Pharma Marketing News Calendar

Issue 9.10: December, 2010

2010-12-14T12:31:00.000-08:00

Focus

This issue of Pharma Marketing News is focused on online privacy, innovative online healthcare marketing solutions, market research in India and China, and good promotion practices. Featured organizations and companies include Center for Digital Democracy, Kantar Health, and the Good Promotion Practices Alliance (Prolifiq Software and Reprints Desk).

OpEd

Pharma's 2010 Christmas Wish List for Santa

A few people helped me put together a short wish list for the US pharmaceutical industry to send to Santa this year.

There are only a few items on the list so far that merit Santa's urgent attention. To find out more, you can vote or write-in your item to include on the list (find the survey here) or read this OpEd piece.

The full text of this OpEd piece (pdf) is will be published on or about 16-DEC-2010.

Planned Articles

New Media Privacy Issues & Online Health Marketing
Privacy Groups Focus on the Pharmaceutical Industry

Recently, online privacy issues have been in the news as Congress exams whether it should enact legislation requiring a do-not-track function in Web browsers to allow consumers to opt out of the extensive data collection by Internet companies. The Wall Street Journal, for example, published a series of investigative articles on online privacy under heading “What They Know.”

What you should know is that the current focus on privacy in the new media advertising world may have a very substantial impact on marketers. Read this article to learn more about the issues and also for a review of innovative online healthcare marketing and advertising solutions.

Estimated publication date for this article is on or about 16-DEC-2010.

Getting Market Research Right in India and China

This is the third in a series of three articles highlighting points made by Kantar Health executives in a recent webinar entitled “Getting It Right in the Emerging Markets: Identifying the opportunities and avoiding the pitfalls in conducting market research in new geographies.”

Estimated publication date for this article is on or about 30-DEC-2010.

Good Promotion Practices
An Alliance Sponsored by Prolifiq Software and Reprints Desk

Good Promotional Practices (GPP) ensure that Life Sciences companies successfully promote their products and solutions to the health care community and comply with applicable laws, codes of ethics, and accepted industry standards.

The GPP Alliance (GPPa) is a forum for learning about the practices and technologies that lead to a balanced approach to sales, marketing and compliance. GPPa is sponsored and managed by Prolifiq Software and Reprints Desk.

This article reviews the work of the GPPa based on interviews with the principals.

Estimated publication date for this article is on or about 30-DEC-2010.

Anticipated Publication Date

Individual articles will be published 16-DEC-2010 through 30-DEC-2010. The full issue containing ALL articles will be available on 30-DEC-2010.

Ad Submission Deadline Date

14-DEC-2010 through 20-DEC-2010

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 9.9: November, 2010

2010-11-05T10:38:00.000-07:00

Focus

This issue of Pharma Marketing News is focused on Patient Opinion Leaders, physician use of social networks, market research in the Middle East, and reporting HCP-related meeting spending. Featured organizations and companies include DocCheck, Kantar Health, and StarCite.

OpEd

Pharma Collaboration with Online Patient Opinion Leaders

The pharmaceutical industry has a long tradition of working with individual patients and patient organizations. Currently, pharnaceutical marketers are talking about “stepping in” to join discussions patients are having online. In the near future pharma companies may hire influential online patients to act as "patient opinion leaders" (POLs) just as they have hired physicians to be key opinion leaders (KOLs).

It's time to determine the issues involving transparency and conflicts of interest that may arise if and when pharma companies pay individual POLs to help manage their engagement with patients online. What best practices should govern pharma’s collaboration with POLs? Should the industry develop guidelines for their interactions with POLs? This OpEd is a call for action and input from readers regarding these issues and questions.

The full text of this OpEd piece (pdf) is will be published on or about 10-NOV-2010.

Planned Articles

How Healthcare Professionals Engage in Social Networks
Highlights from a DocCheck Survey

With over 700,000 users, DocCheck® is one of the most heavily subscribed medical portals in the world. Recently, Pharma Marketing News and DocCheck collaborated to survey members of the DocCheck online community.

The goal of the present study was to depict the usage of social media (online networks) within the target group of physicians. The influence and importance of social media as a modern channel of communication is growing constantly, also in the pharmaceutical sector. To date, there has been study that focuses on the usage behavior of physicians in social media. The present study aims at contributing to knowledge in this field.

The study at hand differentiated between different target groups. The main focus lays on users of social media, who both read and post medical information on networks. We were also interested in users who read only but do not post on medical networks and users who post only, but only on non-medical networks.

Specifically, the following data were assessed: type of networks used, the frequency of posting, motivation of posting, estimation of network usage through colleagues, relevance of contents posted and an estimation of online user-generated content in the future.

Estimated publication date for this article 10-November-2010

Getting Market Research Right in the Middle East
A Land of Diversity, Opportunities and Unique Challenges

This is the second in a series of three articles highlighting points made by Kantar Health executives in a recent webinar entitled “Getting It Right in the Emerging Markets: Identifying the opportunities and avoiding the pitfalls in conducting market research in new geographies.”

If the Middle East was a single country, it would be the fifth largest market in the world in terms of GDP. The sales of pharmaceuticals in the Middle East surpasses 20 billion US dollars per year. That’s about equal to the UK Pharma market but unlike the UK, the Middle East is growing by 10 to 15% per year.

The Middle East is not only a land of demographic diversity, but also a land of diversity of health systems and also a land of opportunities. To succeed in this market, pharmaceutical companies must get the best possible market data, which is often difficult to do. In this article, Sherif Shafick, General Manager, Middle East and Africa for Kantar Health, provides some insights on the nature of pharmaceutical market in the Middle East and a case study on how these insights can help launch products.

Estimated publication date for this article: 16-November-2010

Capturing & Reporting HCP-Related Meeting Spending
Technology Enables Sunshine Act Compliance

Life Science companies are struggling to understand the complex reporting requirements and compliance issues presented by existing and new regulations like the Sunshine Act.

This article is a summary of a Webinar by StarCite, which defined what pharma marketers and meeting planners need to know when it comes to meetings-related HCP reporting:
- How does your meetings program factor in to overall HCP compliance efforts?
- Exactly which meetings-related spend categories do you need to report against?
- What is the potential impact of not being adequately prepared?
- How are best-in-class Life Sciences companies handling compliance in their meetings programs?
- How can you be sure that you will be able to easily access all of the meetings-related HCP data required by the new laws?
Estimated publication date for this article: 30-November-2010

Anticipated Publication Date

Individual articles will be published 8-November-2010 through 30-November-2010. The full issue containing ALL articles will be available on 30-November-2010.

Ad Submission Deadline Date

5-November-2010 through 20-November-2010

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 9.8: October 2010

2010-10-11T05:28:00.000-07:00

Focus

This issue of Pharma Marketing News will be focused on custom media marketing, emerging pharma markets, highlights from DigiPharm EU, and DocCheck online physician survey. Featured organizations and companies include American Diabetes Association, and Kantar Health.

OpEd

Social Media and the Limitations of Disease Awareness Campaigns

I am impressed by all the pioneering social media campaigns that have been created by European pharma companies. Of course, all these campaigns are "unbranded" disease awareness initiatives. It's as if the ban on DTC allowed EU marketers to see the forest for the trees.

But disease awareness (DA) campaigns have limitations that even well-executed social media campaigns cannot overcome.

The full text of this OpEd piece (pdf) is now AVAILABLE: http://www.news.pharma-mkting.com/PMNews_98_Upfront.pdf

Planned Articles

Integration of Custom Media into the Marketing Mix
The American Diabetes Association Makes It Easy!

Which do patients, caregivers, and healthcare professionals prefer: custom educational materials (“custom media”) or advertising? It may not surprise you to learn that 3 out of 4 respondents in a study by Roper Public Affairs for the Custom Publishing Council agreed that getting information from an interesting collection of articles is more appealing than getting information from advertisements.

Of course, not all custom media are up to the task. What you need is information that is specifically tailored to the audience you are trying to reach and that is created by a well-known and respected educational partner. Pharma marketers are increasingly turning to patient advocacy groups as educational partners in order to reach their members and leverage their content. One of the most premier advocacy organizations in the U.S. is the American Diabetes Association®: (ADA).

This article summarizes a discussion with Abraham Ogden, the Director of Book Publications for the American Diabetes Association, about integrating ADA’s custom publications into the pharma marketing mix.

Expected publication date for this article: 12-October-2010

EU Pharma Leads Way in Social Media
Highlights form the 2nd Annual DigiPharm EU Conference

From September 28 through October 1, 2010, over 200 conference attendees of the DigiPharm EU conference in London, heard from industry experts including marketing specialists from Lundbeck, Janssen-Cilag, GSK, Schering Plough, Boehringer Ingelheim, Pfizer (Wyeth), Genzyme and Merck Serono who provided a summary of the best current practices and a glimpse at how EU pharma companies are driving digital marketing and communications forward.

This article presents highlights from the conference. It was written by Paul Jacobs who is the Director of Digital at a global medical education agency based in London. Paul is passionate about social media, digital innovations and the digital environment and is the author of Medigital blog.

Publication date for this article: 15-October-2010

Getting It Right in the Emerging Markets
Identifying the Opportunities and Avoiding the Pitfalls in Conducting Market Research in New Geographies

With the challenges facing our industry in the more developed markets of the US, Western Europe and Japan, the Emerging Markets have become the growth engine for many businesses. Big Pharma is shifting its investment to new geographies. Nevertheless, in countries where market research is not yet established, online penetration is limited and secondary data sources are nonexistent, the challenge remains how to get the business insights required to guide business strategy in these markets.

This article summarizes a Webinar presented by Kantar Health, a global consultancy and marketing insights organization, on September 29, 2010. The first article is an overview. Two followup articles will cover specific markets:
Focus on the Middle East (est. publication date: November 10, 2010)
Focus on India/China (est. publication date: November 17, 2010)

Expected publication date for this article: 28-October-2010

Anticipated Publication Date

Individual articles will be published 12-August-2010 through 28-October-2010. The full issue containing ALL articles will be available on 28-October-2010.

Ad Submission Deadline Date

11-October-2010 through 20-October-2010

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 9.7: September 2010

2010-08-25T12:51:00.000-07:00

Focus

This issue of Pharma Marketing News will be focused on pharma-physician social media interactions and medication adherence. Featured companies include Sermo, MedTera, and HealthPrize.

OpEd

Solving the Adherence Problem in Economic Hard Times

Medication non-adherence -- ie, patients not taking their medications as prescribed by their doctors -- is one of the most significant problems in healthcare. It is an even bigger problem during economic hard times as more people cut back their medications to save money. There are many facets to this problem, which cannot simply be solved by lowering drug costs.

This month’s Pharma Marketing News includes several articles that feature innovative solutions to the adherence problem. In preparation for these articles, several experts will be guests on the Pharma Marketing BlogTalkRadio Show during the month of September.

Read this OpEd piece to find out the details. The full text of this OpEd piece (pdf) is AVAILABLE now! Click here.

Planned Articles

Pharma, Physicians, and Sermo
A Social Media Win-Win-Win!

In 2007, Pfizer Inc and Sermo, the largest online physician community in the U.S., embarked on a strategic collaboration designed to redefine the way physicians in the U.S. and the healthcare industry work together to improve patient care. Since then, other pharmaceutical companies have also engaged physicians via Sermo

This article provides an overview of Sermo's new Client Center and summarizes a Pharma Marketing Talk podcast interview of with Daniel Palestrant, Sermo’s Founder and Chief Executive Officer.

Publication date for this article: 31-August-2010

Eyes on the Adherence Prize
How HealthPrize Uses Financial Incentives and Fun to Change Patient Behavior

Medication non-adherence is one of the most significant problems in healthcare. It is responsible for an astonishing number of poor outcomes and, as a result, an estimated $290 billion in otherwise avoidable medical spending in the US per year. It is also responsible for over $150 billion in lost pharmaceutical revenues per year. Up to 25% of prescriptions are never filled, and average medication compliance, for people who do fill their prescriptions, is only about 50% for most chronic diseases.

There have been many strategies to overcome poor adherence. Drug companies, for example, have incentive programs that include coupons for the partial or total re-imbursement of copayments. Usually, however, these programs are designed more for capturing initial market share during the launch phase of a new drug than for maintaining allegiance to a product that has been on the market for some time. With fewer and fewer prospects for new blockbusters, pharmaceutical companies these days can no longer ignore the value of increasing adherence.

Recently, HealthPrize, a startup internet-based software company, was featured in a New York Times article that described a lottery in which patients prescribed warfarin, an anti-blood-clot medication, can win $10 or $100 each day they take the drug.

This article provides details about the HealthPrize's innovative, compelling approach to solving one of pharma's most perplexing puzzle: how to improve medication adherence.

Publication date for this article: 16-September-2010

Closed-Loop Patient Education
MedTera and HealthPrize Team Up to Improve Medication Adherence & Health Outcomes

Research shows that 29 to 71 percent of patients new to therapies ("rookies") stop taking their prescribed medication during the first month of treatment. This is a discontinuation rate 6 to 31 times greater than during subsequent monthly periods.

To address this problem, MedTera in conjunction with Dr. Mark Vanelli, a member of MedTera's Physicians Advisory Board and a faculty member at the Harvard University Medical School, developed the Rookies@Risk™ program.

MedTera recently partnered with HealthPrize Technologies, a web-based software company that motivates people to fill and stay on prescription medications, to bring together MedTera's online and offline educational resources and HealthPrize's online, interactive platform to educate people about their chronic diseases and incentivize them for taking their medications as prescribed.

This article summarizes this partnership and presents details of MedTera's research regarding "rookie" patients.

