More ePharma Summit Observations

Okay, apologies for the lateness of this post. Here, as promised, is my (albeit tardy) wrap-up from the ePharma Summit in Philadelphia Feb. 10-11.

Spotlight on Twitter. They did a nice panel demo on Twitter, and a number of people were tweeting live from the conference, which conference organizers supported and encouraged. It was one of the more useful examples of the use of Twitter that I've seen. I'm new to Twitter, which on the surface seems so simple, but I realized there really is so much more to learn. Through the miracle of Twitter technology, you two can view the entire stream of conference tweets.

Size Matters. I liked what HealthCentral had to say about traditional versus digital marketing: We can expect cost/performance pressures to shift to interactive. Size for size’s sake will become irrelevant. Scale still matters -- but qualified scale wins.

Rules of Engagement. Steve Woodruff reviewed his 4 rules for engaging in social media. My head almost fell off from nodding enthusiastically in agreement. Too many marketers want to jump in and jump out without thinking through the right way to do it. Short version of his 4 sage rules: Immediacy, two-way engagement, authenticity, and long-term commitment.

Lots of Lurkers. Jack Barratte of WeGo Health stated that 10% of the universe creates the content, and 90% reads it. But check this out: 70% of internet users in the U.S. engage in social media. (was from a different speaker; didn't catch the reference)Wow! Can this really be true?

Reputation Repair. Jack also stated "Social media is the last best hope to rehabilitate the reputation of the pharma industry." In fact, the industry's poor reputation - and the opportunity to repair it - was a recurring theme.

Working with Agencies. There was an excellent panel discussion on the "right" model to service your interactive needs. Since this is a topic of extreme interest to me, I'm going to devote my own post to it, so stay tuned.

Some Trends are Just Boring. Mark Bard from Manhattan Research pointed out one of the more “boring” trends is that emails are up and coming and on the rise. It's possible emails are one of the most under-utilized of digital tactics in pharma, and they're much easier to execute than social media, video, etc., just not as sexy And who knew there was 40% penetration among physicians now using email to communicate with patients patients? Other trends to watch in 2009: 1.Online Video, 2.Social Media, 3.Online Media Driving Offline, 4.Mobile Web .

Let's Hear it for Mobile. Chris Fields from 3C Interactive shared some practical ways pharma can use mobile marketing. Namely: He also pointed out that dealing w/ the carriers is ridiculous and there are lots of hurtles. It can take 12-16 weeks on top of Med/Reg -- that’s an eternity!

Overall, I really enjoyed the conference, and enjoyed seeing old friends and meeting new ones. Incidentally, several of those new friends beat me to the punch and have already blogged their final blogs about the conference. So if you're in the mood for more nuggets (and who doesn't like nuggets, really?), follow these links:

• Steve Woodruff posted a nice wrap-up at his blog here. (BTW - he also posted a great list of "various active bloggers and social networkers in the pharma networking world."
  
• John Mack, in his usual somewhat cranky-but-amusing style, had some good commentary here.


• Twitter King Shwen (how did I not know about this guy?! ) has some summit mentions here. He's a good one to follow on Twitter at @shwen.


• The ePharma Summit peeps know how to use social media, too, and they themselves keep the conversation going here and on Twitter at @epharma. I just signed up for my 2010 updates.

I think my favorite thing about attending these conferences is the validation of what we are currently advising and preaching, plus hearing new ideas, and bringing those ideas back to colleagues and clients. Now just how can I find a way to quit my day job so the work doesn't pile up while I'm out of the office?