Catlin Renaud, Research Analyst, Palio

Marketers have long used consumer insight to guide decisions and strategy. Today, getting information about consumer attitudes, buying habits, preferences, trends and opinions is as easy as following a Tweet stream or collection of Facebook postings, right?

Not so fast. With the abundance of information available today it’s hard to distinguish critical data from noise. Before using social data to redefine your brand or offering, you need to take a step back and “look under the hood.”

Not everything that gets posted is accurate. Because of its immediacy, social media can become a platform for fleeting thoughts rather than well-thought out ideas. Someone writing that your new applicator is difficult to use may not follow up later with a positive post after they complete the learning curve. This makes this kind of data unreliable.

It’s easy to miss information. There’s so much activity on the social networks – in May, Twitter reached more than 4,000 Tweets per second at the beginning and end of President Obama’s speech – that you’re likely to miss critical information, even with rigorous monitoring. This makes your data incomplete.

Recognizing trends can be difficult because of skewed data and missing information. It also can be difficult because social media is still relatively new and companies are unsure of what to measure.

Listening in on customers via social media helps companies identify what people are saying about their products and services, but it’s important to validate the data before acting on it. By separating valid, actionable data from noise, companies can use this real-time feedback as the ultimate weapon in redefining their brand, products or services.

When thinking about social data and brand strategy, consider the following:

Size matters. The bigger your fan base, the more likely you’ll be able to raise awareness of your company or product and increase interactivity among consumers. Be sure to also look beyond size and at volume to identify frequent posters or tweeters. Encouraging either is likely to benefit your brand.

Follow your information. Want to know if your message resonates with your audience? Watch where it goes; is it being retweeted? Are bloggers linking back to your content? By understanding where your information is shared, you can further refine your messages and ensure you’re tapping into the interests of your buyers.

Don’t get hung up on time spent. Does it really matter how much time someone spends on your blog or Website? To a degree, yes, but that metric as a reflection of your popularity is flawed and hard to validate. How many times have you left a browser window open and walked away? Instead, monitor what people do when they interact with your brand. Look at activity and focus on where they came from, what they do when they arrive or why they came in the first place. This kind of feedback will tell you more about your target than your brand, which enables you to craft a strategy that aligns with their interests or requirements.

By listening to what people are saying, and validating what you hear, companies can get a better understanding of their buying audience and create a meaningful strategy that drives results.

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Jeremy Lichtenberger, Senior Brand Planner, Palio

When Sally Field took the stage to accept her second Oscar award she exclaimed, “You like me. You really like me.”

The desire to be liked hasn’t changed over time, but how we express our approval has evolved. Liking is now an active expression of sharing, and we’re doing it through social media, whether that’s actually hitting the “like” icon on Facebook or retweeting a message on Twitter.

There has been a lot of focus on accumulating or generating likes, but social media is growing up. It’s time to move onto the next phase: deepening relationships and increasing engagement.

According to eMarketer:

Research has shown that people who voluntarily click the “like” button are apt to recommend the brand to friends and may also be more willing to purchase the brand. But at the same time, the simplicity of the “like” button means that there may be no actual engagement beyond the fleeting moment of the click.

Getting beyond likes is less about making impressions and more about generating expressions. As author and researcher Brian Solis says, it’s about loyalty, advocacy, and engagement. His advice:  Spend less time on superficial interactions and more time cultivating value.

To do that:

Understand what your customers want. Know their preferences, challenges and what they’re expecting. Then, deliver on it.

Go where they go. Remember that your Website or fan page is just a starting point. You need to interact with consumers outside your own house. That means participating in other communities to extend your reach.

Be responsive. Acknowledge positive feedback but also be proactive when negativity surfaces. Demonstrate that you value customer input in both words and actions.

Be authentic. People expect personality, whether that’s through brand messages or the ambassadors that carry the message. Stay away from scripted copy and humanize interactions as much as possible.

Foster ongoing interactions. Give people a reason to come back to your site, page or tweet stream. Whether that’s sharing content, asking for feedback, providing a coupon or creating an application or game, they need to know there’s something in it for them to continue the relationship.

If you want to keep people engaged, the focus should be on staying connected while serving as a resource to your target audience. Businesses want customer loyalty and customers want brands that deliver on (or exceed) their expectations.

