By Riagan McMahon, Guest Blogger

Riagan McMahon was nominated to participate as a National Youth Correspondent, representing Saratoga Springs High School and New York State, in the Washington Journalism and Media Conference held July 8 through 13. As a National Youth Correspondent, she was recognized as one of the most promising young leaders in journalism and media and joined scholars from across the country to share in this experience.

As part of this elite group, she participated in hands-on learning projects that challenged her to solveproblems, as well as dive deep into the creative, practical, and ethical tensions inherent in journalism and media. If she was interested in communications and public relations before the conference, she is downrightcommitted to the field now.

Riagan reached out to Palio for corporate sponsorship and we made a deal: We would gladly sponsor her if she agreed to write about her experiences. In the next series of posts, Riagan shares the insights and moments that most impacted her during the conference. In this post, she describes meeting Hoda Kotb.

Hello, I am Riagan McMahon blogging about the experiences I was fortunate to have at The Washington Journalism and Media Conference. I am a senior at Saratoga Springs High School and an aspiring communications and public relations major.

Hoda Kotb, co-host of the fourth hour of NBC’s “Today” and New York Times bestselling author of Hoda: How I Survived War Zones, Bad Hair, Cancer and Kathie Lee, was the keynote speaker during our visit to The National Press Club in Washington, DC, on July 10. Besides Kotb, the press conference panelists included the following political experts: Chief White House Correspondent Chuck Todd of MSNBC, Senior Congressional Correspondent Dana Bash of CNN, American political reporter Chris Cillizza of the Washington Post, and White House Correspondent April Ryan of American Urban Radio Networks.

All of the speakers were phenomenal in describing their successes and how they made it possible. But it was Hoda Kotb’s emotional story that impacted me most. Her story is triumphant. Kotb began her discussion by describing the hardships she faced before she had her first break, detailing how she received 27 rejections in her early hopes of being on the air as a news reporter. Kotb was then led by fate. She focused on her passion and was aggressive in making her dreams reality. Kotb’s eagerness to make it as a journalist proved to me that the level of fervency and determination one has really does separate one from the competition.

The quote from her keynote that stays with me is, “This business is so subjective, people quit because they don’t have enough stamina.” Hoda never stepped down. She worked harder than everyone else in her field to come out on top. She holds this work ethic accountable for her success, and knows that without her inner drive she would never have made it to where she is today.

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

By Riagan McMahon, Guest Blogger

Riagan McMahon was nominated to participate as a National Youth Correspondent, representing Saratoga Springs High School and New York State, in the Washington Journalism and Media Conference held July 8 through 13. As a National Youth Correspondent, she was recognized as one of the most promising young leaders in journalism and media and joined scholars from across the country to share in this experience.

As part of this elite group, she participated in hands-on learning projects that challenged her to solve problems, as well as dive deep into the creative, practical, and ethical tensions inherent in journalism and media. If she was interested in communications and public relations before the conference, she is downright committed to the field now.

Riagan reached out to Palio for corporate sponsorship and we made a deal: We would gladly sponsor her if she agreed to write about her experiences. In the next series of posts, Riagan shares the insights and moments that most impacted her during the conference. In this first post of five, she takes you through the week:

Hello, I am Riagan McMahon blogging about the experiences I was fortunate to have at The Washington Journalism and Media Conference. I am a senior at Saratoga Springs High School and an aspiring communications and public relations major.

I was fortunate to be nominated and then ultimately admitted as one of the 280 National Youth Correspondents at the wonderful conference held at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. The conference has given me opportunities that would seemingly have been impossible. Among many industry leaders I had access to at various press conferences and workshops were Chuck Todd of MSNBC, Hoda Kotb of “Today,” film critic Kevin McCarthy, and George Mason University professor, Robert Litcher, director of the Center for Media and Public Affairs.

As if this were not enough, we “Correspondents” traveled to Washington, DC, to visit various historic buildings and museums, including Newseum, The National Press Club, and Capitol Hill. We even had a moonlight tour of the National Mall. I found that although the areas we visited were incredible, it was the speakers at the conference who most inspired me through their words and humbling advice.

The key message that was communicated and reinforced to us was that we should always push to prove the potential we have within ourselves. In order to reach the success that we had the privilege to observe around us, we learned that we must push ourselves harder than our competitors. Because of this experience, I understand to the fullest extent just how important it is to be relentless and to never give up.

I am very grateful for this opportunity. Such an experience will undoubtedly develop solid foundations for my future in the field of communications and public relations.

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

In this episode of #ChalkChat, Palio’s Nick McDowell, Senior Copywriter, shares insight on the value of social media to your brand.

Here are the links Nick references in his #ChalkChat:

FDA Guidelines

Palio’s blog post

#ChalkChat is a weekly video series that brings you insights on branding, marketing and multichannel integration within the pharmaceutical industry. Follow us at #ChalkChat. Follow up with Nick: nick.mcdowell@palio.com.