Publication date for this article: 23-September-2010

Anticipated Publication Date

Individual articles will be published 31-August-2010 through 16-September-2010. The full issue containing ALL articles will be available on 23-September-2010.

Ad Submission Deadline Date

25-August-2010 through 3-September-2010

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 9.6: Summer 2010

2010-07-23T09:05:00.000-07:00

Focus

This issue of Pharma Marketing News will be focused on Apple's iPad platform, physician access, consumer marketing, Pharmaguy, and social media marketing leadership.

OpEd

Just-in-Time Publishing

Pharma Marketing News is an electronic publication and unlike print publications it has no obligation to appear as a collection of articles on a regular monthly schedule. Yet this is exactly how it has been published -- one issue per month and each issue containing 3 to 4 articles.

Beginning this issue a new publication plan -- what I call Just-in-Time Publishing plan -- is being implemented. I believe it will benefit my readers with more timely release of valuable information. It will benefit advertisers too. Read this OpEd piece to find out the details.

Planned Articles

The iPad as a Pharma Marketing Platform
Is It a Game-Changer for Consumer & Physician Access?

Can the pharmaceutical industry make money from the iPad? Or, rather, can pharma marketers use the iPad in their campaigns to help improve sales, physician education, and disease awareness?

There are three areas in which the pharmaceutical industry might consider using the iPad:
- Detailing (ie, use by sales force)
- HCP marketing/communications
- Consumer marketing
This article summarizes how the iPad is currently being used by the pharmaceutical industry, how it is being adopted by physicians, and what the roadblocks are to using it for eDetailing.

Publication date for this article: 26-July-2010

The Pharmaguy Next Door
U.S. Pharma Blogger John Mack Talks about Social Media in Pharma Marketing

This article is an edited Google translation from the German of an article published in the publication Pharma Relations.

Included are additional comments made in a separate interview with DocCheck TV and excerpts from Pharma Marketing Blog that illustrate some points.

Publication date for this article: 29-July-2010

Social Media Leaders Wanted
Nominations for The Pharmaguy Social Media Pioneer Award

The first part of this article is a post by Corey Mull of the Marketing Leadership Council (MLC), which is a membership organization for senior marketers at the world’s leading companies. The Council provides quantitative and case-based best practice research and tools to help marketing leaders and their teams solve immediate business challenges. Mull reviews the results of Pharma Marketing News' "What's Your Social Media Implementation Plan?"

The addendum to this article is the announcement of the Pharmaguy Social Media Pioneer Award, which recognizes excellence in social media marketing leadership. Candidates for this prestigious award must work or have worked within an FDA-regulated pharmaceutical, medical device, or biotech company when he or she pioneered in social media marketing or non-branded communications or was an advocate for such. The Pharmaguy Social Media Pioneer Award is sponsored by ExL Pharma and the 4th Annual Digital Pharma East Conference. Winners will be announced at the conference in October, 2010.

Publication date for this article: 5-August-2010

Anticipated Publication Date

Individual articles will be published 26-July-2010 through 5-August-2010. The full issue containing ALL articles will be available on 12-August-2010.

Ad Submission Deadline Date

23-July-2010 through 9-August-2010

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 9.5: May 2010

2010-05-22T13:43:00.000-07:00

Focus

This issue of Pharma Marketing News is focused on crisis communications, public relations, sales force effectiveness, ratings of pharma sales reps in the US and Europe, and data mining of patient social networks.

OpEd

Public Relations Communications in the Fast-paced World of Twitter

When it comes to crisis communications in the faced-paced digital world of blogging and Twitter, pharmaceutical companies have no roadmap to guide them. Johnson and Johnson, for example, has been criticized in the media for “abandoning its template” for crisis management and not using the social media tools it has pioneered to keep consumers adequately informed about recent recalls prompted by manufacturing problems at its McNeil unit.

The J&J/McNeil recall fiasco may be a case study on "how-not-to" manage crisis communications in the faced-paced digital world of blogging and Twitter. Pharma can learn from this case to learn how, crisis or otherwise, one deals with the breakneck pace and two-way, consumer-driven nature of digital communications.

Planned Articles

The Changing Pharma Commercial Model in 2010 and Beyond
Delivering the Customer Experiences Physicians Want

In recent years, the pharmaceutical industry has moved away from its traditional sales model based solely on physicians’ relationships with their sales reps to a multi-stakeholder influencer model. What are the key elements of the new Commercial Model? How has this new Commercial Model progressed? Is the new Commercial Model having a positive impact on physician relationships? Which companies are seeing the greatest impact on their customers?

These were some of the questions addressed in an webinar presented by Kantar Health, a leading healthcare-focused global consultancy and marketing insights company.

This article features a summary of the much anticipated NEW TRI*M^TM annual survey results with physicians across the U.S. and Europe on their service expectations -- plus how they rate 16 Pharma companies on reps, relationships and services. The survey looked not only at PCPs/GPs but also -- for the first time -- at what oncologists expect from the industry.

ePrints NRx for Physician Detailing
Reprints Desk’s Solution to the Medical Marketing Blues

Given the increasing difficulty that sales reps have gaining access to busy physicians, it is more important than ever to offer value and not just sales pitches. Physicians are looking for help to add value to their efforts to deliver good outcomes and satisfactory patient care. They expect appropriate help from pharmaceutical sales reps, as well as from other parts of the company that provide important support services.

One way that pharmaceutical companies can aid physicians is to provide them access to articles published in peer-reviewed journals, which have a particularly high level of credibility among physicians. The logistics and copyright issues of managing hundreds of different reprints and efficiently distributing them in accordance with FDA’s hood reprint practice guidelines, however, is a challenge.

To meet and solve that challenge, Reprints Desk recently announced the launch of ePrints NRx, a new scientific article collection service that simplifies the re-use of PDFs by medical marketers, brand managers, and sales professionals.

This article describes and summarizes the features and benefits of the ePrints NRx solution offered by Reprints Desk.

Data Mining in the Deep, Dark Social Networks of Patients
Advice for Pharma: Caveat Emptor

Many pharmaceutical companies are actively monitoring discussions on patient social networks to find negative comments about their products and/or research the issues of importance to patients who suffer from the medical conditions their medicines are designed to treat.

Many of the most important patient communities such as PatientsLikeUs (PLM), however, are “closed,” members-only communities that have rules restricting data mining by third parties. These communities are “dark,” meaning that search engine spiders are also not allowed to index the content.

If pharma marketers wish to tap into this rich source of information, they need to pay careful attention to the rules lest they suffer the consequences to their reputations.

This article takes a look at the issues involved in data mining the deep, dark and closed patient communities on the internet and provides a glimpse into what treasures lie beneath the surface.

Anticipated Publication Date

27-May-2010

Ad Submission Deadline Date

24-May-2010

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 9.4: April 2010

2010-04-27T07:59:00.000-07:00

Focus

This issue is focused on social media management best practices, how to moderate pharma online discussions, use of social media in EU, and the future of real patient testimonials in a social media world.

OpEd

TBD

Planned Articles

Real Patient Testimonials
The “Killer” Social Media Marketing Strategy

Drug companies have long used celebrities to endorse their products. However, according to a recent Wall Street Journal article, market research shows that the sick are relying more on the recommendations of fellow patients, and less on the reputations of companies and endorsers, in deciding whether to seek treatment and what drugs to ask for. Exploiting that trend, pharma marketers are beginning to use real patients in their direct-to-consumer TV and print ads and are soliciting real patient stories on their web sites, YouTube channels and Facebook pages.

Given the popularity of social networks among consumers seeking medical advice, the next logical step may be the use of real patient brand ambassadors to participate in pharma-owned and 3rd-party online discussion forums.

This article discusses the potential pitfalls, regulatory issues, and best practices regarding the use of real patient testimonials based on comments collected from a recent survey of readers and other experts.

How to Manage the Online Conversation
Community Management Best Practices & Other Tips from LiveWorld

As more and more pharmaceutical companies launch social networking platforms associated with their brands, some will allow users (consumers, patients, and physicians) to post comments as part of ongoing discussions about their drugs and/or the conditions these drugs treat. Recent pharma experience with social media discussions demonstrates how important it is to properly manage online communities.

In public comments made to the FDA, LiveWorld, Inc. -- a leading global social network marketing agency that develops, operates and moderates private label social network sites – said “Moderation of user content related to healthcare subjects in social networks is central to the current discussion.” Pharma Marketing News had an opportunity to interview Jenna Woodul, LiveWorld’s EVP and Chief Community Officer, about how pharma companies can manage their social media interactions using technology and "credentialed participants" for moderating and managing online discussions.

This article presents a summary of that conversation plus some results of a recent survey of readers regarding moderation best practices.

Moderation Best Practices for Pharma Social Networks
Pre, Post, or No Moderation, You Must Have a Plan

As pharmaceutical companies attempt to interact with consumers and patients on social media networks they host, they are wary of overstepping undefined regulatory boundaries. One issue that requires clarification concerns accountability for user-generated content posted on these pharma owned and controlled social networks such as comments submitted to Facebook pages and YouTube channels.

While the FDA mulls over new guidelines that define those boundaries, pharma companies are launching new social media sites with increasing frequency. Although these sites may not be branded and may have terms of use specifying what is acceptable and unacceptable user-generated content, the question remains how to enforce those rules through moderation, especially with regard to handling of off-label information. Although this is a moot point at the moment – almost all such sites have comments turned off – it is important to have a moderation strategy designed to meet your specific goals when and if you build a truly interactive social network.

This article presents a summary of results from a recent survey of readers and other experts regarding pharma social media moderation best practices.

Use of Social Media for Health Purposes in the EU
How Doctors, Patients, and Pharma Engage with Each Other

EPG Health Media (part of the IMR International Group), recently published a market research report “Social Media and Healthcare.” The report shows how European doctors, patients/consumers and pharma engage (and seek to engage) with each other. The information helps EU marketers understand the potential for future change in terms of the use of social media in relation to health.

This article is a summary of that report, which surveyed HCPs, pharmaceutical professionals and consumers/patients within the "top-5" EU countries; ie, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Spain and Italy.

Anticipated Publication Date

29-April-2010

Ad Submission Deadline Date

27-April-2010

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 9.3: March 2010

2010-03-25T11:19:00.000-07:00

Focus

This entire issue is focused on an analysis and summary of comments submitted to the FDA regarding the regulation of Social Media.

OpEd

FDA Can Relax. I Did All the Work for Them!

"This issue of Pharma Marketing News does practically all the work for the FDA in summarizing comments submitted," says John Mack, Publisher of Pharma Marketing News and author of the article. "We have even included the most updated charts showing the results of our reader survey, which collected more than 700 comments from 274 people."

Read more about what's in this issue in the UpFront OpEd piece (full text; pdf) and below.

Planned Articles

Industry and Consumer Advocates Square Off Regarding Social Media
An Analysis and Summary of Comments Submitted to the FDA

This article presents an overview of the types of organizations that submitted comments versus those that made presentations at the November 2009 public hearing. It also includes general comments from the pharma industry regarding the process by which the FDA should regulate the Internet and social media. Also presented in this article are the comments submitted by consumer advocates and individuals who generally supported more strict regulation across the board.

Overcoming Space Limitations in Social Media
The One-Click Rule and Other Novel Ideas Proposed by the Drug Industry

FDA's public notice regarding Promotion of Food and Drug Administration-Regulated Medical Products Using the Internet and Social Media Tools asked “Are there proposed solutions that may help address regulatory concerns when using social media tools associated with space limitations or tools that allow for real-time communications to present product information?”

FDA's "regulatory concerns" are primarily about how to ensure that consumers have access to a balanced presentation of both risks and benefits of medical products. Given that, the following question asked by the FDA is relevant to the discussion of space limitation solutions: "How should product information be presented using various social media tools to ensure that the user has access to a balanced presentation of both risks and benefits of medical products?"

This article presents a summary of comments from the drug industry regarding this issue.

Accountability for Pharma Content on Social Media Sites
Who Owns and Controls the Content?

The FDA asked for public comments regarding how pharmaceutical companies should be held accountable for a communication about its product(s) and how much control they exert over activities on the Internet, regardless of whether the promotional activity occurs on company-sponsored venues or on third-party venues. Related to this, FDA also asked whether or not pharmaceutical companies should correct misconceptions or misinformation about their products, including unapproved uses of their products that are being conveyed on a Web site outside their control, such as on a blog, social networking site, or a wiki Web site (i.e., Wikipedia).

A substantial portion of the comments submitted to the FDA by the drug industry in response to the FDA was devoted to the accountability issue and the related issue of correcting misinformation on social media sites.

This article presents a summary of comments from the drug industry regarding this issue.

Solving the Social Media Adverse Event Reporting Problem
Is It Just Too Much “Noise” to Sift Through?

Pharmaceutical marketers claim to be prevented from engaging in online conversations with consumers because of FDA’s AE reporting requirements. No drug company wants to be responsible for pro-actively monitoring the entire Internet for potential adverse events. Even so, are adverse events reported on social media sites just a lot of useless "noise" and not worth the effort to sift through?

Many presenters at FDA’s November 2009 public hearing on the Promotion of Food and Drug Administration-Regulated Medical Products Using the Internet and Social Media Tools addressed this problem and offered solutions.

Comments submitted to the FDA after the meeting offer more details, which are reviewed in this article.

Anticipated Publication Date

31-March-2010

Ad Submission Deadline Date

26-March-2010

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 9.2: February 2010

2010-02-16T04:57:00.000-08:00

Focus

Behavioral targeting, physician marketing, closed loop marketing, Twitter, patient support, social media, FDA guidance

OpEd

Waiting for Goduidance

It seems like every pharmaceutical marketer is waiting for guidance from the FDA before they do more online marketing and especially more social media marketing. It's like Waiting for Godot -- guidance may never come. What then? Or it could come. Then what?

