends, and create a staggering amount of 1st, 2nd and 3rd degree contacts. A user with over 100 connections can conceivably be tied to over a million users. With these connections, LinkedIn members can recommend colleagues, request recommendations from employers, maintain a list of professional contacts, seek new sales opportunities, research a potential client and find a job. Just like on Facebook and MySpace, members can join groups, often affiliated around universities, employers and other professional associations. One of the most powerful features of LinkedIn is the ability for members to ask their extended network questions about work topics, and receive some great mentoring in return. The business presence on LinkedIn is primarily brand building in a different way than Facebook and MySpace. While these sites allow businesses to connect with customers, LinkedIn is a wonderful place for businesses and Pharma companies to connect with employees and new recruits. Nearly every Pharma company is represented on LinkedIn, with extensive group pages linking to their talent, new hires, regional connections, and more.

Maximizing the Use of Facebook, MySpace & LinkedIn

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Maximizing the Use of Twitter

32

What’s all the buzz about? Is

Twitter here to stay? Does it

really provide business

opportunity?

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Maximizing the Use of Twitter

Current estimates say that Twitter (http://twitter.com/), the micro-blogging marvel, has a total user count of around 8 million. Every day, up to 10,000 new people join. It’s no wonder that the New York Times calls Twitter “one of the fastest growing phenomenon on the Internet”. What’s all the buzz about? Is Twitter here to stay? Does it really provide business opportunity? In this chapter, we’ll look at the tool, current uses and tips for maximized business use. TWITTER IN ACTION Twitter combines components of blogging, Facebook, and other social media, and condenses it down to a small but potent task. Members post updates (called Tweets) of up to 140 characters as often as they wish. Ostensibly, the updates are to answer one question: “What are you doing?”

Like Facebook and other networks, people can follow each other and their tweets. Like many social media options, participants can reply to tweets and begin a whole new conversation. The result is a constant stream of communication. Twitter started gradually in 2006, and by the start of 2008 had around 500,000 unique monthly visitors. But then… it exploded – by December 2008, Twitter had a total of 4.43 million unique visitors, a growth rate of 752%. The most recent figures from March of 2009 indicate Twitter has again nearly doubled, with 8 million unique visitors. Twitter users are primarily adults and are highly mobile, updating through their laptops, Blackberries, iPhones and other devices. Together, users have created over billions of tweets to date. Many Twitter naysayers contend that the whole exercise is pointless. Isn’t a bit narcissistic and boring to keep everyone apprised of your lunch menu and what’s happening at work?

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TWITTER IN HEALTH CARE AND PHARMA What about physicians? Physicians are an active user group of Twitter, and they’re working to push the boundaries of what to Tweet. Take the February 17th Twitter conversation by surgeons. An Oncological surgery at Henry Ford Hospital was broadcast to the Twitterverse, giving short, real-time updates on the procedure as a learning exercise in removing a kidney tumor without taking out the entire kidney. Doctors, medical students, and the simply curious around the world, tuned in. This type of sharing will undoubtedly increase over time, especially as the medical student population grows increasingly fond of social networking and Twitter. The patients are also using it. Twitter users are finding conversations about drug side effects, clinical trials, approvals and recommendations infinitely easier and more useful through Twitter than many static sites. Countless Twitter conversations on these topics have been documented and recorded. So, the physicians and the patients are using it. What about Pharma? Pharma companies have been hesitant, worried about the unknown. This is probably largely driven by lack of knowledge about it as well as legal and regulatory fears. Nonetheless, some intrepid Pharma companies have ventured into the unknown waters. At the beginning of this year, several key Pharma companies dove into Twitter, setting up corporate accounts with a variety of content: Boehringer Ingelheim (http://twitter.com/Boehringer?page=2) uses a point person, John Pugh, Boehringer’s Director for Global Corporate

Communications/External Communications, to personalize and participate. He posts press releases, links to Internet based information about disease areas, and posts articles he thinks followers might find interesting.

Johnson & Johnson (http://twitter.com/JNJComm) have set up an account focused on personalizing the company and building its reputation. A real company member tweets and interacts with the public on a variety of topics.