If you want to retain your social media fan base and get customers to stick around longer, stop talking, start listening and focus on building great relationships.

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Steve Dubansky, M.D., SVP, Medical Director, Palio

Rather than explain inverse proportionality mathematically, you can simply visualize in the above equation that when “P” increases, “V” decreases, and vice versa. If that still isn’t clear, try these:

1. Usefulness is inversely proportional to its reputation for being useful.
2. Car size is inversely proportional to the intelligence of its owner.
3. The severity of an itch is inversely proportional to your ability top reach it.
4. The availability of a ballpoint pen is inversely proportional to how badly it is needed
5. In political debate, heat is inversely proportional to knowledge.

But is this true:

“PUBLIC SAFETY IS INVERSELY PROPORTIONAL TO THE MARKETING OF DRUGS” ?

That is, is there an inverse relationship between the aggressiveness of pharma marketing and the health of the general public? In a recent thought-provoking article by Drs. Brody and Light in the American Journal of Public Health, the author posit that increased and aggressive marketing of pharmaceuticals may help undermine the general public’s health.¹

While agreeing that not all marketing of prescription drugs is bad for public health, Brody and Light attempt to make the case that the benefit:harm ratio is decreased as pharma marketing becomes more aggressive and less supervised. They believe that if pharma companies marketed their products in an evidence-based manner, there would be fewer negative effects on individual and public health. They state, “Unfortunately, with such a small percentage of the population eligible to receive the drug, an evidence-based strategy yields low sales, much to the chagrin of the shareholders.”

The marketing measures they believe responsible for more patients getting unnecessary and less-than-carefully-proven medications are:

1. Reducing the thresholds for diagnosing diseases. For example, despite evidence that maintaining strict glucose levels doesn’t benefit most patients, guidelines have continued to lower the glucose level necessary for diagnosing diabetes. This lowered threshold raises the number of patients needed to treat (NNT), and many patients are unnecessarily exposed to the risks of a drug they may well not need.
2. Using surrogate endpoints rather than patient-oriented outcomes. Generally, using surrogate endpoints increases the NNT for preventing hard (patient-based) outcomes. “More prevention is better than less prevention” may not be true in regard to surrogate endpoints isolated from real outcomes. The authors conclude, “Drug manufacturers sometimes find it more advantageous to market the test that measures the surrogate endpoints rather than the drug itself.”
3. Exaggerating safety claims. An example is the professed improved safety profile of newer antipsychotics in the elderly – a claim that has proven untrue. Another example: with the presumed safety of SSRIs, patients with very mild depression are given drugs that previously would not have been prescribed for their degree of illness, drugs that they do not need but may well give them side effects.
4. Creating new diseases. They offer prediabetes, prehypertension, and osteopenia – three “diseases” where treatment may be of no benefit but of some unnecessary harm.
5. Exaggerating efficacy claims. They give as a cautionary example the selective COX-2 inhibitor group of NSAIDs, which, despite performing no better than older NSAIDs, had tremendous uptake due to “massive marketing to physicians and the public,” assuring both groups these drugs were more effective and even safer than standard NSAIDs. Then there was a push to recommend them for prevention of colon polyps. At about that time the increased cardiovascular risks became so obvious that one of these inhibitors – rofecoxib – was removed from the market.
6. Encouraging unapproved uses. Since this practice is illegal, it’s only when a company is fined for off-label marketing that we become aware of it. Recent examples are gabapentin and olanzapine, but there are many others. A 2003 report showed 60% of antipsychotic prescriptions were off label, and 75% of all off-label prescriptions generally lack evidence of benefit.²

The authors raise some thought-provoking issues for modern pharma companies and their promotional partners to consider. The relevance of their concerns can be debated, but the fact remains: drugs can be dangerous. Prescription drugs annually appear to cause about 46 million adverse reactions, 2.2 million hospitalizations, and 111,000 deaths annually in the United States alone.³ On the other hand, during 20 years of practicing oncology, I and my colleagues often reminded ourselves and our patients that the only thing worse than the side effects of chemotherapy was no chemotherapy when patients needed it. That’s the key: for patients who need the drugs, drugs can be life changing and life saving.

We in pharmaceutical promotions must aid the FDA in “helping” the pharma manufacturers police themselves, and, to paraphrase Abraham Lincoln, to behave according to the better angels of their nature. The public health demands that of us.