Planned Articles

Use of Behavioral Targeting by Pharma Marketers
When Is It Appropriate?

"The practice of advertising has clearly been revolutionized by the emergence of the Internet. Today, we can match the content of an ad to the interests of the consumer in ways undreamed of just a few short years ago," said Nancy Hill, President & CEO, 4A's.

This article summarizes the results of a survey designed to answer the questions:
- Should the pharmaceutical industry adopt similar self-regulatory principles that were established by media and marketing trade associations to protect consumer privacy when employing behavioral targeting.
- Should pharma marketers use behavioral targeting at all?
- If they do use it, when is it appropriate?
Building the "New" Pharma Physician Marketing Model
MedTera's HC Professional "Life Long Learning" Platform

Physicians today are likely to receive drug information from a variety of sources and more often than not these sources are accessed via the Internet. Devices such as the iPhone -- and soon the iPad -- will make it even more convenient for physicians to receive online content.

In this new environment, eMarketing -- also called non-personal promotion (NPP) -- should be considered a tactic with unique advantages. "Brand teams can and should leverage the speed and efficiency of the 'e' channel to improve overall responsiveness and efficiency of their physician marketing programs," said David S. Duplay, President of MedTera™, an integrated marketing solutions company. "What were now doing at MedTera is building an integrated marketing solutions company dedicated to improving education, promotion and communications in the healthcare, life science and pharmaceutical industry."

This articles reviews MedTera's branded integrated physician marketing solutions and a summary of research on how pharma marketing is changing and how brand teams see the mix of marketing tactics changing over the next several years.
Pharma and Twitter
A Good Pair for Patient Support?

Twitter has often been hyped as a great way to support customers. The customers of pharma are physicians and patients. But pharma Twitter accounts offer very little in terms of patient support. Most are designed for corporate communications and unbranded marketing.

A branded, patient-focused Twitter account can be used in many ways to support patients. This article summarizes a survey that asked respondents to evaluate several ways in which Twitter could be used to improve patient support. Specifically, the survey asked how effective Twitter can be in carrying out each of the following patient support activities/communications:
- Drug/device safety alerts (eg, drug recalls, medical device malfunctions, emerging safety issues)
- Prescription management, including pharmacy refill reminders
- Daily health tips from authoritative sources
- Publishing disease-specific tips
- Clinical trial awareness & recruitment
- Enhancing health-related support groups (e.g. buddy-systems for depression)
- Providing around-the-clock disease management
- Patient-sharing of health-related experiences
- Issuing dietary/lifestyle tips
- Delivering adherence and compliance messages
Pharma's Social Media Working Group
Who It Consists of, How It Formed, and What Its Objectives Are

While a few individuals and agencies have submitted comments to the FDA regarding regulation of pharma marketing on the Internet, to date only one adhoc group of pharmaceutical industry representatives have submitted comments. That group is the the Social Media Working Group (SMWG), which has come together to "facilitate discussions with the Division of Drug Marketing, Advertising and Communications, industry associations, and other pharmaceutical manufacturers on social media issues. The SMWG includes representatives from the following companies: Amgen, Inc.; AstraZeneca LP; Bristol-Myers Squibb; Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Inc.; and sanofi-aventis U.S."

This article reviews the Who, What, and Why of this group based on a conversation with Craig M. Audet, Vice-President and Head of the US Regulatory Affairs Marketed Products Group at sanofi-aventis, Mark Gaydos, Senior Director, U.S. Regulatory Affairs Marketed Products at sanofi-aventis, and Cynthia Phillips, Sr Dir Labeling and Promotional Compliance at Millennium Pharmaceuticals. Also covered is an analysis of comments the SMWG submitted to the FDA on how pharmaceutical companies should handle off-label and adverse event posts made on social media sites owned or sponsored by them.

Anticipated Publication Date

25-February-2010

Ad Submission Deadline Date

20-February-2010

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 9.1: January 2010

2010-01-21T04:11:00.000-08:00

Focus

Corporate Reputation, KOL Management, Transparency, Payments to Physicians, Future of Pharma, Healthcare Communications

OpEd

Healthcare Communications vs. Pharma Marketing

Whenever someone refers to a pharmaceutical company as a "healthcare company" the hairs on the back of my neck (where I still have some hair) rise up, says John Mack, Editor of Pharma Marketing News. This often happens when you speak to agencies that do consulting work for pharmaceutical companies and talk about "healthcare communications" when they actually mean pharmaceutical marketing.

Are pharmaceutical companies healthcare companies? Should we replace "pharmaceutical marketing" with "healthcare communications?"

Planned Articles

Predicting the Future of the Drug Industry
What's in Store for the Next Decade?

Every new year we either take a look back or ahead one year. Many people would rather forget about 2009 and look forward to better times in 2010. But what about looking even farther into the future? Since we just finished the first decade of the 21st century, why not look into our crystal balls to predict what the next decade (2010-2019) holds in store for the pharmaceutical industry.

Well, Pharma Marketing News did just that with its "Predicting the Future of the Drug Industry: 2010 & Beyond!" survey that was hosted online from 6 December 2009 through 8 January 2010. We collected over 100 responses and many interesting comments that are summarized in this article.
Corporate Reputation in the New Media World
Influencing the New Influencers

There is a direct link between corporate reputation and customer behavior, including recommending or prescribing your brand. In today's negative environment beset by economic crisis and 24/7 communications, how can you enhance your reputation and ensure it delivers results?

In an online webinar entitled "Reputation Strategies That Drive Results: Turning Your Good Name into Good Business" Kantar Health explored the value of corporate reputation and corporate social responsibility from a traditional channel and digital media perspective and also from the view of understanding how this impacts the relationship between pharmaceutical and Key Opinion Leaders. This article summarizes the presentations made at that webinar.
Pharma Begins to Reveal Payments to Physicians
Lilly, Merck, and GSK Lead the Way

In January 2009, Senate Special Committee on Aging Chairman Herb Kohl (D-WI) and Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Charles Grassley (R-IA) introduced the Physician Payments Sunshine Act of 2009. This act, which has been introduced in previous sessions of Congress, attempts to provide for transparency in the relationship between physicians and pharma companies with respect to payments and other transfers of value and physician ownership or investment interests in manufacturers. Several states, including Massachusetts, Vermont, and Minnesota, have either passed or threaten to pass their own "sunshine" that forbid or put limits on gifts to physicians by pharma companies.

Typically, these laws require the public disclosure of types and amounts of payments made to physicians above a certain limit. In response, many pharmaceutical companies have voluntarily published or announced that they will publish a list of payments to physicians. Eli Lilly was the first pharma company to do, followed by Merck and GSK. Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, and Medtronic have promised to do so in 2010.

This article reviews the lists published by Lilly, Merck, and GSK and analyzes the data to get more insights into the amounts of physician fees paid by various companies, how the money is distributed by state and region of the US, and by type of payment.

Anticipated Publication Date

27-January-2010

Ad Submission Deadline Date

22-January-2010

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 8.10: Nov/Dec 2009

2009-11-30T04:58:00.000-08:00

Focus

FDA, Corporate Reputation, Direct-to-Consumer Advertising, Social Media

OpEd

What's Next from FDA?

John Mack, Editor of Pharma Marketing News, discusses the next steps FDA is likely to take on the road toward issuing its anticipated guidance for use of the Internet for Rx drug and device promotion. There are still some questions about the details from interested stakeholders/ To help collect these questions and present them to the FDA, readers are asked to fill out this questionnaire:

Planned Articles

Search Advertising Options for Pharma
What to Do While Waiting for Those Guidelines

At the November 12-13, 2009, FDA public hearing on social media and the Internet, Google presented some new search ad formats for the pharmaceutical industry. According to Julie Batten, eMarketing Manager at Klick Pharma, a full-service digital marketing agency that specializes in the healthcare and pharmaceutical sector, Google previewed its ideas to a small group of agency and advertiser partners, including Klick, several months prior to that.

In this article, Batten discusses pharma’s options for search marketing in this period between the FDA public hearing and when the much anticipated draft and final guidance on the issue is published.
Reputation Strategies That Drive Market Results
Turning Your Good Name into Good Business

New research proves that a strong corporate reputation is not just about good works. It's about good business. There is a direct link between corporate rep and customer behavior -- such as recommending or prescribing your brand. In today's negative environment, how can you enhance your reputation -- and ensure it delivers results?

This article answers that question and covers the following topics:
- Driving Business Performance with Corporate Reputation
- Influencing the New Influencers through Social Media
- Strengthening Your Reputation with KOLs
Experts quoted include: Mark Sales, Head of Global Stakeholder Management, KantarHealth; Amy Krane, Director, Healthcare Solutions, TNS Cymfony; and Gary Bartolacci, Senior Director, KantarHealth.
Consequences of Direct-to-Consumer Advertising
New Research On Link to Higher Drug Costs

A new study published in the November 23, 2009 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine (“Costs and Consequences of Direct-to-Consumer Advertising for Clopidogrel in Medicaid”; Arch Intern Med. 2009;169[21]:1969-1974) offers evidence that drug price increases are engineered to cover the costs of DTCA. The authors examined pharmacy data from 27 Medicaid programs from 1999 through 2005. They analyzed changes in the number of units of clopidogrel (Plavix) dispensed, cost per unit dispensed, and total pharmacy expenditures.

What’s interesting about this study is that it was able to compare volume and costs before and after DTCA initiation. Plavix has been marketed extensively using DTCA starting in 2001, several years after it was initially released. There was no DTCA for Plavix from 1999 to 2000. From 2001 to 2005, U.S. spending on DTCA for Plavix exceeded $350 million, an average of $70 million per year. “This preliminary analysis of an ideal case study,” said the authors, “allowed us to estimate changes in prescribing after the initiation of DTCA, while controlling for existing pre-DTCA trends.”

This article summarizes the results of this study.
A Few Things I Learned at FDA’s Social Media Hearing
What's Next is What Counts

Unless you have been living under a rock – and not reading this newsletter – you probably know that the FDA convened a public hearing on November 12 and 13, 2009, to hear comments from 60 or so speakers about FDA regulation of social media and the Internet.

You can access a boatload of presentations, summary articles, podcasts, tweets, and practically everything you will ever want to know relating to this hearing at www.fdasm.com, a Website set up by Ignite Health. Currently, there are approximately 135 articles related to the public hearing now available online: http://tr.im/FnQL

This article presents key takeaways from the FDA hearing, a synopsis of the presentations made by John Mack, Publisher, Pharma Marketing News, at the hearing, a review of Ignite Health’s study regarding effectiveness of sponsored links, and the next steps in the process.

Anticipated Publication Date

16-December-2009

Ad Submission Deadline Date

11-December-2009

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John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 8.9: October, 2009

2009-10-26T04:37:00.000-07:00

Focus

Adverse Events, Social Media, Market Access, REMS

OpEd

Meet Me at FDA's Public Hearing

John Mack, Editor of Pharma Marketing News, will present results from the survey "FDA Regulation of Drug & Device Promotion via the Internet & Social Media" at the November 12-13, 2009, public hearing in Washington, DC. If you can't be there -- and even if you will be there -- please respond to the survey and give us your answers and comments related to FDA's questions regarding the promotion of FDA-regulated medical products using the Internet and social media tools.

Planned Articles

Social Media Adverse Event Reporting Safe Harbors
It’s Time for FDA to Open Up the Internet to Rx Advertising Like It Did with TV!

Adverse event (AE) monitoring and reporting are the two primary hurdles that pharmaceutical marketers must overcome before they can feel comfortable using the full two-way conversational features of the new Internet (ie, Web 2.0, aka “social media”).

This article presents ideas for regulatory “safe harbors” under which pharma companies would be relieved of the responsibility of monitoring social media for adverse events. Whether or not the FDA implements these or some other form of safe harbor is anybody’s guess. But if the drug industry really wants a safe harbor -- and there is some question about that -- this could be a start.

As background, the article also includes a detailed summary of responses to the survey "FDA Regulation of Drug & Device Promotion via the Internet & Social Media" regarding social media adverse event monitoring, processing, challenges, and uncertainties.
Pharmaceutical Market Access 2010
Strategic Developments Impacting the US, EU, and Emerging Markets

It’s no secret that the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry is confronting significant short-term and long-term financial challenges that range from generic competition, upcoming patent expirations, and pending healthcare legislation and reforms in both the US and EU. These challenges are forcing the industry to "rethink" everything from R&D to Marketing.

“Future revenue growth in the US and EU will be limited,” said Stephen Potts, KantarHealth Regional Director, Asia Pacific, the Middle East and Africa, during a recent webinar entitled “Pharmaceutical Market Access 2010.” “Pharma and biotech companies are looking to emerging market opportunities in Brazil, Russia, India, and China (i.e., BRIC) to drive future business,” said Potts. “The EU is wrestling with the cost effectiveness of treatments and working through key changes in important regulatory processes. In addition, US healthcare reforms and pending legislation are pointing to universal coverage or the emergence of a ‘national plan’.”

What does this all mean for patients, physicians, payers, and pharmaceutical / biotech manufacturers especially as payer actions and priorities converge across borders? Potts and his co-speakers -- Lee Blansett, KantarHealth Senior Vice President, Oncology Market Access and Susanne Michel MD, KantarHealth Head of Global Market Access, Pricing and Reimbursement – addressed those questions during the webinar. This article presents a summary of the webinar.
Risk Mitigation and Its Impact on Pharma Marketing
Appropriate Use Benefits After Launch

Drug safety has always been a concern of FDA and drug manufacturers. Recently, however, FDA is paying even more attention to drug safety issues. The Food and Drug Administration Amendments Act of 2007 (FDAAA) granted the FDA the authority to require pharmaceutical companies to submit and implement a REMS -- Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy -- if the FDA determines a REMS is necessary to ensure that a drug’s benefits outweigh its risks. About 33% of new molecular entities approved since FDAAA became effective on March 25, 2008 have required a REMS, and 75% of these required a Medication Guide, which contains information for patients on how to safely use a drug product, with a REMS assessment. So, REMS are becoming more common than in the past, although they are not yet “the rule.”