AstraZeneca (http://twitter.com/AstraZenecaUS) is focusing on injecting information into the conversation, sending tweets on access programs, Health Care reform and strategy.

Novartis (http://twitter.com/Novartis) tweets from their corporate communications center in Switzerland, and focuses on sending out their existing press releases.

Maximizing the Use of Twitter

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Maximizing the Use of YouTube

35

How can a Pharma company

utilize YouTube to its

advantage, building brands,

increasing awareness, and

ultimately boosting sales?

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Maximizing the Use of YouTube

In the past few years, the Internet has seen a video revolution on the strength of high-speed connections and social networking. In January 2009 alone, Internet viewers watched 14.8 billion online videos, ranging from the silly to the educational, the political to the personal, the unbranded to the branded. YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/) is the king of Internet video: Under its parent company, Google, YouTube holds a nearly 43% market share in online video viewing. It’s also a welcoming environment for all types of viewers and participants, including Pharmaceutical companies and other businesses. How can a Pharma company utilize YouTube to its advantage, building brands, increasing awareness, and ultimately boosting sales? In this chapter, we’ll take a look.

YOUTUBE IN ACTION When a person with the simplest of videography equipment decides to film an office party, a pet’s funny escapades, a live event, or anything they find interesting, YouTube is the place to post it. Videos from sophisticated video equipment, handheld camcorders, or even mobile phones, can be uploaded to YouTube and shared with the entire world. The concept is simple and the response since YouTube’s debut in 2005 has revolutionized the Internet. Today, every type of video can be found on YouTube: Educational films, new and old music videos, movie trailers, behind-the-scenes footage of shows and movies, personal videos from users across the world, commercials, contests and promotions, video blog entries, and much, much more. Anyone with a free account can upload their own videos, to keep private or share with the public, and even create a personal channel that other users can subscribe to. Anyone, with or without an account, can view videos by simply browsing categories or searching for specific items.

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HEALTH USES Patients on YouTube are finding educational clips and videos from hospitals, organizations and other patients, teaching about conditions and treatments. In some cases, patients anxious or curious about screening tests or surgeries can find footage online to show them everything they need to know. Doctors are even offering discounts to patients willing to post this footage, recognizing the immensely powerful educational value inherent. Doctors are also seizing upon YouTube as a means to educate themselves and teach residents, fellows and other staff, as well as alleviate fear of surgery or procedures for their patients. PHARMA USES Several Pharmaceutical companies have also now recognized the potential of YouTube, and organized videos and channels for viewer-focused content. JNJhealth (http://www.youtube.com/user/JNJhealth) is a YouTube channel launched by Johnson & Johnson in 2008. The channel features branded advertisements

and also includes informational videos along key themes, like Obesity, Diabetes, diet and nutrition, Crohn’s Disease, and more. The content is extensive and videos include personal stories, commercials and general education about the conditions. The channel has over 700 subscribers and has garnered over 52,000 views.

Go Insulin (http://www.youtube.com/goinsulin) is a YouTube channel produced by Sanofi-Aventis. It’s an unobtrusively branded site that features videos of patients talking about their experiences with Diabetes and with Insulin treatment. Multiple calls to action exist from the channel page, including options to create a discussion guide to take to your next doctor appointment, and to complete polls that dispel the myths about Insulin. The response has been powerful – the channel has over 220 subscribers and over 64,000 views.

Maximizing the Use of YouTube

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Novartis created a YouTube campaign called FluFlix, in which they asked people to submit videos about what it’s like to have the Flu. They publicized the campaign with example videos, reinforcing the contest rules and the Novartis branding; almost 800,000 people viewed the sample videos. Over 12,000 people viewed the FluFlix channel with entries on YouTube, and the videos continue to circulate (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKVXbanyzOo), get comments and spread the Novartis name. Each winning entry (awarded in different categories) is displayed above a congratulatory comment that includes a link to FluSource.com (http://flusource.com/), the Novartis Flu education site.

Novartis also created a winning campaign for the Excedrin brands with the Excedrin Express Gels $15K Speed Challenge (http://www.youtube.com/excedrinexpressgels). The company challenged users to send in videos of themselves performing “an amazing feat of speed”, focusing attention on the speed with which the gels work. The contest generated 251 user-generated videos, and the winner (with a video showing a hang gliding experiment) received $15,000. The Express Gels channel has over 170,000 views.

