Digital marketing is a far cry from where it was seven, five, or even two years ago. And it continues to evolve at a rapid pace. Sure, there's lots of hype and excitement around social media and what it can do for brands tactically. But looking at the big picture, has the emergence of social media really affected overarching digital strategy?
This isn’t an article about all the statistics around how social media is exploding. If you’re reading this, you’ve probably already seen those statistics. It’s about understanding the implications of this explosion on the overall online marketing mix.
Up until very recently, pharma’s typical approach to online marketing was: build a Web site or two, and then spend a lot of money to drive people to those sites, and hopefully convince consumers or even healthcare professionals to register into a database. The sites might be a mix of branded, unbranded, and educational sites. And clients often asked us, “Why do we need all these sites? Isn’t one enough?”
With the influx of social media, we’re counseling our clients to have a social media presence – in a strategic and regulatoraly responsible manner, of course. Where it makes sense, we’re helping our clients launch YouTube channels, build patient communities, foster online partnerships, and create Facebook pages and iPhone applications, to name a few.
Not surprisingly, many of our clients are now asking: “Why do we need to create a Facebook page, a YouTube channel, and all this other stuff? Aren’t our existing online properties enough?”
In a word: No.
At least, not anymore. The reach of social media cannot be ignored. YouTube is now the second largest search engine, and third largest Web site overall according to Alexa. And get this: Facebook is now sending more traffic than Google to some sites. It goes without saying that Twitter has experienced phenomenal growth in the U.S. in the past year; comScore reports a growth of more than 1,000%, from fewer than a million users in Feb. 2008 to four million in Feb. 2009.
Okay, so I couldn’t resist throwing in some statistics after all. But what do these statistics represent? An opportunity to give your brand more legs. With apologies to arachnophobes, I call this the “Social Spider.”
Embracing the Social Spider means expanding your Web presence. Think about the Web as, well, a spider Web, and your online presence as the legs of a large spider. You need to have a presence in way more than one or two places (have you ever heard of a one or two-legged spider?). In a more traditional sense, it’s an opportunity to have a store on every virtual corner. It means you might have more than a handful of branded and unbranded Web properties, some over which you have only limited control.
At it's core, our infinitely-legged Social Spider is about being in the time and place where your customers are asking questions and seeking information about your brand. How cool is that?
Don’t get me wrong. I love a good product.com web site. Product sites are still the most important central location to house all pertinent information – including benefits AND risks - about your product. But it’s definitely not the only place people go to learn about your brand. And today many customers are learning about your product from other sources - peers, videos, health sites - perhaps without ever visiting your product site.
Simply hosting a static product.com Web site and expecting people to interact with it on their own is not only bad strategy, it’s a bit arrogant. Brands need to be where their customers are, and more and more, their customers of all ages are interacting with social media. You need to make a concerted effort to build your brand’s “spider legs."
The days of building one product Web site and using search and banners to drive to it are ending, if not over. If you’re not exploring all of the Social Spider avenues to reach your customers, you’re missing out on a lot of opportunities to weave your brand's Web in a very powerful way.
This isn’t an article about all the statistics around how social media is exploding. If you’re reading this, you’ve probably already seen those statistics. It’s about understanding the implications of this explosion on the overall online marketing mix.
Up until very recently, pharma’s typical approach to online marketing was: build a Web site or two, and then spend a lot of money to drive people to those sites, and hopefully convince consumers or even healthcare professionals to register into a database. The sites might be a mix of branded, unbranded, and educational sites. And clients often asked us, “Why do we need all these sites? Isn’t one enough?”
With the influx of social media, we’re counseling our clients to have a social media presence – in a strategic and regulatoraly responsible manner, of course. Where it makes sense, we’re helping our clients launch YouTube channels, build patient communities, foster online partnerships, and create Facebook pages and iPhone applications, to name a few.
Not surprisingly, many of our clients are now asking: “Why do we need to create a Facebook page, a YouTube channel, and all this other stuff? Aren’t our existing online properties enough?”
In a word: No.
At least, not anymore. The reach of social media cannot be ignored. YouTube is now the second largest search engine, and third largest Web site overall according to Alexa. And get this: Facebook is now sending more traffic than Google to some sites. It goes without saying that Twitter has experienced phenomenal growth in the U.S. in the past year; comScore reports a growth of more than 1,000%, from fewer than a million users in Feb. 2008 to four million in Feb. 2009.
Okay, so I couldn’t resist throwing in some statistics after all. But what do these statistics represent? An opportunity to give your brand more legs. With apologies to arachnophobes, I call this the “Social Spider.”