“Risk management, REMS, danger management of your product's life cycle, whatever you call it, all are crucial to brand managers and marketing executives,” said Jeff Fetterman, President and CEO of ParagonRx (www.paragonrx.com), a Delaware-based company which specializes in programs for the appropriate use of medications.

This article summarizes Fetterman's ideas about how to develop a REMS that can be a win-win-win situation for you, your product, and the patient.

Anticipated Publication Date

29-October-2009

Ad Submission Deadline Date

27-October-2009

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 8.8: September, 2009

2009-09-18T12:06:00.000-07:00

Focus

FDA, Ghostwriting, Social Media, Regulations, Twitter

OpEd

Let's Respond to FDA's Questions Regarding Its Regulation of Social Media
On Friday, September 18, 2009, the FDA filed a notice to be published in the Federal Register on September 21, 2009 calling for a public hearing on the Promotion of Food and Drug Administration-Regulated Medical Products Using the Internet and Social Media Tools. The FDA is requesting the public to submit comments to a series of specific questions, which are included in a new survey created by Pharma Marketing Network/News.

Planned Articles

What If There Were No Rules in Pharma Marketing?

"Sometimes the biggest inhibitor of the innovation process is ourselves," says author and blogger Jonathan Richman. Sometimes it’s external forces (regulations, guidelines, naysayers). Still other times it’s our interpretation of the external forces. This last one is perhaps the most menacing.

External forces include pesky things called laws that always seem to make it all a bit more complicated for pharmaceutical marketers. Like laws, rules and regulations, such as those from the FDA, often dictate what we can and can’t do. Most of us know the rules and are forced to live under them.

However, many times we don’t really know the rules or understand them. Worse still is when we think we know the rules, but really don’t. When this happens, we essentially create a set of “ghost rules” that inhibit our thinking and that of our colleagues.

What If There Were No Rules in Pharma Marketing? There’s no FDA, no DDMAC, no FTC. Your company guidelines and rules don’t exist and your regulatory and legal teams have been disbanded. It’s a free-for-all and there are no rules. The question is: what would you do?
Pharma-Sponsored Medical Ghostwriting
What the "Ghosts" Have to Say About It

The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and the Journal of the American Medical Association, all recently have come out with stories and studies suggesting that pharma-sponsored medical ghostwriting is rampant. “These seemingly objective articles," says the WSJ, "which doctors around the world use to guide their care of patients, are often part of a marketing campaign by companies to promote a product or play up the condition it treats.”

Pharma Marketing News surveyed readers to determine if medical journal articles sponsored and ghostwritten by drug companies are a legitimate part of marketing to physicians and to get opinions on various other issues raised in the press about ghostwriting.

One of the first things learned was that it is not easy to even define what is meant by "ghostwriting!"

This article presents results from the survey. Nearly 40% of the respondents were medical writers (including "ghosts") who made clear their opinions.
Pharmaguy’s Twitter Followers are Your Followers Too!
Who Are They and Want Do They Want from You & Me?

No matter what people say, your Twitter strategy must include building a large and qualified Twitter following. The last part – qualified – should be the most important part of your Twitter follower strategy. You want followers who are the right fit for your messages.

Pharmaguy (aka John Mack) now has over 3,500 followers and these followers are probably the same followers you'd like to have if and when you get involved in Twitter. But hurry! Breaking in as a power user may be difficult. Research shows a virtuous cycle may exist, making popular users ever more popular.

This article summarizes the findings of a survey of over 400 of @pharmaguy's followers. The results will give you a better idea about why people in the pharmaceutical industry use Twitter and what they expect to get out of it.

Anticipated Publication Date

22-September-2009

Ad Submission Deadline Date

18-September-2009

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 8.7: August 2009

2009-08-03T06:01:00.000-07:00

Focus

Physician Access, CME, Social Media

OpEd

Social Media & the Truncated News Pyramid
PR people are used to issuing press releases to a few journalists at the top of the traditional news pyramid. When the top was blown off by the social media revolution, these professionals had no proven mechanism by which to reach the many thousands of bloggers at the BOTTOM of the pyramid -- until now.

Planned Articles

Owning the Prescription Pad
Driving Brand Decisions in a Multi-Influence World

The security of a controlled environment for pharma marketing communication is giving way to the complexities of a dynamic environment with more empowered players, including patients who have more influence than ever before over which products make it to market and which are prescribed.

"It's no longer just what brands are saying to physicians or what physicians are saying to patients...now all the different stakeholders are talking to each other," said Larry Friedman, PhD, Chief Research Officer, TNS North America. He was speaking at a recent webinar entitled "Owning the Prescription Pad: Driving Brand Decisions in a Multi-Influence World."

"Brands face dynamic environments with many influencers," said Jonathan Kay,
Global Practice Head, Brand and Communications at TNS Healthcare, A Kantar Health Company. "Brand managers need to observe, gauge and seek to influence those influencers. Therefore, we need a new model that helps us make sense of a complex world of communications."

This article summarizes that model as presented at the above-mentioned webinar by Friedman, Kay, and Louisa Holland, Co-CEO, the Americas, Sudler & Hennessey.
Social Communications in Healthcare
Summary of Roundtable Discussions

At the Social Communications in Healthcare conference hosted by the Business Development Institute in NYC on July 23, 2009, there were so many people live Tweeting the case study presentations that it's hardly worth the effort to summarize these presentations after the fact. You can find a good summary—if only in dozens of 140-character packets—on Twitter (search for hashtag #BDI here: http://search.twitter.com).

A better synopsis of the state of social communications in healthcare can be gleaned from summaries of the roundtable discussions held after the case study presentations.

This article provides several summaries written by the roundtable discussion leaders themselves.
Trends in Pharma Support of CME
The Plight of For-Profit MECCs

Recent headlines such as the gleaned from traditional media as well as from the blogosphere paint a bleak picture of the future of commercial support for continuing medical education (CME).

Is the pharmaceutical industry getting out of the business of supporting CME?

This article reviews trends in pharma CME support and critiques of that support. The article begins with a review of recent data from ACCME, which indicates that there is a shift in pharma CME funding from MECCs to physician societies.

Then, a synopsis is presented of the July 29, 2009, United States Senate Special Committee on Aging hearing on "Medical Research and Education: Higher Learning or Higher Earning?,” which featured testimony from experts who were supportive and critical regarding the benefits of industry-sponsored support of CME.

Lastly, the article presents new data from the “What's the Best Way for Pharma to Support CME?” survey, which asked respondents opinions about several alternative ways for pharmaceutical companies to continue to support CME without drawing the ire of Congress and other critics.

Anticipated Publication Date

6-August-2009

Ad Submission Deadline Date

3-August-2009

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 8.6: June/July 2009

2009-06-23T05:38:00.000-07:00

Focus

Social Media Marketing, Twitter, Drug Risk Communication

OpEd

Wither Twitter for Pharma?
Twitter is growing by leaps and bounds, but is it an appropriate channel for pharmaceutical brand marketing?

Planned Articles

Pharma Marketers Dive Deeper Into Social Media
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly Case Studies

Several pharmaceutical companies have recently dipped a whole lot more than their toes into the social media waters.

This article focuses in some detail on three cases that highlight the good, the bad, and the ugly uses of social media for pharmaceutical marketing: (1) Proctor & Gamble's Asacol Community for Ulcerative Colitis Patients; (2) Novo Nordisk's Levemir-branded Race With Insulin Twitter account; and (3) UCB's sponsored Crohn's & Me website.

You'll have to read the article to find out which one is good, which is bad, and which is downright ugly!
How Should Pharma Engage in Social Networks?
Aiming at Best Practices

The pharmaceutical industry is currently experimenting with social media as a channel for promoting products and/or enhancing disease awareness. Some of these efforts have been less than stellar, while others have been exemplary (see "Pharma Marketers Dive Deeper Into Social Media").

Each pharmaceutical company should have its own guidelines for best practices in the social media space.

Pharma companies can either develop best social media practices by learning from mistakes and public criticism (eg, see "Novo Nordisk's Branded (Levemir) Tweet is Sleazy Twitter Spam!") or through discussion and analysis of specific issues. To assist in that discussion, Pharma Marketing News provided two forums:
1. An ePharma Pioneer Club members-only discussion of the first-ever pharma branded Tweet (see "Pharma Twitter Best Practices"), and
2. The "How Should Pharma Engage in Patient/Physician Social Networks?" survey, which explores issues relating to pharma advertising and engagement in social networks.
This article focuses on presenting a summary of the above-mentioned survey, including comments from respondents. The results are not meant to offer a scientifically significant analysis, but to suggest ideas that may be helpful to pharmaceutical marketers who are currently working on developing their own guidelines.
FDA Draft Guidance on Risk
Read It and Weep!

On May 27, 2009, FDA published in the Federal Register draft "Guidance for Industry, Presenting Risk Information in Prescription Drug and Medical Device Promotion."

This guidance focuses almost exclusively on print and broadcast promotional ads. It is possible, however, to apply some of FDA's "thinking" to certain kinds of Internet ads such as search engine paid ads.

This article reviews the draft guidance with a special focus on how it may apply to the Internet and how marketers can use the comment period to raise the issue of FDA regulation of sponsored search engine ads.

Anticipated Publication Date

8-July-2009

Ad Submission Deadline Date

24-June-2009

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 8.5: May 2009

2009-05-27T07:01:00.000-07:00

Focus

Branding, FDA Regulations, Viral Video, PhRMA Code

OpEd

Will the Drug Industry be the Next Auto Industry?
Is the drug industry right on the cusp of a huge fall like the auto industry? Taking risks may hasten that fall, but sometimes standing on the sidelines may be more risky!

Planned Articles

Protection from Brand Infection
Marketers Must Take Control of Their Brands,
Especially Online

“Make no mistake,” says the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) Council in the opening statement to its report Marketer’s Fight Against Fakes, Frauds, and Infringements, “marketers and their brands are under siege. A vast and ever-expanding range of threats to brand value, integrity and image are bearing down on marketers in the form of counterfeits, gray market knock-offs, phishing attacks, cybersquatting, and a broad range of patent and trademark trespassing, especially online—that will likely intensify thanks to a softening economy.”

In response to concerns about the growing range of threats to brand value and the sheer volume of brand hijacking incidents, the CMO Council set out to assess the challenges marketers face as stewards of their brands. The result is Protection from Brand Infection, a seminal authority leadership report that outlines the proliferating threat-scape that marketers face and reveals how marketers are struggling to understand and measure the impact brand intrusions have on their second most valuable asset, their customer.

This article summarizes the results of that survey and cites examples of how pharmaceutical brands are being hijacked and what the drug companies are doing or not doing to counteract the problem, especially online and in social media contexts.

Ramifications of FDA Regulatory Actions and What to Do About It
Helping FDA Find a New Media Regulatory Pathway

On April 2, 2009, the FDA issued 14 letters informing drug companies that their search engine ads, which included drug brand names and indications but no risk information or fair balance, were in violation of the law. This caught many in the drug industry by surprise because they assumed the "one-click rule" applies; ie, as long as the fair balance information was just one click away -- on another Web page -- such ads are allowed by the FDA. With the 14 letters, FDA disagreed and quashed the "one-click rule."

Arnold Friede, counsel to the law firm McDermott Will & Emery LLP, and former Senior Counsel at Pfizer, believes that there is an opportunity now to make a strong and compelling argument for the adoption of rational regulatory policies by the FDA that address the unique features not only of sponsored links, but of other kinds of new communication tools, such as social media and the like.

This article reviews legal ramifications of FDA enforcement letters and focuses on the FDA’s contentious regulation of Internet advertising and what the industry is doing to “help” it find a new path in that arena. Included is a discussion of FDA's draft guidance "Presenting Risk Information in Prescription Drug and Medical Device Promotion" and the relevance of FDA's/FTC's "reasonable consumer standard" to search engine paid promotional drug ads.
The New PhRMA Code and Beyond
It Impacts Manufacturers and Vendors

In a recent ExL Pharma conference industry leaders from pharma and the vendor community reviewed the impact on “Marketing and Sales Under the Revised PhRMA Code”. In this article, Vincent DeChellis of NHHS Healthcare Consulting, LLC summarizes what the industry must do to comply with the code and reconciling its voluntary nature with mandatory state requirements.

Kevin Nalty, aka "Nalts"
Viral Video Genius or Pharma's Biggest Pain in the Butt?

One man’s experience that gives us some insight into whether or not a traditional pharmaceutical company can tolerate the creative thinking required for it to engage in social media marketing.

Anticipated Publication Date

28-May-2009

Ad Submission Deadline Date

27-May-2009

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 8.4: April 2009

2009-04-22T08:00:00.000-07:00

Focus

FDA, Social Media, Patient-Centric Marketing, Medical Device DTC Principles

OpEd

TBD
Publisher John Mack discusses what's on his mind at the time of publication.

Planned Articles

Social Media Guidelines for Pharma
Overcoming the Challenges

Pharmaceutical companies and their agencies are "mulling" over amongst themselves how the drug industry should engage consumers and physicians via social media without violating FDA regulations. They are struggling because the FDA has never issued clear guidelines for how it may regulate the industry use of social media in the future. Many have called upon the FDA to issue such guidelines.