Maximizing the Use of YouTube

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Maximizing the Use of Other Social

Media Tools

39

New tools pop up every day,

and will continue to as more

users engage and more

businesses invest

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Maximizing the Use of Other Social Media Tools

Social media is constantly evolving. New tools pop up every day, and will continue to as more users engage and more businesses invest. In the previous chapters, we’ve taken a close look at some of the big players in today’s social media world. In this chapter, we’ll examine other key social media tools to consider in your eMarketing campaign. PODCASTS As Internet speeds have increased, and portable digital music players have exploded, podcasts have become an exciting way to communicate. Podcasts are free collections of audio (or occasionally, video) clips that you can listen to from your browser or download to your computer/portable MP3 Player. Podcasts are, therefore, informative and mobile, working with listeners’ busy schedules and coming to them where they want to listen. According to eMarketer, the number of Internet users who download podcasts is on the rise worldwide.

In 2008, the worldwide average of podcast users hit 48.8%. In the U.S., 29.5% of Internet users downloaded podcasts in 2008, up 15.2% from last year. eMarketer predicts the U.S. podcast audience will grow from 18.5 million in 2007 to 65 million in 2012 - an increase of over 250%. Podcasts can cover every topic imaginable and, therefore, appeal to a wide audience. Users vary along demographic lines, with a sizable market share among 35 to 54 year olds. Many of the top podcasts are in the educational and business genres, appealing to these older, more educated and higher-income consumer segments. Businesses have, therefore, jumped into the podcast world, offering shows that teach, that encourage, that provide entertainment, and that gently brand. National Geographic offers multimedia podcasts featuring the latest nature and science news, photography, audio travel guides, classic video clips, world music coverage and wild animal adventures (http://www.nationalgeographic.com/podcasts/).

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WIKIS As the Internet has evolved over the last decade, so have the rules for creating content. Wikis, named after the Hawaiian term for ‘fast’, take full advantage of this, providing a Website that anyone can edit, at any time. On a public Wiki, anyone can contribute, change or remove content very easily. A private version is usually a password-protected space for teams in a corporate environment. Perhaps the most famous wiki, and the one that makes many companies pause when considering wiki usage, is Wikipedia (http://www.wikipedia.org/), the popular online encyclopedia, with millions of topics and contributing writers. This site demonstrates that wikis take the ideas of social media involvement and content creation further than even blogs. Readers can use wikis as a source of knowledge, but are also empowered to scrutinize information and change what’s “not quite right” easily and on the spot. If someone else disagrees, a change may be rolled back or replaced completely. This idea of ceding complete control, and offering only self-policing based on the honor system and loose confirmations, can scare marketers when thinking about using public wikis. WIDGETS Simply stated, widgets are mini applications that allow users to do a particular thing. They are an icon, image or text with code embedded on the back-end. By clicking or manipulating the widget or gadget in some way, the user is able to interact with the computer or Website, telling it to perform a desired function. Widgets have taken off in recent years as an easy way for users to get common information without constantly visiting a Website or series of Websites. They enhance and simplify the Internet user’s experience. They also make sites more enjoyable and useful – widgets are found on blogs to view most popular posts or most prolific commenters; they’re found on Facebook in the form of all the mini applications created by individuals and companies, and they’re found nearly everywhere else: Stock tickers

Media player buttons

Web browser controls

Email function controls

Social networking sites that enable information sharing

RSS feed icons

Interactive graphs, charts, and other statistical media

Maximizing the Use of Other Social Media Tools

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BOOKMARKING Every Internet browser gives you the ability to bookmark your favorite pages. However, in the age of social media, it’s about sharing information, swapping favorites, and creating discussions about them. Social bookmarking is a way to turn the simple act of creating a bookmark into a social activity. Social bookmarking is a method for Internet users to store, organize, search and manage Web page bookmarks. In a social bookmarking system, users save links to sites and pages that they want to remember and/or share. The bookmarks can be saved privately and shared only with a specified group of people or network, or can be made public. Social bookmark services encourage users to organize bookmarks through tags, metadata that basically involves assigning keywords to each post for easy searching and organization. Tags also include information about the number of users who have bookmarked the pages. Many social bookmarking services provide feeds for their lists of bookmarks, organized by tags, allowing subscribers to receive new bookmarks as they are saved, shared and tagged by other users. As social bookmarking has grown and evolved, services often offer the ability for users to rate and comment on bookmarks, the emailing of bookmarks, and other social network features.