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

By Joe Arcuri, Director of Multichannel Services, Palio

I consider myself a pretty active Instagram-user, I really dig the filters and blurring effects that are at the heart of the app.

So when Facebook released their companion camera app, I was very anxious to see how it stacked up. Especially since FB purchasing their biggest competitor, Instagram prior to the camera release.

After installing it I was pretty excited to see what it’s capabilities were. One of (the few) complaints I have with Instagram is if I like a friends’ photo in the app, it doesn’t share on my FB wall.

My first impression opening the app was a good one with the design of the UI, it carried over the familiar FB blue and had some nice detail in the icons. I took some shots and added the supplied filters, which were nice. They were all pretty cool effects. Then I went to add a blur – what no blur feature, major FAIL. This is one of my fave features of Instagram. Hopefully they will be adding this in the near future. The fact you can add multiple photos is nice since the FB app doesn’t let you do this, but you can’t chose what album to upload to.

You can browse your friend’s photos, and add comments fairly smoothly; I like how you can slide horizontally through multiple images in a post.

Here’s another issue, Facebook now has 4 different apps in which to interact with your FB community. This is getting a little out of control. Why not bake in the messenger and the cam app into the native FB app??

I surveyed a variety of FB users and 4/5 had no idea there was a camera app, another FAIL. Overall I would wait on this, until they flush out the areas that need more attention.

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

In this episode of #ChalkChat, Palio’s Joe Arcuri, Director of Multichannel Services, offers 4 key steps in building for multichannel brand domination.

#ChalkChat is a weekly video series that brings you insights on branding, marketing and multichannel integration within the pharmaceutical industry. Follow us at #ChalkChat. Follow up with Joe Arcuri @joearcuri.

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

In this episode of #ChalkChat, Saul Morse, Palio’s VP of Multichannel Integration, shares 5 key ways to integrate your brand across multiple channels.

#ChalkChat is a weekly video series that brings you insights on branding, marketing and multichannel integration within the pharmaceutical industry. Follow us at #ChalkChat. Follow up with Saul Morse @SaulMorse orsaul.morse@palio.com.

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

by Sean O’Donnell, Group Copy Supervisor, Palio

It was the best of times, and it was the worst of times. As a child of the ‘70s we didn’t have access to our friends 24×7. Playing games with peers required actually going to someone else’s house or a playground. And, if you wanted to reach someone immediately, you had to hope they were home when you called or close enough that a shout out the window got their attention.

In the workplace, we were equally challenged. There was no email, video conferencing or instant messaging. We walked information to a colleague’s office or shared documents through manila interoffice mail envelopes. Top-secret information was stamped “confidential” and had the security of a string-and-button closure. And, for colleagues, customers and business partners in remote locations, we accepted having to wait days as paper traveled through the postal system.

However, as technology progressed and patience gave way to the need for immediacy, pagers and fax machines entered the workplace. There was newfound freedom as workers could leave the office knowing if anyone really needed to get in touch, they were just a few beeps away. The slick curls of paper exiting fax machines meant copy could be approved faster, invoices could be received quickly and information could be shared readily.

Technology advancement fueled an unprecedented boom in productivity, both by increasing efficiency as well as extending the typical workday. The taste for real-time information sharing created a voracious appetite for greater connectivity and collaboration, and as social and mobile technologies have entered the workplace, they’ve opened the channels of communication across borders and cultures. Looking at the people I communicate with each day (outside of family and officemates), I’ve never been in the same room with the majority of them. But, they color my thinking, influence decisions and represent a cornucopia of opinions, experiences and backgrounds beyond what I could have realized in a pre-social media world.

However, as incredible as social media and real-time connections are for information exchange and human connections, it’s not without its downsides.

While this never-having-to-wait-environment might be good for the speed of business, there is a price for it. Stress is common for workers who are compelled to work around the clock – whether that’s from managers putting pressure on employees to respond immediately, travel with Blackberry devices and iPhones on at all times or because employees feel pressured that if they don’t work 24×7, their colleagues will. Grammar and punctuation are also suffering as texting and tweeting becomes the norm, with people either truncating messages to shave time off composition or because they’re limited in character allotment.

With written communication, words are often misconstrued and tone in text is often hard to decipher. Our mistakes are now public, as is how we respond to them. And, losing some of the nuances of communication– eye contact, hand gestures, a softening smile – can also be detrimental. After all, we like to do business with people we like and it’s harder to like someone when you can’t look into their eyes or hear the smile in their voice.

Would I give up the ability to Facebook message a friend, tweet an interesting article I read to my network or make a single announcement every time I have an update to share? Not in a million years. Social media has forever changed how we connect and interact, but as nice as it is to have technology at our fingertips, there’s no replacement for sitting in the same room with someone, sharing a meal, a handshake or other human connection. After all, technology or not, by nature, we’re all social beings.

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

By Saul Morse, VP, Multichannel Integration, Palio

There is no doubt that the iPad has made a profound impact on the technological landscape in the last two years. While the concept of a tablet had been discussed and tried by various companies, no one really captivated the market until Apple hit one out of the park. Rewind to 30 months ago and the craze seemed to be the netbook…as soon as the iPad hit the shelves the netbook industry disappeared almost overnight. Between the iPhone and the iPad the entire way we look at consuming digital information has dramatically changed.