Shouldn't we make sure that when it comes time for the FDA to actually create a guidance document on social media that it does it with input from ALL stakeholders?

This article will present a review of this issue based upon input received from experts and respondents to the “Should FDA Convene a Public Hearing on Use of Social Media by Pharma?” survey hosted by Pharma Marketing News starting on April 2, 2009. Also included in a review of an ePharma Pioneer Club roundtable discussion on what it's going to take to enable pharmaceutical marketers to engage in social networks without fear of adverse event reporting and other regulatory, corporate, and cultural roadblocks.

The Empowered Patient
Patient-Centric Marketing

Selecting the appropriate pharmaceutical product is one of the choices that empowered patients can make. But according to Reinhard Angelmar, the Salmon and Rameau Fellow in Healthcare Management and Professor of Marketing at INSEAD, empowered patients are involved before a drug even makes it to the market.

This article will review a presentation made by Angelmar at the recent eyeforpharma SFE Europe 2009 conference held in Barcelona, Spain. Angelmar makes a case for the drug industry to adopt a patient-centric model in which pharma companies can develop unique expertise in decoding the behavior, needs, motivations of patients and then use this knowledge as the basis for helping healthcare professionals and payers to put into place programs that achieve better patient outcomes.

Socially Challenged Pharma
Change is Never Without Some Pain

Digital Pharma Europe was ExL Pharma's first entry into the ‘Old World’ hosting an event already well established in the States. It seems they have found the time right to see whether the Europeans are like-minded in the exciting area of new/social/digital media in pharma.

In this article Erik van der Zijden -- entrepeneur, marketing professional, new media evangelist and self-styled "autodidactic techno-nerd" -- presents highlights of this conference and his personal point of view.

Report from the Social Pharmer “Unconference”
Sowing Seeds of Social Media Change

One only has to recall the 7-Up “Uncola” campaigns to understand the limitations of defining something by the absence of certain qualities. But the Social Pharmer Unconference was more refreshing than a fizzy soda exactly because it lacked what causes so many industry conferences to fall flat: marginally relevant speakers, boring PowerPoint presentations and silent participants. In this article, Amber Benson, Group Strategy Director for IMC2’s Health & Wellness practice, summarizes key presentations made at the April 21, 2009, Social Pharmer "unconference."

Anticipated Publication Date

30-April-2009

Ad Submission Deadline Date

24-April-2009

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 8.3: March 2009

2009-03-23T04:49:00.000-07:00

Focus

FDA, Drug Industry Reputation, Social Media, Future Scenarios, Privacy

OpEd

Syndication is da Bomb!
Publisher John Mack discusses the syndication strategy of Pharma Marketing Network and how readers and subscribers can benefit from being part of PMN's content syndication network.

Planned Articles

Pharma's Bad Rep or Bad Rap
Whatever! The Drug Industry Must Earn Back the Public's Trust

Over the years, Harris Interactive has polled Americans about their attitudes toward corporate America. The pharmaceutical industry has consistently received low scores; in 2007, for example, only 26 percent of Americans viewed the industry favorably. Among the 11 industry sectors examined, only tobacco companies had a measurably lower rating.

Who and/or what is to blame for pharma’s bad reputation? And what should the industry do to win back the public's trust?

The “How to Earn Back the Public's Trust” survey hosted by Pharma Marketing News between February 4, 2009 and March 14, 2009 was designed to answer these questions. This article summarizes the results of that survey, including selected comments from respondents and other commentators.

Will Healthcare be Rationed or Rational?
A Case for Supporting Comparative Effectiveness Research

"We ration care in the US today using one of the most capricious and inequitable means possible--ability to pay," says Kim Slocum, former Director, Strategic Planning & Business Development at AstraZeneca. "As cost shifting to consumers has accelerated over the past decade, we’ve seen the effects of this as year-on-year sales growth for prescription products has dropped on more or less a straight line since 2000."

Unless something changes, Slocum envisions dire consequences for the drug industry: "Extend the trend out just a bit further and you’re faced with a world in which sixty or seventy million people are completely uninsured with many of the remainder living with very skimpy coverage. Generic utilization rates in this situation probably exceed 80% and perhaps 30%-40% of all prescriptions go unfilled." This describes a future scenario Slocum calls "Consumer Chaos."

In this article, Slocum describes several alternative scenarios and makes a case for the industry to support Comparative Effectiveness Research or CER.

FDA's Use of Social Media
Peanuts Today, Drugs Tomorrow!

Pharmaceutical marketers were surprised to learn how extensively FDA used social media and Web 2.0 in the new year. The recall of 3,400 contaminated peanut products in 2009 was described at an eMarketing conference in Princeton, NJ. Pharma marketers heard that blogs, social media, YouTube and Twitter were new tactics embraced by the regulatory agency, at least in its communication with the public on an important food safety issue. FDA, along with CDC and HHS, was pulled further into social networking by growing public concern over the rapid growth and diversity of the peanut-product recall list.

In the future, will the FDA also be pulled into social media by a major Rx drug recall? Or is the drug side of FDA more conservative than the food side in its use of social media? What can the drug industry learn from the FDA's use of social media and will FDA's example help guide the industry toward best practices in this area?

This article describes FDA's social networking initiatives in context of the above questions. Included are several ideas for how the drug industry can partner with FDA and develop social media best practices.

New Privacy Rules in Economic Stimulus Law
Will They Restrict Certain Pharmaceutical Marketing Practices?

Beefed-up patient privacy protections in the recently enacted economic stimulus package are expected to place significant new restrictions on how some players in the pharmaceutical supply chain, including chain drugstores and PBMs, gather and distribute prescribing information to pharmaceutical firms for what critics claim is the purpose of marketing drugs.

This article reviews the medical privacy restrictions included in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which President Obama signed into law on Feb. 17, 2009, and discusses the impact these restrictions might have on pharmaceutical marketing.

Anticipated Publication Date

30-March-2009

Ad Submission Deadline Date

24-March-2009

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 8.2: February 2009

2009-02-23T03:49:00.001-08:00

Focus

eMarketing, Sales Force Effectiveness, Industry Reputation

OpEd

Yes We Can!

"I would love to have representatives of the CDC, the FDA, DDMAC, regulatory [people] within the pharmaceutical industry, key marketers, key patients, key doctors ... sit down and discuss what this industry should be doing," said Fabio Gratton, Co-founder, Chief Innovation Officer, Ignite Health, in an interview with John Mack, Pharma Marketing News Editor. He was talking about establishing guidelines for using social media for disease awareness education (and product education) without the risk of being penalized by regulatory agencies.

What exactly does Gratton have in mind? Can we do this?

Planned Articles

ePharma Summit Highlights
Practicing What's Being Preached

Highlights from the ePharma Summit conference, which took place on February 9-11, 2009 in Philadelphia.

Building the Optimal Service Model
Creating the Right Physician Experiences To Drive Business

The vast majority of pharmaceutical companies across the US and Europe say they are moving to new customer-centric service models, which focus more on building relationships with physicians than do traditional detailing models. But are doctors experiencing any real change? What does that transition mean for companies, reps and physicians? What should you do differently to ensure the new models succeed? And what do doctors really want from you?

Those were some of the topics and questions addressed by TNS Healthcare in a recent webinar. This article presents a summary of this webinar and personal conversations with presenters conducted beforehand. Included are NEW research results about how US and European physicians rate pharmaceutical companies against a number of customer value points that are important in achieving success with the new sales model.

Earning Back the Public's Trust
What Should Be Done?

Results of a 2008 Harris Interactive poll of American attitudes toward corporate America revealed that only 26 percent of Americans view the pharmaceutical industry industry favorably. 52 percent are firmly negative, which places pharma slightly below big oil, and above tobacco.

Is the drug industry's bad reputation is deserved? What are the specific reasons why the public has such low esteem for the industry?

This article summarizes results from the Pharma Marketing News survey on this topic (see survey here) and also includes a synopsis of opinions by experts.

[THIS ARTICLE WILL BE PUBLISHED IN THE MARCH ISSUE TO ALLOW MORE RESPONSES TO OUR SURVEY TO BE INCLUDED.]

SFE Metrics
More Important Than Ever in a Tough Market

Hans Nagl, Promotion Response Modelling Manager, Shire -- a scheduled speaker at eyeforpharma’s upcoming Sales Force Effectiveness Europe 2009 summit March 3-5 -- focuses on SFE metrics for Shire.

This article summarizs a recent discussion between eyeforpharma's Editor Lisa Roner and Nagl about how the current economy and changing pharma landscape is impacting program effectiveness measures.

New Rules of Marketing & PR
Do They Apply to Pharma? A Book Review

Now, most of you reading this are engaged in pharmaceutical marketing or PR, so you should be forewarned that this book does NOT address the challenges we face in a heavily regulated environment. But that is not to say that the methods explored in this book are not extremely valuable. As an industry, we must find ways to utilize these tools in a way that is compliant with FDA regulations. The good news is we can! Let’s explore...

Anticipated Publication Date

3-March-2009

Ad Submission Deadline Date

24-February-2009

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John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 8.1: January 2009

2009-01-23T05:19:00.000-08:00

Focus

DTC, ePharma, Marketing Free Speech, FDA Reprint Distribution Guidance

OpEd

What's "Your" Media?

Planned Articles

The Future of DTC Advertising
The economy, drug pipeline, and new regulations are all factors

Experts don't know if it's the economy, lack of new drugs in pharma’s pipeline, or the new pro-regulation political climate, but 2009 is shaping up to be the year that direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising will suffer a round of budget cuts and setbacks not seen in a long time.

How can we predict the future of DTC given all these influences? As usual, Pharma Marketing News hosted an online survey to tap into the knowledge and views of readers to perform that task. The survey ran from November 12, 2008 through January 19, 2009. Sixty responses were collected. The results are summarized in this article.

The ePharma Pioneer Club
Convincing pharma marketers to engage in “e”

In short, Pharma Marketing Network's ePharma Pioneer Club™ is an EXCLUSIVE, members-only Facebook Group through which pharmaceutical eMarketing experts "meet" to discuss and exchange views on how to advance the use of the Internet and other technologies in pharmaceutical marketing, sales, and communications.

This article introduces the Club and its mission.

The Hypocrisy of Healthcare Marketing Restrictions
Stand Up for Healthcare Marketing Free Speech!

Ayn Rand and her book Atlas Shrugged have come back in vogue because of the recent meltdown in the financial, housing, and automotive sectors and the big bailout by government. Many people have pointed to the lack of government regulation or enforcement of regulations as the main culprit.

Pharmaceutical marketing, some say, have benefited by the recent “dramatic drop off of enforcement of domestic laws” and there will many changes now that Democrats are in control. But Dmitriy Kruglyak of Trusted.MD Network is not one of them.

“Well-intentioned measures can go very wrong,” says Kruglyak. “Time to call out the disturbing hypocrisy directed at healthcare marketers” was his rallying cry in a recent post he made entitled “New Year Resolution: Stand Up to Healthcare Marketing Hypocrisy!”

This article summarizes Kruglyak's thesis and offers a counterpoint from John Mack, the editor of Pharma Marketing News. Hopefully, it will generate further discussion from readers.

FDA Finalizes Guidance on Distribution of Reprints
Agency clarifies when manufacturers may hand out scientific journal articles

The FDA recently finalized its "Good Reprint Practices for the Distribution of Medical Journal Articles and Medical or Scientific Reference Publications on Unapproved New Uses of Approved Drugs and Approved or Cleared Medical Devices U.S."

"There is a more defined line which manufacturers and companies can look at and figure out, 'how can I make this work for me and how can I make this work for my company,'' says Erin Reilly Lewis, Esq., counsel with Baker and Daniels in Indianapolis.

This guest article written by Michelle Leppert, Managing Editor, HCPro, Inc., outlines the major provisions of FDA's reprint guidelines.

Anticipated Publication Date

28-January-2009

Ad Submission Deadline Date

23-January-2009

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John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 7.10: December 2008

2008-12-12T06:39:00.000-08:00

Focus

FDA, Patient Assistance Programs, Policy Changes, Daschle

OpEd

Prepare or Die!

Planned Articles

The Changing Policy Landscape & What to Do About It
Prepare Now for Coming FDA and Pharmaceutical Marketing Reforms

“The two traditional means by which pharmaceutical marketers have relied on for many, many years to encourage the uptake of new pharmaceutical products – direct-to-consumer advertising and physician marketing – are about to change,” warned Mark S. Senak, J.D., SVP, Fleishman-Hillard Washington D.C. , in a presentation at the recent DTC in the Era of Consumer Choice conference.

Senak summarized all the possibly policy changes coming down the pike that will specifically impart pharmaceutical marketing. He also suggests what the industry should be doing to meet these challenges.

This article is summarizes Senak’s presentation, which he later expanded upon in a YouTube video.

Patient Assistance Program Rankings
Going Beyond Sales Force Effectiveness to Customer Experience Satisfaction

“While free samples clearly play a valuable role in helping millions of financially-struggling patients get access to the medicines they need to live healthier lives, patients should know there are other options,” said Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) Senior Vice President Ken Johnson.

Among the "other options" patients have to get access to the medicines they need are the over 200 Patient Assistance Programs (PAPs) sponsored by pharmaceutical and biotech companies. Patient assistance programs are offered by pharmaceutical companies to help low-income, under-insured, or uninsured individuals and families afford necessary medications, with reduced-cost or free prescription drugs.

In a syndicated study that identifies what primary care physicians perceive to be the top pharmaceutical PAPs in the industry, Market Strategies -- research and strategic consulting firm -- identified how PAP image influences overall corporate image among primary care physicians, what performance measures drive a pharmaceutical company's PAP image, and which companies are perceived as having the best PAP.