Maximizing the Use of Other Social Media Tools

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Maximizing the Use of Google

43

While other search engines

still exist, Google has

emerged as the giant of

search in the last decade

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Maximizing the Use of Google

While other search engines still exist, Google has emerged as the giant of search in the last decade. Increasingly, Google (http://www.google.com/) is the search engine of choice for individual Internet users, including patients, physicians, businesses and even Pharma. Overall, estimates suggest at least 2 billion searches are conducted daily on Google, and the engine has indexed over one trillion unique URLs. Pharma marketers utilizing the best of today’s Internet are looking to attract users to their Website, blog, and other eMarketing initiatives. So the question becomes this: How, amongst all this online clutter, can someone find you? How can you make sure that those searching on Google will discover you and your Internet content in their search results? Google can be a tremendous asset for Pharma brand building activities, and a means to publicizing social media activities. With a little knowledge, marketers can help themselves by making sure Google can help you. In this chapter, we examine how.

HOW DOES GOOGLE SEARCH? Instrumental to understanding how your Website, blog and other content can be seen in search engine results is first understanding how Google works. In the few milliseconds it takes for your Google results to appear, a number of things happen behind the scenes:

Crawling. The Googlebot is the engine’s ‘spider’, crawling across the Internet to fetch the results you most need. Except crawling isn’t really what it does: The Googlebot connects to Internet servers around the world, asking them to return a specified Internet page. The spider then scans that page for links, which provide new documents to fetch. The spider gives each retrieved page a number so it can refer easily to its search results. Indexing. If Google just stopped at crawling, your search results would be slow and very unhelpful. Without an index, the Google servers would have to read the complete text of every document to find the search term, whether it’s ‘Pharma’, ‘nursing’, or ‘medications for Irritable Bowel Syndrome’.

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So Google creates an index, ‘inverting’ the crawl data. Rather than scanning for each word in each document, they juggle their data to list every document that contains a certain word. ‘Medications’ might occur in documents 3, 8, 16 and 78 among the search results; ‘Irritable Bowel Syndrome’ might occur in 5, 8, 16 and 79. Google can then identify that pages 8 and 16 contain both terms. Once they build their index, Google ranks the documents to determine how relevant they are. Google uses several factors in ranking, evaluating how many links there are to a specific Internet page from other pages, the quality of the linking sites, the proximity of the search terms to each other in the document, the title of the document, and more. They score each aspect to determine the ultimate page rank. Once all this is complete, Google takes the documents with the highest scores and places them first in the search results you see on your screen. There are several key takeaways from this background, information that is important to understanding how your page will rank. First, the presence of links on your page as well as the source of those links, is critical to where your site appears on Google results. Also, the keywords on your Internet pages are important, as is the placement of these keywords. Keywords are the search terms people use to find your site, words that describe your brand and customer needs. Keywords can be singular words, phrases, or other options, and can vary in popularity. We’ll talk more about keywords in the next sections.

Maximizing the Use of Google

Why is page rank so important? Consider the searches that you conduct on a daily basis. Depending on the keywords you use, your search results can number in the thousands or even millions. Invariably, you will look at the first few pages, the first 30 or so results, and call it a day.

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Tying it all together: Social Media & Business

46

Where do you begin, and how

does all this come together

into any semblance of an

organized campaign?

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Tying it all together: Social Media & Business

Reading about all these social media tools can threaten to overwhelm marketers. Where do you begin, and how does all this come together into any semblance of an organized campaign? In an upcoming chapter, we’ll talk specifics about how to get started with social media and social marketing. But first, we’ll discuss a few case studies of organizations that have done it, that have incorporated a variety of techniques and tools into a comprehensive and coherent campaign. And they’ve found success in the process. FUSION OF ELEMENTS The companies and organizations that successfully blend social media tools towards a business or other objective are those that think in terms of fusion. Successfully building a brand, generating interest and new customers, or reaching another major goal, involves combining new tools with traditional marketing environments and welding online components into a whole that’s greater than its parts.