Embracing the Social Spider means expanding your Web presence. Think about the Web as, well, a spider Web, and your online presence as the legs of a large spider. You need to have a presence in way more than one or two places (have you ever heard of a one or two-legged spider?). In a more traditional sense, it’s an opportunity to have a store on every virtual corner. It means you might have more than a handful of branded and unbranded Web properties, some over which you have only limited control.
At it's core, our infinitely-legged Social Spider is about being in the time and place where your customers are asking questions and seeking information about your brand. How cool is that?
Don’t get me wrong. I love a good product.com web site. Product sites are still the most important central location to house all pertinent information – including benefits AND risks - about your product. But it’s definitely not the only place people go to learn about your brand. And today many customers are learning about your product from other sources - peers, videos, health sites - perhaps without ever visiting your product site.
Simply hosting a static product.com Web site and expecting people to interact with it on their own is not only bad strategy, it’s a bit arrogant. Brands need to be where their customers are, and more and more, their customers of all ages are interacting with social media. You need to make a concerted effort to build your brand’s “spider legs."
The days of building one product Web site and using search and banners to drive to it are ending, if not over. If you’re not exploring all of the Social Spider avenues to reach your customers, you’re missing out on a lot of opportunities to weave your brand's Web in a very powerful way.
8 comments:
Wendy,
Thank you for this very informative and insightful blog post. It is so refreshing to see individuals such as youself counseling Big Pharma to not only embrace social media technologies, but also and more importantly, begin cultivating online communities via "word-of-mouse" or "online word-of-mouth."
Keep up the great work and always look forward to your "tweets" on Twitter.
Thanks so much for the kind words, Tony. Good to know I'm not the only one out there thinking these things. I look forward to your tweets as well.
Hi,
I agree with the post. The question for me is not why to do it (statistics don't lie), its a question on how to do it right. Social media is all about sending your own (individual) message to the community and make the content yourself. The problem is pharma companies like to control the overall message they send more than most of the other industries. For example: let's say there is an unbranded patient community where people say bad things about certain drug. Pharma company probably would not like that. Are companies ready for web 2.0 truth about their services and products? Right now they participate in social media websites by posting their content but this is just a tip of an iceberg when it comes to real web 2.0 opportunities.
Pabloz: Thanks for your post. It is precisely this viewpoint that has earned Big Pharma its bad reputation, and Big Pharma has done little to prevent it. You - and many consumers - have the perspective (and who can blame you) that Pharma must "control" the message because they don't want negative comments made about their drugs. (Of course negative comments are being made, they're just being made on other sites.)
What most people outside the industry don't realize is that Pharma is severely restricted by FDA around what can and can't be said about a drug. Even if someone else (a disgruntled consumer, for instance) says it on the Pharma's site, Pharma can be liable.
Here's an example: Say a Pharma co. hosts an online forum for people to talk about a disease and treatments for that disease. A consumer might post "this drug gave me a really bad rash." Okay - then if the consumer has enough identifiable information then the Pharma would need to report that as an adverse event. That's manageable, and even responsible of the co. to do so.
But if another consumer then posts "this drug literally saved my life. It's a miracle drug," you'd think Pharma would love that, right? Wrong. It's off-label, and they could very well get a warning letter from FDA for it.
FDA restrictions are severe and very much a part of Pharma's reality.
But I do maintain that Pharma can get involved in social media -- AND still follow the rules. See other related posts for those suggestions.
Wendy,
Thanks for reply!. I understand that FDA and different organizations around the world set the rules of communication within health industry. Considering that they decide what can and can't be said around the drug is it possible to have true community?
As a patient if i posted a post like "this drug is a miracle" because it really worked for me and this post would get deleted / censored i would probably leave the community. I guess its possible to work out some rules, moderate the communication and create real value. The question is - because of bad rep of pharma - are people going to believe in this?
There are some successfull on-line commnunities of doctors and patients in many countries so i guess it is possible and can create a value.
Wouldn't it be wonderful if FDA would just come out and say, "Pharma, you can create true online communiites. Just disclose, via disclaimer, that you're not liable for what is said and that it should not be construed as medical advice, and you're in the clear!"
Alas, what an easier world it would be. It's okay to dream. ;-)
All: here's a link to Mashable's latest stats on usage of major social media outlets such as FB, MySpace, YouTube, HuLu, Twitter, etc:
http://mashable.com/2009/04/17/web-in-numbers-social-media/
Wendy, just a quick comment...
Search and social media are so directly tied. Big brands having at least some type of social presence is defintiely going to be key to capture consumers (and HCPs) attention.
As an example, check out a quick search for Ashton Kutchner in Google. As you can see, his Twitter feed is the #3 result.
When you combine this with the fact that almost 50% of all search queries are health related... wow! Social media and search will continue to grow hand in hand.
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