This article reviews this research with comments from Peter Carlin, Senior Vice President of Market Strategies.

Reforming the FDA
It All Starts with A New FDA Commissioner - Survey Results

"[The Committee on Energy and Commerce in the US House and Representatives] has found that FDA not only failed in its basic mission, but refused to admit its failures and take steps to protect Americans from unsafe food and drugs," said Rep. John D. Dingell (D-MI), former chairman of that committee. "In the 111th Congress, the committee will swiftly move FDA reform legislation that is needed to ensure FDA does its job." Now that Henry Waxman is the new chairman, "swift" may be inadequate to describe the changes ahead for the FDA.

The biggest and possibly most important change, however, is who President-elect Obama and his Secretary of HHS, Tom Daschle, decide to nominate for the new FDA Commissioner. "Now, in the Administration's final days, policymakers at FDA want to appear to be tough on industry," said Sen. Bart Stupak (D-MI). "This latest posturing is no reason for FDA political appointees to retain their positions. I encourage the incoming Obama Administration to clean house among FDA’s political appointees and bring change to an agency that badly needs it."

It seems like everyone in the Pharma Blogosphere and the press is recommending or wondering who Dr. Andrew von Eschenbach's replacement will be.

To help take the pulse of various stakeholders, Pharma Marketing News hosted the "Who Should Obama Nominate for FDA Commissioner?" survey starting in November, 2008. To date, over 400 consumers, healthcare professionals, government agency staffers, and drug industry executives have voted in this survey. This article summarizes the results of that survey.

Critical
What Daschle Plans to Do About the Healthcare Crisis

"The time has come, finally, to fix our broken health-care system," says Tom Daschle in the close of best-selling book, "Critical: What We Can to Do About the Healthcare." Daschle, of course, is Obama's choice for Secretary of Health and Human Services. Daschle will also lead a new White House office of health reform.

To paraphrase General Patton, "Daschle, you magnificent bastard, we read your book!" Which is what all pharmaceutical executives and marketers should do. After all, Daschle warns that the "health-care industry would have to reconsider its business model" and he include pharmaceutical companies as part of the "health-care industry."

For those among you who do not have time to read Daschle's book, Pharma Marketing News has done it for you. This article summarizes the main points Daschle makes and reveals his plan for "fixing" the problem.

Anticipated Publication Date

18-December-2008

Ad Submission Deadline Date

15-December-2008

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 7.9: November, 2008

2008-11-14T05:06:00.000-08:00

Focus

Value-based marketing, eMarketing success measures, Sampling

OpEd

TBD

Planned Articles

Optimizing Market Access: A Guide to Effective Pricing, Reimbursement and Messaging Strategies. In today’s competitive market, pricing and reimbursement strategies are key to maximizing brand success and ROI. Because every country’s healthcare system is different—and every product situation is unique—every brand requires a specific access plan, tailored to each market. And you must support each plan with effective messaging that ensures strong product acceptance and uptake.

Experts from TNS Healthcare spoke on this issue in a recent webinar and during an exclusive interview with Pharma Marketing News.

Jonathan Kay, Global Practice Area Leader, Brand and Access Management, TNS Healthcare, set the stage by reviewing global market access issues and identifying challenges and opportunities in coverage and payment.

Larry Olson, Vice President and Practice Leader, Payer Markets, TNS Healthcare, looked in greater depth at communication strategies to maximize access, including how to develop compelling messages to build and sustain brand value.

The Role of Sampling in the Marketing Mix: Includes results from the survey "Should Free Drug Samples Be Banned?"

eSuccess: Measuring Success and Communicating the Impact of eMarketing.This article is a review of a presentation by Aaron Uydess, Senior eMarketing Manager at Novo Nordisk, made at Eye for Pharma’s 3rd eCommunication and Online Marketing Summit held October 23-24, in Boston, Massachusetts.
Uydess presents a best-in-class approach to developing online plans that align with strategy, reduce silos, and measure and merchandise digital strategies across a pharmaceutical marketing organization

Anticipated Publication Date

20-Nov-2008

Ad Submission Deadline Date

17-Nov-2008

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 7.8: October, 2008

2008-09-04T09:28:00.001-07:00

Focus

CME, Elections, Sampling, Clinical Trial Marketing

OpEd

TBD

Planned Articles

Industry Support of CME at a Crossroads

What Pharma Thinks of the Presidential Candidates

The Role of Sampling in the Marketing Mix

Marketing Clinical Trial Results

Anticipated Publication Date

9-Oct-2008

Ad Submission Deadline Date

25-September-2008

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 7.7: August/September 2008

2008-07-16T06:31:00.000-07:00

Focus

India, Sales Force Effectiveness, CME

OpEd

TBD

Planned Articles

Indian Market Booming

Building Power Sales Messages

PhRMA's New Code on Interactions with Healthcare Professionals

Sales Force Effectiveness: Current Influences and Future Prospects

Anticipated Publication Date

9-Sept-2008

Ad Submission Deadline Date

15-August-2008

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 7.6: June/July 2008

2008-07-08T04:13:00.000-07:00

Focus

Marketing ROI, Sales Force Effectiveness, Racism, Public Image, Value-based Pricing, EU focus

OpEd

A Global Perspective on Pharmaceutical Marketing

Planned Articles

Why Pharmaceutical Marketers Ignore ROI
You Want ROI? You're Not Ready for ROI!

Pharmaceutical marketers are being asked to more thoroughly prove the effectiveness of their programs by quantifying exactly which messages impact prescribing the most, what the return on each sales and marketing program is, and what optimal combination of programs (and budgets) will deliver maximum prescribing (market share) results. Thus, we often hear speakers affirm the importance of “Return on Investment” (ROI) in their presentations at conferences relating to sales force effectiveness and marketing. However, there is often scant evidence that ROI has been effectively measured.

There are many reasons why pharmaceutical marketers may not be effectively measuring ROI. This article discusses several of these reasons and includes feedback and opinions from several experts who agree that all marketers – and pharma marketers in particular – have a problem with traditional ROI analysis.

Creating the Most Effective Sales Calls
The Impact of Messaging on Prescribing

As sales costs soar, it is critical to design and deliver messages that break through the competitive clutter and impact product performance. But how can develop messages that drive prescribing? How can you be sure your reps are giving the messages you want to convey—and know those messages are working? And how can you protect against competitive messaging and unexpected market events?

This article presents highlights from a presentation by David Owen, Director, TNS Healthcare and Ian McKinnon, Senior Vice President, TNS Healthcare. Included in this article are the results of TNS Healthcare's physician research from across the US and Europe, revealing key insights into message effectiveness and prescribing impact.

The Life Sciences Profiles of Color Project
An Opportunity for Pharma to Improve It’s Public Image

On October 14, 2007, Dr. James Watson, winner of the Nobel Prize as co-discoverer of DNA's molecular structure and former chancellor of New York's Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory was quoted in the Times of London saying he was “inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa'' because “all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours -- whereas all the testing says not really.''

In response, Fard Johnmar over at HealthcareVOX blog, went "off topic" to comment on racist "gestures" like nooses hung on trees and doors and the brouhaha over Watson’s remarks. Johnmar suggested that we should not waste our time condemning these incidents but rather counteract racist beliefs with communication.

This article describes how this lead to the creation of the Life Sciences Profiles of Color (LSPOC) Project and Blog. Not only can this project give young people examples of successful people of color in the life sciences, it can also help improve the industry's public image, which has fallen to a new low in the last year.

Value-based Pricing
Lessons to Learn from the UK Experience

This article is reproduced with permission from eyeforpharma, which hosted the Oncology Summit Europe conference in January, 2008. The original title was "Market access: obstacles and opportunities (Part II)."

This article summarizes the second half of a presentation by Uday Bose, European marketing director for GlaxoSmithKline Oncology, in which he focuses on reform attempts within European countries and pharma’s reactions, the benefits and perils of risk-sharing agreements and how pharma might best meet the challenges of the marketplace now and into the future. Also included are updates relating to these issues since the presentation was made.

Anticipated Publication Date

16-July-2008

Ad Submission Deadline Date

11-July-2008

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

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Issue 7.3: March, 2008

2008-03-27T03:40:00.001-07:00

Focus

DTC advertising, Sales Force Effectiveness, eDetailing, Social Media Marketing, Recession

OpEd

I'm All a Twitter Over Twitter!

Planned Articles

The Coming Pharma Marketing Recession
Tips for Surviving the Slump!

The U.S. has finally slid into recession, according to the majority of economists in the latest Wall Street Journal economic-forecasting survey.

Will the recession spread to the pharmaceutical industry and, in particular, lead to a slump in pharmaceutical marketing? Is the pharmaceutical industry already in a recession?

This article presents opinions and evidence that there is a slump in pharma marketing spending and provides some tips to vendors for surviving the slump.

Tips for Improving Small Pharma’s Sales
No Additional Sales People Needed!
While small pharma can boast of several prominent breakthroughs in the research lab, Big Pharma still maintains an inevitable advantage in sales. However, Small Pharma companies have leveled the playing field here as well by adopting the sales techniques of their larger counterparts, particularly those that take advantage of business intelligence technology.

This article highlights five tips from OnDemandIQ designed to help Small Pharma focus and prioritize their sales teams on their most important goals -- improving efficiency and boosting sales.

What Americans Think About Drug Advertising
The 2008 USA Today/Kaiser Family Foundation/Harvard School of Public Health Survey -- "The Public on Prescription Drugs and Pharmaceutical Companies" -- discovered the obvious; namely, "TV Drug Ads Prompt Viewers to Ask Docs for Rx."

Although huge pharma profits and easy money have made marketing ROI analyses unnecessary, it doesn’t require a survey to prove that direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising works.

The survey, however, has some nuggets of information that give marketers further insight into the public’s attitude towards drug industry advertising. This article summarize these insights.

Closed-Loop Marketing
A New Role for eDetailing

Despite all the complaints about how little of pharma marketers’ budgets are devoted to Internet-based channels (ie, eMarketing), there’s always good attendance at industry conferences focusing on eMarketing and always something to learn by attending. This was the case for CBI’s 7th Annual eMarketing for the Pharmaceutical Industry conference, which I attended a few weeks ago in Philadelphia, PA.

This article is a review of the presentation “Where Should Closed Loop Marketing Really Begin?” by Bruce Grant, Senior VP, Business Strategy and David Wigder, Senior VP, Strategy & Analytics at Digitas Health. This presentation was focused on leveraging eDetailing for effective closed-loop marketing campaigns.
Pharma’s Social Media Marketing Readiness Score
Results of the Social Media Pharma Marketing Readiness Survey

Each pharmaceutical company has its own unique regulatory environment, corporate culture, and knowledge that will determine if it is ready to embark on social media marketing. In order to determine how ready pharmaceutical companies, their vendor partners, and other companies are for engaging in social media marketing, Pharma Marketing News is hosting an online “Rate Your Social Media Marketing Readiness” survey or tool. To date, about 108 people filled out the survey and received their personal Social Media Marketing Readiness Score.

This article summarizes the aggregate findings and presents the average scores against which you can compare your own score.

Anticipated Publication Date

27-March-2008

Ad Submission Deadline Date

22-March-2008

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

Issue 7.1: January 2008

2008-01-12T04:44:00.000-08:00

Focus

Celebrity Endorsement, CME, MSL, DTC, Prescription Data, PDUFA

OpEd

TBD

Planned Articles

Use of Celebrities for PR and DTC Advertising
Congress is investigating the use of celebrity endorsements in pharmaceutical advertising and recently sent a letter to Pfizer questioning if the use of Dr. Robert Jarvik, a physician and inventor of the Jarvik artificial heart, is misleading consumers. At issue is the fact that Jarvik has never held a license to practice medicine in any state.

If you have questions about the "dos & don'ts" and "pros & cons" of using medical and non-medical mouthpieces for pharma PR and DTC advertising, this article may have some answers based on interviews of experts with years of experience in this area.

Wither CME? Industry Support, New Rules, Technology's Influence
Last year, the pharmaceutical industry provided $1.19 billion to sponsor CME programs ($1.44 billion if you include advertising and exhibits at CME events). That's about 60% of all sources of funding for CME reported by ACCME.

A task force of the American Psychological Association (APA) recently recommended that its 148,000 members "turn their nose up at pharma funds; limit the role industry plays at professional conferences, meetings and CME sessions; and adopt strict guidelines on conflict-of-interest disclosure."

Congress continues to examine pharma industry support of CME and ACCME has issued some new guidance for accredited CME providers.

This article examines the current state of industry support for CME and what reforms may be coming down the pike. Several experts contribute to the discussion, including Pharma Marketing Roundtable members and bloggers. The article also presents results from a current survey on this topic, entitled "Is It Time to End Industry Sponsored CME?"

Understanding the Strategic Value of MSLs What the Future May Hold
This article by contributing author Neil Gray, examines why the industry’s current use of tactical value measures for MSLs might ultimately prove limiting by positioning MSLs inappropriately and inhibiting their broader involvement in organizational and stakeholder problem-solving.

The author examines how tomorrow's MSL might be employed by Pharma and discusses the strategic movement of MSLs into the competitive intelligence space, teaching roles, strategic input to and evaluation of portfolio development, and investor relations.

Doctor Data Wars: Another "Free Speech" Issue?
In 2006, New Hampshire became the first state to prohibit pharmacies from selling information about what drugs doctors prescribe. IMS Health and Verispan are companies that sell prescribing data to drug companies, which use it to tailor sales pitches to doctors. IMS Health sued the state of New Hampshire, arguing that the new law violated the company’s “free speech” rights.

The U.S. District Court for the District of New Hampshire struck down the law, but the state of New Hampshire appealed.