Marketers that work towards this can ultimately create exponential increases in brand recognition, leads, word-of-mouth and sales, leaps that could not come from one single social media or other tool by itself. The trick is to understanding how to maximize the individual elements alone and determine how they can interact with others. How does Twitter work best and how could its strengths mesh well with email marketing? How does a blog integrate well with Facebook? How can all the disparate pieces fuse into a powerful movement forward? The key is to think at all times of what you are trying to achieve and what your customers want, while always measuring results and modifying efforts accordingly. To illustrate how this can work, we first examine a shining example from the non-Pharma world: The successful U.S. Presidential Campaign for Barack Obama.

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Main hurdles for Social Media & how to

overcome them

48

What challenges do we face

in Social Media, and how do

we overcome these?

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Main hurdles for Social Media & how to overcome them

The key issues for Pharma can be divided into three main areas. Let’s look at each of these in turn. CORPORATE/ENTERPRISE This can be divided into three key areas: IT, Marketing and Executives. IT One issue for IT is the fact that we have no control of the software or servers and it doesn’t comply with the enterprise standards. Some of the issues are lack of experience with the new media and no ownership or power to drive the business. The IT teams are used to being the experts in knowing the infrastructure and options, and implementing IT rather than strategizing what to do (which is the job of the marketing team). IT teams need to change the way they view things and move from an enterprise standards implementation model to becoming experts in the different social media models, and how they work best so they can guide and recommend practical considerations in this arena also.

Marketing One of the key issues we see here is understanding how social media fits in with the rest of marketing, how and where to use it, how to integrate it effectively. Also, of course, how to measure the results and know how to allocate budget across traditional and social media, and within these, for the best bottom line results for the brand. Marketers are also very aware of the regulatory team and how they often put a stop to many activities out of fear of going against the code. They are not sure who owns it and sometimes ask – can’t IT just do it? They also often don’t know where to start. The real issues here are that they are unfamiliar with the social media around, having a lack of exposure to them, since they have always used traditional activities and are often stuck in that mentality. Also, the majority of medical communications agencies have come from a traditional background and are struggling to understand these media; many marketers have an over-reliance on their agencies to guide them. The other issues are that they don’t know where to start or how to justify the spend.

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The marketing teams need to begin to understand social media to some degree and can rely on internal experts to guide them. These could be the eMarketing Department or the IT Departments – both of which need to get up to speed on these areas very quickly. The marketers should be able to have discussions with these teams on the objectives they want to achieve and brainstorm these with the internal experts to see what options make most sense to achieve their objectives. Also, they need to ensure that financial impact of these activities (and their traditional activities) is carefully measured and the results feed back into the activities. This, and how to do this, is discussed in more detail in Chapter 18.

Main hurdles for Social Media & how to overcome them

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Getting started with Social Media &

Web 2.0

51

In a climate such as this, the

time is perfect to dive into

inexpensive and effective

social media

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Getting started with Social Media & Web 2.0

As this report is written, the world is facing a disastrous economic environment. It’s forcing companies the world over to focus and rethink strategies, and do it within smaller budgets. In a climate such as this, the time is perfect to dive into inexpensive and effective social media. But how? In our previous chapters, we’ve shown the basics of social media, the principles behind its usage, and dove deep into specific tools. We’ve also talked measurement and case studies. After all this information, we now need to bring it down to the steps you need to take to get started. In this chapter, we’ll look at the best ways to begin your social media marketing campaign. PERSPECTIVE Social media tools are cool. They’re ‘hip’ and ‘hot’, and everyone is talking about them. That’s wonderful, but it’s easy to lose sight of your focus when you’re excited about new gadgets and neat tricks.