So when we announced we were purchasing iPads for the entire staff of Palio it was received with a giant chorus of “cool.” While iPads were already proliferating throughout the halls, we wanted to formalize its presence and embrace this revolutionary piece of technology with open arms. In doing so we not only better position our teams to become thought leaders but give them a tool to help them do their job better, work more efficiently, and discover cool new things.

Now many companies are quick to point out why they shouldn’t embrace iPads in the organization. They’re a security risk, they cost too much to add onto the cost of an employee’s existing computer, how do you refresh when a new model comes out each year, how do you manage them, etc. We knew we had to think about this, but the bottom line is our clients are using them and our clients customers are also. So rather than focusing on the reasons we shouldn’t do it, we focused on the reasons we should. By making Palio an iPad culture we can help identify the unique opportunities afforded by these devices, and in general have it become integral to our company DNA.

We’ve encouraged our teams to sign up for the app store using their own AppleID so it becomes a blend of personal and professional and given new iPad users an iTunes gift card to go and experiment with various apps. We’re bringing in specialists from Apple to train on the basics and then building a series of roundtables led by champions across the organization on function specific topics. For instance an upcoming roundtable will highlight some of the creative apps available in the marketplace and how to use them for sketching, sharing, wireframing, app design, etc. Other roundtables will focus on video, notes, presentations and many more as time goes on.

Our clients are constantly asking about iOS devices and how they can be used in this highly regulated industry and by building an army of highly motivated, smart, creative people we will position ourselves to be at the forefront of the discussion. It’s already happening that there will be group of people will be in a strategy meeting together and when an idea comes up someone will say “I saw something similar…check it out” and within seconds it is being shared on one of the AppleTV equipped conference room monitors.

So will having an iPad alone make you a better thinker? Absolutely not. But by creating a culture open to sharing, discovering, and thinking in a technological way you can bet that this simple pane of glass will be a big contributor to our daily lives.

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

by Carl Turner, SVP, Director of Insight and Brand Strategy, Palio

If 2011 showed us anything, it’s that the people have the power.

Marketing messages and buying digital advertising is still important, but companies today are using advertising less to promote their products and more to direct consumers to their Facebook or Twitter pages. With conversations taking center stage for extending brand messages, it’s time for pharmaceutical companies to go culture casting and find brand influencers to support them in communicating key messages.

Pharmaceutical companies have long relied on other people to pitch their products and tell their story. Key opinion leaders such as physicians who hold academic titles at medical schools often partner with pharmaceutical companies to speak at industry events or participate in detailing prescription drugs to doctors. Physicians have also long been the conduit of information for patients. But, with more individuals going online for health information, their role is changing.

Physicians will continue to play an active role in influencing decisions, but having a doctor endorse a drug or treatment is similar to a mother giving advice to a teenager. While parents are often right, it’s the peer group that holds the most influence. The same is true for communicating with patients; other people may be the most influential opinion leaders. Going culture casting and finding the most active patient participants can help influence public opinion in an authentic manner.

Pharmaceutical advertising has incorporated the stories of real patients to connect with customers. Smoking-cessation drug Chantrix has people sharing their experiences quitting smoking. Long Island Jewish Medical Center uses a narrator to tell the tale of real patient encounters. New York Columbia Presbyterian hospital features actual patients who are undergoing treatment or have overcome an illness thanks to physician expertise and state-of-the-art facilities.

Market research supports the power of peer influence. Tapping into the power of empowered patients can play a meaningful role in other’s health care decisions.

Why should pharma cultivate more brand ambassadors?

*There will be negative stories. Transparency is a must, and that means patients will be posting about procedures that went wrong or drugs that weren’t effective. Encouraging patients who had a more positive experience to post and share their stories can provide balance and perpetuate positive messages.

*Buzz builds buzz. An expert word-of-mouth network can support the launch of a new drug, foster discussion around new health guidelines, or raise awareness of a clinical trial. Getting people talking – whether that’s posting comments on your blog, retweeting messages or interacting with their followers and sharing opinions and views – can provide the support patients need to help them make informed decisions. And, the more influential and vocal an individual becomes, the more their network listens to them and turns to them for advice.

*People remember stories. People tuned into your culture tell the most compelling stories – which are much more memorable than marketing messages. That’s because people remember stories that elicit an emotion and it’s sometimes hard to differentiate marketing messages. Plus, as people develop a following, they build trust and their opinions tend to be valued.

The current pharma landscape still doesn’t offer guidelines for social media participation, but it’s not stopping patients from talking and influencing their networks. Going culture casting and enlisting the help of the most influential patients can help companies establish an online presence, inform people of an unknown disease or treatment, elicit hope or provide support to patients and improve disease care.

What are you doing to engage patients and get people talking?

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

(Image credit: biojobblog.com)