This article reviews the case and looks at the issue of who owns physician prescribing data and the free speech implications. Sean Flynn, Associate Director of the Program on Intellectual Property at Washington College of Law at American University, who argued on behalf of a number of "amici curiae" at the appeal, is interviewed and opinions from members of the Pharma Marketing Roundtable as also included.
PDUFA Update: No Get-Out-of-Jail-Free Card for Pharma
In September 2006, Congress enacted a new user fee program as part of the FDA Amendments Act, aka Prescription Drug User Fee Act (PDUFA) to fund pre-reviews of direct-to-consumer (DTC) television ads. This was something the drug industry fought hard for. But the fiscal year 2008 omnibus appropriations legislation signed into law Dec. 26 by President Bush does not appropriate the money for FDA to spend.

Instead, the law increases by $4 million the amount of funds available from the U.S. Treasury for ad review. This will bring spending for the program to $6.5 million, a House staffer told "The Pink Sheet." The action reflects House members' concern that user fees give the impression drug makers are buying FDA approval.

Unlike the User Fee Program, which would have guaranteed funding for the program for 5 years, there is now no guarantee that funds will be available in 2009 or thereafter.

This article reviews the recent history of PDUFA and summaries the opinions of several experts on what the changes will mean for pharmaceutical DTC advertising.

Anticipated Publication Date

29-January-2008

Ad Submission Deadline Date

22-January-2008

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

Issue 6.10: Nov/Dec 2007

2007-11-18T05:49:00.000-08:00

Focus

Online DTC, Adherence, Medical Transcript Advertising, Web 2.0 Regulatory Framework

OpEd

TBD

Planned Articles

Mapping New Paths through the DTC Marketing Mix Maze: Integrating the Power of Non-Traditional Media
On one hand, pharmaceutical marketers allocate a disproportionately larger share of their advertising budgets to broadcast media (TV and radio) than do most other industries—70% versus the overall average of 54% based on 2006 TNS Media Intelligence data. On the other hand, it is a well-known fact that pharmaceutical marketers allocate a much smaller part of their ad budgets to the Internet channel than do most other industries. The majority of consumers now rely more on the web and word-of-mouth than on traditional media for their health information.

All this begs the question, are pharmaceutical marketers optimizing their media mix to take advantage of the consumer contact points offered by new and non-traditional media such as blogs, WOM, texting, etc.?

In this article, David Kweskin, Senior Vice President and Practice Area Leader, Brand and Communications Division, TNS, explains how his company helps marketers look across the full spectrum of media—traditional media like radio, TV, print—and and gives them a common way of measuring them against new media like blogs and word of mouth. Meanwhile, Morgan Lozier, Director, Web Evaluation Brand and Communications Division, TNS, presents a review of 3 erectile dysfunction product websites to illustrate what the online DTC experience should look like. He finds one winner among the contenders.
Accomplishing Adherence Chase Compliance, Pursue Persistence
Lack of adherence -- the combined effect of compliance and persistence -- is a big problem for the pharmaceutical industry. James Chase, editor-in-chief of MM&M, once wrote "To say that tackling patient compliance and persistence poses a challenge to the pharmaceutical industry is like calling Tiger Woods a competent golfer or describing Katrina as a particularly bad storm. It is a gross understatement."

This article reviews presentations made at the recent eyeforpharma Patient Adherence and Persistence Summit including a presentation by David Baker, VP & General Manager of Shire's ADHD Business Unit, who presented on "Best Practices for Fostering Adherence." He used the ADHD market as a case study.

Medical Transcript Advertising Reach Targeted Physicians at the Point of Care
With roughly 100,000 pharmaceutical sales representatives knocking on doctors’ office doors every day, the increasing workload of physicians, and states imposing restrictions on sales rep activity, it is harder and harder for pharmaceutical companies to reach prescribers with their marketing messages. There is also the expense of using "live" sales reps, which can range from $200 to $500 per call.

All this underscores an ever-increasing need to reach physicians with brand messages and reminders through "non-personal" marketing techniques that do not directly involve sales reps.

This article reviews advertRx™, a solution offered by datumRX, a California-based company that specializes in aggregating clinical data and medical records. advertRx™ reaches physicians with targeted brand messaging by inserting Rx product logos on medical transcripts containing key words, relevant to the product.

Web 2.0 Regulatory Framework: A Critical Analysis
At the recent eyeforpharma "2nd Annual eCommunication and Online Marketing" conference, Fard Johnmar (Founder, Envision Solutions), Jim Nail (CMO, TNS Media Intelligence/Cymfony), and John C. Serio, (partner, Seyfarth Shaw LLP) talked about regulatory issues relating to Web 2.0 and summarized a new social media monitoring and marketing framework for pharmaceutical companies ("New Social Media Marketing Framework White Paper"). This article takes a critical look at the "Framework" and offers further insights into the regulatory issues it raises.

Anticipated Publication Date

28-November-2007

Ad Submission Deadline Date

21-November-2007

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

Issue 6.9: October 2007

2007-10-22T05:32:00.000-07:00

Focus

Online Physician Collaboration, Competitive Intelligence, Rep Access Tools, Sales Force

OpEd

Awards. What Are They Good For?

Planned Articles

Collaborating with Online Physician Communities: Pharma-Physician Peer-to-Peer Dialog via Sermo
Pfizer and Sermo -- a Web-based community where physicians share observations from daily practice, discuss emerging trends and provide new insights into medications, devices and treatments -- recently announced a "strategic collaboration designed to redefine the way physicians in the U.S. and the healthcare industry work together to improve patient care." To answer the many questions raised by this collaboration -- including concerns about off-label communications -- Pharma Marketing News invited Daniel Palestrant, M.D., founder and CEO of Sermo, to be a guest on a recent Pharma Marketing Talk podcast. This article is based partly on that interview as well as other sources.
Pharmaceutical Competitive Intelligence Forewarned is Forearmed
The phrase "competitive intelligence" (CI) may conjure images of dumpster dives, covert ops, and general sneaking around, poking into the business of other businesses. Or, you may look at audience profiles, focus groups, campaign metrics and competitor landscape analyses, and figure that’s all the CI you need. However, one of the foremost practitioners of CI, Jan Herring, puts it in a broader frame: "Knowledge and foreknowledge of the world around us – the prelude to management decision and action." This report of impressions from a pharma CI conference is an insider view, primarily how-to principles for CI providers, rather than how-to-use concepts for CI consumers. Yet you don't have to be an operative to benefit from reading this article, if for no other reason that to realize that SWOT is not just pitch-deck boilerplate, but the evolving awareness of your brand's interactions with the world.

Re-Designing the Pharma Sales Force: An Ailing Model in Need of Change
More and more doctors, clinics, and healthcare institutions are closing their doors to sales reps out of concern for the increasingly aggressive tactics used by pharmaceutical companies. The frequency model utilized by major pharmacos – pushing 5 reps per doctor to gain a share of voice – is frowned upon by prescribers as an over-kill. This article focuses on presentations made at a recent conference that underscored the conundrum the industry now faces – a sales model which is steadily losing the ability to deliver results in proportion to its costs, and not much on the horizon by way of an alternative. This leads very naturally to a provocative question – is it going to be best to focus on incremental (micro-evolutionary) changes, or is a radically different approach needed? The article concludes with some thoughts on the answer to that question.

Rep Access Tools: Skyscape’s Educational, Non-Personal Promotions Open Docs’ Doors
There’s no denying that the pharmaceutical industry is challenged today more than ever before to obtain quality face-to-face interactions with physicians. Such interactions are vital to enhancing brand awareness and increasing market share. Skyscape offers a medically-relevant service that is highly sought-after among physicians. As a result, it has become a popular and effective tool for field representatives to gain access to practitioners. Skyscape’s Representative Assess Program takes advantage of over 500 specialty educational titles that doctors are interested in receiving. This article describes this program and how it can increase your product's market share.

Anticipated Publication Date

29-October-2007

Ad Submission Deadline Date

20-October-2007

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

Issue 6.8: September 2007

2007-09-17T13:29:00.000-07:00

Focus

DTC, Web 2.0, CME

OpEd

TBD

Planned Articles

Web 2.0 Tricks: All is Revealed! FDA Will Never Be the Wiser!
Pharmaceutical marketers are having a field day pushing the envelope on the Internet and especially in the social networking, Web 2.0 arena -- the new WILD, WILD WEST of the Internet. Secrets of the perfect execution of the following tricks are revealed:
1. Google "BAdwords"
2. Posing as a Consumer on Social Networks
3. Wikipedia Sleight-of-Hand Edit
4. YouTube "Consumer-Generated" Video

Surviving the Election Wars Use DTC and Your Employees to Your Advantage
Advertising by political candidates has been growing. Total political ad expenditures in 2006 exceeded $2.5 billion. This year, with campaigns starting much earlier than usual, there already is significant ad spending in the political arena. Although many issues relating to the pharmaceutical industry in Congress have been essentially tabled for now, they never go away. If, for example, a Democrat is elected as president in 2008, the threat of veto may disappear and Congress will again push for things like a direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising moratorium. Given this outlook, the pharmaceutical industry must take a pro-active stance if it is to counter all the negative publicity the 2008 campaign will generate. With the billions of dollars that the industry spends on DTC advertising, there is an opportunity to use DTC to focus more on humanitarian goals of the industry.

Measuring Consumer Sentiment About Prescription Drugs: Data Mining and Scoring Consumer-Generated Content About Pharmaceutical Brands
If the chatter and buzz of marketing vendors at industry conferences is any gauge, pharmaceutical companies are excited about consumer-generated content (CGC) (sometimes called user-generated content, or UGC), now being touted as the Internet’s next "new thing". At a recent Pharma Marketing Talk podcast, John Mack spoke with Mark DePaoli, life sciences analyst at BrandIntel, an online information service, about mining CGC to evaluate consumer sentiment about pharmaceuticals. This article summarizes that discussion and presents a case study analysis comparing consumer sentiment of Botox vs. Restalyne.

CME Laundromat or ACCME Cleaning House?: A New Focus on Industry Support of CME
In a recent New York Times Op-Ed piece, Daniel Carlat, a professor at Tufts Medical School and editor in chief of The Carlat Psychiatry Report, characterizes pharma-sponsored Continuing Medical education (CME) as "a new twist on that well-known instrument of corruption, money laundering." Congress continues to examine pharma industry support of CME and ACCME has issued some new guidance for accredited CME providers. This article examines the current state of industry support for CME and what reforms may be coming down the pike.

Anticipated Publication Date

25-September-2007

Ad Submission Deadline Date

20-September-2007

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

Issue 6.7: Summer 2007

2007-08-13T04:46:00.000-07:00

Focus

Marketing Mix, DTC, Whistleblowers, Physician Marketing

OpEd

J&J's PR Hindenburg Disaster!

Planned Articles

Merck Rejiggers Its Marketing Mix: Will Other Pharma Companies Follow?
Adam Schechter, President of Merck US Human Health, made this statement not long ago at a Goldman Sachs healthcare conference: "Industry must embrace new ways of engaging physicians on their terms." Clearly, physicians are not embracing pharma on THEIR terms. Schechter laid out some details of Merck's 2007-2010 goals.

Stop Wasting $Millions on Ineffective DTC Ads! Testing Technology Can Help Improve Ads and Engage Viewers
You're wasting hundreds of millions of dollars on ads that aren't delivering your key messages! And it has nothing to do with FDA rules. That’s the opinion of Lee Weinblatt, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of the PreTesting Company. Weinblatt’s company has been measuring the effectiveness of drug ads since 1974. Of course, at that time there were only print ads aimed at physicians in medical journals. Today, the pharmaceutical industry spends in excess of $5 billion per year on direct to consumer (DTC) advertising and billions more on physician ads. This article highlights PreTesting's ad measurement technology and Mr. Weinblatt reveals interesting insights about the major mistakes that pharmaceutical advertisers make with regard to measuring the effectiveness of their ads. The article also presents 17 key findings on How to Create an Effective Drug Ad.

The Changing Landscape of Physician Interactions: Strategies to Improve Interactions with Key Physicians
Pharmaceutical companies are under increasing pressure to reduce costs, speed the time-to-market for new products and ensure that physicians are informed and educated about their products. Traditional interaction methods, however, are becoming less effective as the quality of interactions between physicians and pharmaceutical representatives have decreased. Brand marketing managers are looking to augment traditional offerings with non-personal selling technologies to reach new segments or healthcare professionals. MERGE Rx recognizes these changes and offers a new generation of Web-enabled software that helps pharmaceutical companies manage physician interactions—including key opinion leader (KOL) management, phaseIV trials, and eDetailing—from a single, secure and scalable access point.

A Tale of Two Pharma Whistleblower Novels: Big Pharma and Killer Drug
My summer reading included two novels about the pharmaceutical industry that featured industry whistleblowers and/or were written by whistleblowers. The first novel I read was Big Pharma, The Novel, written by John Prieve, a former pharmaceutical executive. The second novel, Killer Drug, is the second by Peter Rost, a well-known whistleblower and former Pfizer executive. Although whistleblowing figures prominently in both novels, the two are as different as night and day. Killer Drug is the night – very dark and lacking depth – whereas Big Pharma is the day – shedding light on real-world pharmaceutical marketing and sales practices. This article is a review of both novels and includes insights from several bloggers and other experts, including Jane Chin.