Remember – always - that social media methods serve a distinct purpose for you and your brand. They are a tool, a means for social marketing, a way for you to build your brand, provide value for your customers, build strong two-way relationships, market your brand, and create more sales. Ultimately, social media is a technique for you to extend your marketing power. To get started with social media, then, we need to return to our conversation on overall strategy. Remember why you’re embarking on this social media adventure. Remember what you’re trying to achieve, and what you hope to gain. Remember – always - your purpose, and your social media activities will remain useful, powerful, and an activity in growth. By keeping the focus clear on your eMarketing campaign, each of the key steps below will fall into place naturally.

For the full report, please visit: www.eularis.com or email us at [email protected]

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Measurement of your eMarketing Campaign

53

It is not only possible but also

necessary to ensure actual

brand building and ultimate

bottom line results

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Measurement of your eMarketing Campaign

After creating the strategy, choosing tools and learning from others to maximize your eMarketing campaign, measurement looms. Just as with any marketing campaign, social media efforts must be gauged for their effectiveness in meeting the objectives set, and judged by financial and intangible ROI. However, with social media, this is sometimes challenging. A perception that businesses will be hard pressed to measure results may be the single biggest reason why people hesitate when it comes to using social media. Measurement is possible, just as it is with other supposedly difficult-to-measure, traditional media, such as PR. It is not only possible but also necessary to ensure actual brand building and ultimate bottom line results. It starts from your strategy, where you decided what you hoped to achieve. It develops from your campaign choices, and it ultimately can help you determine your next steps.

When facing down the seemingly impossible task of measuring social media campaigns, some perspective is needed. First, remember all that hard work you put in to develop a strategy? All the thinking and planning to determine what you were hoping to achieve and how to achieve it? That work has guided your campaign strategy, and now it will guide your measurement strategy. You determined that your most important goal was increasing customer trials, or improving brand advocacy, increasing market share, or some other target. If you know what you’re looking to do, if you’ve put in the work to plan your goals, if you know what business outcomes you’re seeking – you can measure impact. Of course, there are still challenges posed by measuring social media. Everyone wants simple metrics that will tell the whole story. Figures that will make the C-Suite sit up and notice, and thank you for a job well done. They also want clear figures that point towards what is working and what isn’t. Tracking in the usual ways can leave out a significant portion of the activity taking place, and neglect to provide insight into bottom line impact.

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However, you CAN measure the overall impact of the channel itself on your brand’s bottom line results. We will get into this later in this chapter after examining some of the basic metrics currently used. As we mentioned in Chapter 2, an online strategy may revolve around or at least involve several main goals: a. Market expansion b. Increased brand awareness c. Improved reputation d. Personal development e. Relationships with benefits f. Generating leads/gaining trial g. Driving sales, market share and profit To measure these, you need the right metrics. To find the right metrics for social media, you first need to choose a measurement approach. What approach will you take? What methods will you use? How can you even start?

Measurement of your eMarketing Campaign

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Conclusions

56

The need for a strong, well

planned Internet marketing

strategy

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THE FUTURE OF SOCIAL MEDIA The environment for Big Pharma today is tough. Competitive threats are all around, ever-present; the public and physician community are increasingly hostile, and figures across the board indicate the time to panic. That’s why the need for a strong, well planned Internet marketing strategy is so profound. With a carefully planned eMarketing strategy, and cost-effective tactics that promise surprising value, companies can find ways to connect with customers and the public, build their brands and sales, and improve the future. What works in Internet marketing? Creating a plan built on clear objectives and targets. Understanding the essential differences in the Internet as it exists today versus a decade ago. Internalizing the principles necessary for today’s social media dominated Internet, and working towards creating community and relationships. Observing how companies in all industries use key social media tools like blogs, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, podcasts, social bookmarking and Google. Knowing the first steps to take for a cohesive action plan. Finally, learning the key to meaningful measurement. In short, companies that are willing to take some chances in a deliberate way that is planned in accordance with sensible marketing principles, while taking heed of how social media marketing is done, are those primed to find success.

Conclusions

The future of the tools we will use in the future on the Internet is uncertain. They will continue to evolve. Just as the initial beginnings of the Internet have evolved to today’s Web 2.0 tools, so the evolution will continue in future years. However, with the planning framework and principles marketers learn in this report, companies can be poised to take on the future with confidence.

For the full report, please visit:

www.eularis.com or email

[email protected]

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