References:

1. Brody H and Light DW. Am J Public Health. The inverse benefit law: how drug marketing undermines patient safety and public health. 2011; Mar;101(3):399-404.
2. Stafford RS. Regulating off-label drug use-rethinking the role of the FDA. N Engl J Med. 2008; 358(14):1427-1429.
3. Light DW, ed. The Risks of Prescription Drugs. New York, NY: Columbia University

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Gillian Slattery, Interactive Producer, Palio

Everyone seems enamored with Google’s foray into social media, Google+, a social platform that enables users to segment followers and friends in circles and promises a richer social media experience. Unlike current online social models such as Facebook and Twitter, users can easily tailor messages for specific segments, resulting in greater control of their social networking participation. Google+ also incorporates video conference technology, enabling people to create “hangouts” using their webcam to chat with up to 10 members of their circles. And, it integrates a variety of online resources – RSS feeds, blogs, Google Reader, email, etc. – into a single interface.

Online enthusiasts and techno-geeks have embraced the new service in droves – Google+ has about 4.5 million users so far – and the service is still in beta. While I can respect that a beta version of anything needs to work through the kinks, I’m not yet sold on the value of this new platform.

Sure, people are snatching up invites as quickly as they’re made available, but that may be indicative of human nature’s need to access and try anything new. If it doesn’t deliver a better experience, users are going to stick with what they know. Tech writer Robert Scoble has praised Google+, yet he admits that it’s not likely to gain widespread adoption and doubts your mom will move from Facebook to Google+.

Several prominent technology pundits have professed their abandonment of other social platforms, but that may not be the smartest move for most people. Here’s why:

Your friends are not yet on it. Unless you work in or have friends with a deep love of technology, chances are they haven’t heard of this new service or they don’t see the reason to try it. Not everyone jumps to the next new shiny object. And, if your friends and colleagues aren’t on it, what’s the point? Even if they are, you may already be using LinkedIn for work, Facebook for friends and Twitter to blend the two. Do you really need another social network?

Control is subjective. Yes, you can control who you share content with, but you can’t edit the title and comments of videos and links that you post on Google+. On Facebook, you get much more control of how content is presented.

Video chat isn’t for everyone. If you work at home or “socialize” online in the evenings, you may not be camera-ready. Does your boss really need to see you in your bunny pajamas at two in the afternoon? While Google is pushing this as a revolutionary advantage, group chat is a bit reminiscent of 1992 and the option of adding a video component doesn’t make it more appealing.

Having everything in one place isn’t always a good idea. Sure, it’s convenient to have centralized access to all your information, but do you really want a single service knowing who you chat with, what you’re searching for and everything you deem sharable? Plus, in the event of a disaster, is it prudent to keep everything in one place?

You give up your right to ownership. Facebook has gotten a bad rap for using user-generated content, but if you’ve read Google+’s fine print, you know you’re selling your soul. Google owns the right to everything you post and has the ability to redistribute it as it sees fit. So, if you’re a budding photographer, you may not want to post your original images because once you do, they belong to Google, violating any copyright hold you may have on them (and thus limiting your ability to profit from content you share).

Maybe I don’t like Google+ because it’s the new kid or maybe because I’m not suffering from Facebook fatigue. While I’m dabbling around and still learning the nuances of Google+, I’m not yet ready to abandon the investment I’ve made in other social platforms.

Have you tried Google+? Will it be a category killer or go the way of Google Wave?

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Mary Kate Hallahan, VP, Human Resources, Palio

Rudeness and incivility have pervaded the modern workforce and its effect is proving costly to morale, productivity and turnover in most companies in the healthcare industry. Beyond rudeness and incivility, we don’t hear a lot about bullying at work, yet 35 percent of the U.S. workforce reports being bullied on the job.

On NBC’s The Apprentice, Meatloaf’s colossal meltdown illustrates the epitome of impossibly bad behavior in the workplace and shows such as Hell’s Kitchen seem to glorify it, but this type of drama goes beyond reality TV. Are people watching this type of rudeness and bullying in the evening and then bringing it to the workplace the next day?

Incivility is infusing many corporate cultures, and as employees are stressed and overburdened, this type of behavior is becoming the norm, not the exception. Even worse, when incivility is demonstrated or condoned by leadership, it can paralyze productivity and transcend to customers, suppliers and even potential job candidates.