Anticipated Publication Date

21-August-2007

Ad Submission Deadline Date

16-August-2007

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

Issue 6.6: June 2007

2007-06-16T07:24:00.000-07:00

Focus

KOL Management, Sales Analytics, MSL Leadership, Social Media

OpEd

TBD

Planned Articles

Big Pharma: A Whistleblower Novel: A review of the novel "Big Pharma" by John Prieve, a former phrmaceutical executive. The story: "As Jack Ford ascends the corporate ladder within Alsace Pharmaceuticals, a powerful Fortune 500 company, he is exposed to the ultimate in corporate espionage, deception, and graft. To avoid federal prosecution for his own illegal promotional and contracting practices, Jack is forced to cooperate with Food and Drug Administration agents assuming the unwanted role as a corporate whistleblower." Sound familiar (except for the bit about FDA)?

Big Pharma Sales Analytics for the Rest of Us: When it comes to implementing Big Pharma-style sales analytics, smaller life sciences companies have traditionally been caught between a rock and a hard place: either they were stuck in “Excel Hell” or opted for expensive business intelligence tools requiring high up-front costs and IT infrastructure.

Now, OnDemandIQ Inc., a Los Angeles based company, provides OnDemandIQ Insights’™ Life Sciences, which is an affordable web-hosted business intelligence solution for smaller companies that find themselves in this position.

This article is a review of OnDemandIQ Insights based on a dicsussion with Steven Schneider, Principal at OnDemandIQ Inc.

KOL Management: Mobile devices -- especially cell phones -- are becoming ubiquitous in the U.S. Most people never leave home without their cell phones and text messaging is mainstream among cell phone users. Approximately 350 billion text messages are sent and received worldwide each month. It is estimated that more than 15% of these messages are commercial or marketing messages. How can pharmaceutical companies use this technology for consumer acquisition and retention? To get some ideas, we interviewed Robert Flynn, President of Pulse Media Response, LLC, and summarize that discussion in this article.

MSL Leadership: Speed bumps, traffic lights, and landmines: It's not often that one gets to hear and observe three pharma CEOs on the same meeting discussion panel, but that’s precisely what unfolded as part of Scientific Advantage’s Annual Medical Science Liaison Seminar and Leadership Summit held May 1-2 at the Bridgewater Marriott. During the second day of the meeting, P. Roy Vagelos, MD, retired Chairman and CEO of Merck & Company, Ernest Mario, PhD, Chairman of Reliant Pharmaceuticals, and Laurence J. Downey, MD, President and CEO of Solvay Pharmaceuticals shared with their audience some of the drivers that brought them into the pharmaceutical business, challenges and opportunities they faced over their careers, and advice to those medical science liaisons seeking to expand their horizons and responsibilities.

Anticipated Publication Date

21-June-2007

Ad Submission Deadline Date

19-June-2007

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

Issue 6.5: May, 2007

2007-05-18T11:57:00.000-07:00

Focus

Medical Science Liaisons, Brand Optimization, Mobile Marketing, Social Media

OpEd

Moore, Don't Ignore Pharma Bloggers

Planned Articles

Measuring an Intangible: Medical Science Liaison Metrics Consensus: As catalysts of collaborative relationships and scientific knowledge exchange, medical science liaisons (MSLs) are immersed in intangible value contribution that often require lengthy business cycles and vesting terms. Now, 40 years since the inception of the MSL concept by Upjohn in 1967, industry’s MSL programs face the same challenges that knowledge programs like strategy and competitive intelligence face: how do you measure the value of science and collaborative processes required to develop scientific ideas into practical reality and competitive advantage? This article by Dr. Jane Chin of the Medical Science Liaison Institute, offers suggestions for MSL metrics based on results of a consensus survey.

Optimizing Brand Power, from Before Launch to Beyond Expiry: There are few new blockbusters on the horizon and many profitable drugs are coming off patent. Pharmaceutical companies have scarce resources to deal with this situation and every function wants to be taken seriously when these resources are marshalled and everybody wants a seat at the decision-making table. If pharmaceutical marketers want seats at the table, then they must show how marketing can contribute to long-term company financial performance. What’s the real value marketers can provide over the years ahead? Data and methodological limitations will not be accepted as an excuse, according to Friedman. The mandate is to dig deeper, think differently and come up with ideas for creating long-term value in the brand.

Mobile Pharma Marketing: Mobile devices -- especially cell phones -- are becoming ubiquitous in the U.S. Most people never leave home without their cell phones and text messaging is mainstream among cell phone users. Approximately 350 billion text messages are sent and received worldwide each month. It is estimated that more than 15% of these messages are commercial or marketing messages. How can pharmaceutical companies use this technology for consumer acquisition and retention? To get some ideas, we interviewed Robert Flynn, President of Pulse Media Response, LLC, and summarize that discussion in this article.

How Consumers Use Social Media for Health: Health marketers are used to waiting out technology trends, but Social Computing is making them nervous. New forms of Social Computing are emerging for healthcare, from expert health blogs that turn medical information into conversation to social networks that inspire with personal stories and progress trackers. Result: more transparency in healthcare, a trend that health plans and pharmaceutical companies must prepare for. Marketers should move now to monitoring, planning for, and, when possible, participating in Social Computing activities. This article reviews a recent Forrester report.

Anticipated Publication Date

30-May-2007

Ad Submission Deadline Date

21-May-2007

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

Issue 6.4: April, 2007

2007-04-18T11:15:00.000-07:00

Focus

Brand Optimization, New Media, Targeted Marketing

OpEd

TBD

Planned Articles

YouPharma: New Rules for Pharma Marketing and New Media: The return on investments for traditional pharma marketing channels -- TV, drug reps, print -- is declining. A new approach to the way forward in pharma marketing is needed. Is it time for the pharmaceutical industry to take the advice of some of its critics and use the new Web 2.0 tools available to it and extricate itself from its moribund situation of declining ROI? Highlights from a Pharma Roundtable discussion and comments from several bloggers in the Pharma BlogosphereTM.

How Readable, Credible & Useful are Pharma Blogs?: This article presents the compllete results from the first ever survey of The Pharma Blogosphere in which blog readers evaluate 22 different pharma-related blogs on the basis of readability, credibility, usefulness, and bias.

Faith-based Pharma Marketing: This article describes a new health awareness initiative intended to reach African Americans via churches and health ministries in an effort to alert this community to their heightened risk for life-threatening conditions such as high blood pressure, diabetes and much more.

Americans Skeptical Of Pharma Cause Marketing: A new survey by Envision Solutions, LLC, a healthcare marketing communications company, suggests that many Americans are deeply skeptical of pharmaceutical companies' motives for supporting non-profit patient advocacy groups.

Optimizing Brand Power, from Before Launch to Beyond Expiry: There are few new blockbusters on the horizon and many profitable drugs are coming off patent. Pharmaceutical companies have scarce resources to deal with this situation and every function wants to be taken seriously when these resources are marshalled and everybody wants a seat at the decision-making table. If pharmaceutical marketers want seats at the table, then they must show how marketing can contribute to long-term company financial performance. What’s the real value marketers can provide over the years ahead? Data and methodological limitations will not be accepted as an excuse, according to Friedman. The mandate is to dig deeper, think differently and come up with ideas for creating long-term value in the brand. NOTE: This article will be published as a "prequel" to the May issue, on or about May 4, 2007.

Anticipated Publication Date

26-April-2007

Ad Submission Deadline Date

9-April-2007

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

Issue 6.3: March, 2007

2007-03-05T04:24:00.001-08:00

Focus

Disease Education Marketing, Pharma Blogging

OpEd

Should Bloggers Dine at Pharma's Table?

Planned Articles

Disease Mongering: Is It For Real?: Disease mongering is a term that was coined by the late journalist Lynn Payer to describe what she saw as the confluence of interests by some doctors, drug companies, patient advocacy groups and media in exaggerating the severity of illness and the ability of drugs to "cure" them. Today's definition includes the accusation that, for example, cardio metabolic syndrome is really a cluster of risk factors for patients with diabetes, hypertension and heart disease.

Innerstate: A Review of the First Disease Awareness Documentary Film: Innerspace is a film produced by Centocor, which produces and markets biologics for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis (RA), Crohn's disease, and psoriasis -- the three conditions described in the film. John Mack reviews the film after after seeing it in a private screening. It can be seen in selected theaters.

Are Pharma Bloggers Biased Against the Industry?: Well, no! Duh! There are some blogs out there that are very supportive. But how supportive or critical are individual blogs in the pharma blogosphere and is there an overall bias one way or the other? This article presents preliminary results from the first ever survey of The Pharma Blogosphere in which blog readers evaluate 22 different pharma-related blogs.

Anticipated Publication Date

27-March-2007

Ad Submission Deadline Date

9-March-2007

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

Issue 6.2: February 2007

2007-02-21T10:23:00.000-08:00

God Bless R&D, but Marketers May Go to Hell!: Hey you friggin' critics of the pharmaceutical industry! Shut your pie hole! Drug companies have done a lot more to make my life better than you critics have. Aside from the anecdotal nature of this defense, here are five reasons why I hate this "better than the critics" argument made by some defenders of the pharmaceutical industry. Read the full text of this OpEd piece...
The Expanding Pharma Blogosphere: Although the pharmaceutical industry is slow to adopt blogging for PR purposes or otherwise, its critics and supporters alike are flocking to the blogosphere to make their voices heard. This article introduces you to several of these blogs, what motivates their authors, and what the pharmaceutical industry response, if any, should be. Read more... and order the reprint without subscribing.
Surfing the eMarketing Big One!: For Pharma marketers, the "Big One" is the Boomer population curve with the economic potential that it represents. A key question is: "Are we ready for it?" Read more... and order the reprint without subscribing.
Social Network Marketing: The Wisdom of the Crowd: Highlights from the first ever live podcast from a pharmaceutical industry conference. The podcast was one of the biweekly Pharma Marketing Talk shows hosted by John Mack, publisher and editor of Pharma Marketing News. Each show features interviews with leaders and innovators in pharmaceutical marketing. Read more... and order the reprint without subscribing.
What's Next vs. What's Best: Harry Sweeney reports on the recent Pharmaceutical Brand Leadership conference held in Chicago. The article covers presentations on branding, marketing "Negative Goods," the Boomer Wave, unrefuted industry criticism, and other issues impacting the future of the pharmaceutical industry. Read more... and order the reprint without subscribing.

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Issue 6.1: January 2007

2006-11-24T07:14:00.000-08:00

Focus

Sales Force Effectiveness

OpEd

Word-of-Net: I hope that PMN Forums will become a big part of the Pharma Marketing Network and that many of you will become my buddies as well.

Planned Articles

Are Sales Reps Necessary?: It is common knowledge that sales reps are much less effective than they used to be. The pharmaceutical industry is set to follow Pfizer's lead and cut 10-20% of the sales force. Is it crazy to ask if sales reps are needed at all?
Reinventing the Sales Model: TNS Healthcare experts talk about moving beyond current approaches to a new sales model--one with the right balance of selling and service to forge the strong physician relationships that drive long-term prescribing
Sales Reps Debate Their Value: We asked reps on a CafePharma discussion board what they think. You might be surprised by their responses.
An Online Community to Call Our Own: Pharmaceutical sales have CafePharma and now pharmaceutical marketers have Pharma Marketing Network Forums. Find out more by reading this review. (Download complete article. FREE!)

Publication Date

16-January-2007

Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164

Issue 5.10: November/December 2006

2006-11-16T13:48:00.000-08:00

Focus

Industry Regulation, eMarketing, Sales Force Effectiveness

OpEd

Betting the Pharm

Planned Articles

Congress vs. Pharma: Trouble Ahead? - A Pharma Marketing Roundtable discussion of the Democratic agenda for pharma (real and feared). See Pharma Marketing Talk show "110th Congress: What's in Store for Pharma?" for more information on topics to be covered and how to listen in to the live podcast scheduled for Tuesday, November 28, 2006 at 1 PM Eastern US. Read more...
Pharma’s Plodding Approach to eMarketing: Speaker after speaker at eyeforpharma’s eCommunication & Online Marketing Conference, held recently in Philadelphia, commented on the plodding approach to e-communication and e-marketing (including social networking) taken by the pharmaceutical industry. This article, written by health communications veteran, Harry Sweeney, is a frank assessment of the key takeawys from this meeting. Read more...
Sales Effectiveness Meets eMarketing: Steve Woodruff, Founder and Principal Consultant of Impactiviti, and John Mack team up to review eyeforpharma’s Sales Effectiveness conference, which was co-located with the eCommunication & Online Marketing Conference. Occasionally, the dialogue takes a point-counterpoint turn as the authors approach topics from their differing perspectives. Read more...
Teaching New Dogs Old Tricks: An interview with Professor Jim Avery at University of Oklahoma's Gaylord College of Mass Communication about preparing graduate students for a career in health advertising. You can listen to a Pharma Marketing Talk interview of Professor Avery here. Read more...

Publication Date

6-December-2006

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Issue 5.9: October, 2006

2006-10-23T06:55:00.000-07:00

Focus

eMarketing, DTC

Articles

Interpretation of Ads (OpEd): What's pharmaceutical marketing coming to if we have to interpret the ads that marketers produce?
e-Interia Plagues the Pharma Industry: To make sense of current estimates about pharma spending online and understand where it may be heading in the future, Pharma Marketing News recently hosted a Pharma Marketing Roundtable discussion of the issues. This article summarizes that discussion.
Optimiizing DTC Performance: How TNS Healthcare helps clients build a lifetime connection between consumers and brands.
The Brand Marketing Mix: This article is a summary of a presentation made before a pharmaceutical brand team on marketing tactics that are viable now and in the future, how to avoid risk by balancing risk vs. impact, and what the marketing mix trends will be one to five years out.
Pharma Online Spending: An Interview with eMarketer Senior Analyst Lisa Phillips regarding an eMarketer report predicting pharmaceutical companies will increase their Internet spending by about 25% this year.

Publication Date

24-October-2006

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Contact

John Mack * johnmack@virsci.com * 215-504-4164