While some people are comfortable confronting bad behavior, others feel powerless and “just take it.” In many settings, organizational ombudsmen provide a resource for employees to discuss their grievances and help employees resolve conflict and controversy. Others are taking workplace issues public, venting on social networks such as Facebook and Twitter and on online communities such as Workrant, Jobitorial, Glassdoor, Criticant and Café Pharma.

While viral venting can release stress for workers, detrimental comments about a supervisor or workplace can have a negative impact on organizational performance and profitability. When grievances are aired publicly, it can also damage corporate reputation. Conflicts at work aren’t going to go away, but organizations need to put processes in place to foster a more collegial environment that supports collaboration and a strong sense of community and work to eradicate incivility. This can include mentoring, company-sponsored volunteer initiatives, and recognition programs – anything that will enhance communication and keep employees focused on working toward a common goal. Companies should also implement social media policies that address parameters for employees using social media to complain about their workplace, bosses or coworkers. This way, should employees want to vent online, they understand the company’s position in advance and can adhere to the guidelines.

There are costs to incivility. Managers who spend time dealing with drama are less able to lead and innovate. Skilled employees, whether victimized or observers, are likely to leave in pursuit of a more positive workplace.  Employees should be allowed to discuss their grievances, but if they’re bullying and beating down coworker morale, there should be consequences.

Organizational support and good colleague relationships not only influence performance and retention, but can result in better care. If organizations want to foster a healthy work environment, disruptive behavior cannot prevail. By checking drama at the door, organizations can improve care delivery, career satisfaction and enable employees to perform to the best of their ability each and every day.

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Michael Smith, Digital Strategist, Palio

Have you ever played Round Robin? Round Robin tale telling is a collaborative creation of a story where individuals each contribute a small part to drive the plot forward. Social media is similar in that plenty of people participate, and at any given moment each participant can affect a story’s outcome.

Businesses have always used words and pictures to tell their story, but – outside of marketing research initiatives like focus groups or surveys – information flowed in one direction, from companies to consumers. Today, stories are told from multiple perspectives using various mediums and reach a wider audience.

Getting people to communicate passionately about your business – whether that’s a new treatment therapy, technique, hospital or physician’s office or pharmaceutical product – can create engagement and interaction among individuals, increase customer or patient loyalty and impact the bottom line. Not taking advantage of the art of storytbuilding and effectively crowdsourcing your message is a missed opportunity because of the sheer volume of people interacting on social networks.

In this Harvard Business Review article, Coca-Cola’s Joe Tripodi advises companies to not fight this wave of expression and accept that consumers can generate more messages than you ever could. With changes to Facebook rules, it’s time to accept that everyone really is empowered to tell part of your story. Rather than fighting to control the message, it’s time to figure out how to influence it or take advantage of it.

People love telling stories – the nutrition major talking about a hands-on learning experience at Lowell General or the patient who blogged about bad hospital food – and they love sharing them. Stories are like puzzles, and there is no puzzle if your pieces aren’t matching.

How do you help your fans and customers put the pieces of the story puzzle together?

Make your best information inherently shareable and granular. That means more than just a row of social media sharing icons on your company blog – it means breaking your information up into smaller pieces that can be repurposed by your fans and customers. Not many people want to share a 10-page white paper, but a tip of the day? A contest that rewards social linking? A build-your-own video microsite that stars users – and your product? Those are going to get more traffic.

Stories can – and should – be told across channels and even across products. Using print ads to drive traffic to your website? Welcome to 1995! Today, savvy marketers are building defined-path stories and messages that still start from a common channel, but increasingly the best ROI is coming from stories that can be joined from a range of channels and followed across whatever media the user happens to feel like jumping to next.

Quit trying to own the whole narrative and be happy with own the Dramatic Opening and the Big Finish. All stories have an arc, and 1.0 marketers – those same folks stuck in 1995 – often try too hard to own the whole arc. Instead, look for opportunities to launch stories with a dramatic opening and let users and fans guide themselves (and their network) to a big finish that drives home your key messages.

Of course, not every twist and turn will be positive. Negative feedback is par for the course with social interaction. There may be times marketing needs to intervene, which is why social media monitoring is so important, but there also may be times when your customers and fans will do that for you. You may choose to wait and see if your network of fans and friends comes to your defense and perpetuates the happy ending of your story. And when they do? Be sure to acknowledge their contribution. They’ll know they’re being heard, respected and valued, enabling you to continue building the loyalty you’ve worked so hard to create.

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Andy Smith, EVP, General Manager, Director of Global Operations, Palio

Are you familiar with NBC’s “The More You Know” public service announcements? The long-running campaign has been used to raise awareness of social issues and to move viewers to action. As social media becomes ubiquitous inside corporate walls, many organizations are embracing internal social networks – either proprietary communities or using platforms such as Yammer – similarly for employees, keeping them up-to-date with business activity, discussing ideas and fostering a stronger sense of community.

Social technologies, including wikis, forums or suggestion boxes in the form of blogs or message boards, provide employees with the opportunity to share and build on ideas in a collaborative arena that has visibility across the organization. This can make employees more knowledgeable, more connected and have a positive influence on business results. It can also shed light on where expertise is in the company and eliminates the boundaries of physical location.

By embracing internal social networks and encouraging employees to use these technologies to communicate, employees can participate in broader discussion of company goals, beyond their department or facility, and share ideas across many levels – beyond their department or senior leadership.

Naysayers may claim “I don’t need another network to check!” or “I don’t want to see pictures of colleagues attending the recent team-building event or read another status update,” but the reality is, the more employees know and can collaborate, the more likely innovation will occur.

Some people will take to internal social networks like a fish to water, but as with all new technologies, there’s likely to be some resistance. Recognize that embracing social media and implementing new modes of communication requires a cultural shift. Companies need to work at getting comfortable with the free flow of information and increased transparency social media offers rather than the traditional and limiting mode of keeping information in “silos” or departments.

Through social tools, employees can learn more about the business and their peers while increasing efficiency. A well-thought out communication strategy should be part of the initial foray into incorporating internal social networks because social media is a tactic, not a strategy. To use it effectively, educate employees on its value and how it can help them learn, grow and do their jobs better.

Social communication technologies empower employees to take action – whether that’s increasing interactivity, improving collaboration or fostering a stronger sense of community. For employees at every level, the more they know, and the more connected they feel to colleagues and team members, the more likely they are to be engaged and contribute to business success.

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Marty Hardin, SVP, Director of Emerging Media and Technology, Palio

Do you buy into the theory that the Internet has altered our brains? Author Nicholas Carr argues that it’s put us in a constant state of disruption and I agree. Rather than devouring books in deep concentration, we’re now prone to mind wandering, checking email, visiting Facebook or Googling symptoms.

Even though it seems most of us are working with shortened attention spans, it doesn’t mean we’re less hungry to learn. Health care companies that tap into the power of video can present compelling content in a way that is engaging while requiring less time for people to absorb information. Video capabilities on smartphones, iPads or other portable devices also provide flexibility in how and when messages are delivered and can change patient, prospect or employee experiences and interactions in many ways:

Motivate action: Getting patients to take their medications as prescribed is a recognized problem. Short videos that demonstrate how to give an insulin shot or communicate the importance of taking medication on time, are easier to absorb than written instructions. Video reminders can provide a personalized, visual prompt to make sure patients are following physician instructions or remember what they learned in the doctor’s office.

Inform buying decisions: Direct-to-consumer pharmaceutical companies could use QR codes on their packaging to launch a video at the store shelf – when a patient is making a buying decision. Consumers can instantly get more information, watch a commercial or view a testimonial from another consumer.

Educate and entertain: An interactive video brochure can be more engaging than an email or printed piece. Messages can be communicated quickly and effectively and hold the viewer’s attention, enabling them to absorb the information. Marketers can also track and report viewing statistics to understand the effectiveness of their communications.

Prepare sales representatives: PowerPoint presentations pack a lot of information, but they typically require access to a computer and can be a time drain for busy representatives. Video presentations, on the other hand, can be accessed anywhere – at home, in the parking lot prior to an appointment, etc. – giving reps a quick way to review relevant information. If appropriate, they can also share the video with a prospect or send it as a link via email at an appointment’s conclusion. With video capabilities on their smartphone, they can create their own personalized video to follow up from a sales call, enabling another interaction with a physician at his or her convenience.

Video allows people to create compelling content that taps into the emotional center of the brain, making it easier for people to recall what they’ve learned. It’s an effective way to break through messaging clutter.

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.