Comments on: How Marketing with Meaning Can Save Pharma — Part 2 http://www.doseofdigital.com/2009/10/how-marketing-with-meaning-can-save-pharma-part-2/ A Healthy Approach to E-marketing -- Effectively using digital technology and social media in pharma and healthcare marketing Tue, 09 Mar 2010 17:56:22 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 hourly 1 By: Jonathan Richman http://www.doseofdigital.com/2009/10/how-marketing-with-meaning-can-save-pharma-part-2/#comment-2588 Jonathan Richman Thu, 08 Oct 2009 12:13:51 +0000 http://www.doseofdigital.com/?p=1625#comment-2588 Andrew, I suppose what you point out is a part of the problem. So much of today's "marketing" is so bad and intrusive that some people cringe at the word. You can lump "advertising" in there as well. For me, I'm proud to say I'm a marketer. I'm fortunate that I get to work for companies with products that are of high quality and are useful for people (and can even save their life). So, why shouldn't I be out there "marketing" them? The increased awareness of HIV, including all those red ribbons, was marketing. National Breast Cancer Awareness Month (this month, in fact) is nothing more than "marketing," but marketing that's probably saved hundreds of thousands if not millions of lives. Just because these two initiatives don't use the standard 30-second TV spot doesn't make them any less examples of marketing than any infomercial. They just happen to be marketing a more important "product" and using different tactics. Tactics people happen to respond to. Wikipedia actually has a great definition: "Marketing is an integrated communications-based process through which individuals and communities are informed or persuaded that existing and newly-identified needs and wants may be satisfied by the products and services of others." Why is that a bad thing? Marketing is how the world works. My wife happens to be an extremely smart, funny, kind, and beautiful woman. She's way out of my league. How'd I convince her to marry me? Marketing. Marketing has been around forever. Unfortunately, some people use it for evil purposes and some people annoy the hell out of us with their form of marketing. But, in the end, it's an integral and extremely powerful part of our human experience. Part of the goal of Marketing with Meaning is to change some perceptions about what marketing is and what it can be. Thanks for bringing up this important point. Andrew, I suppose what you point out is a part of the problem. So much of today’s “marketing” is so bad and intrusive that some people cringe at the word. You can lump “advertising” in there as well. For me, I’m proud to say I’m a marketer. I’m fortunate that I get to work for companies with products that are of high quality and are useful for people (and can even save their life). So, why shouldn’t I be out there “marketing” them? The increased awareness of HIV, including all those red ribbons, was marketing. National Breast Cancer Awareness Month (this month, in fact) is nothing more than “marketing,” but marketing that’s probably saved hundreds of thousands if not millions of lives. Just because these two initiatives don’t use the standard 30-second TV spot doesn’t make them any less examples of marketing than any infomercial. They just happen to be marketing a more important “product” and using different tactics. Tactics people happen to respond to.

Wikipedia actually has a great definition: “Marketing is an integrated communications-based process through which individuals and communities are informed or persuaded that existing and newly-identified needs and wants may be satisfied by the products and services of others.” Why is that a bad thing? Marketing is how the world works. My wife happens to be an extremely smart, funny, kind, and beautiful woman. She’s way out of my league. How’d I convince her to marry me? Marketing. Marketing has been around forever. Unfortunately, some people use it for evil purposes and some people annoy the hell out of us with their form of marketing. But, in the end, it’s an integral and extremely powerful part of our human experience. Part of the goal of Marketing with Meaning is to change some perceptions about what marketing is and what it can be.

Thanks for bringing up this important point.

]]> By: Andrew Spong http://www.doseofdigital.com/2009/10/how-marketing-with-meaning-can-save-pharma-part-2/#comment-2557 Andrew Spong Tue, 06 Oct 2009 08:07:39 +0000 http://www.doseofdigital.com/?p=1625#comment-2557 There's so much to like about this body of thought, but I wish it wasn't lumbered with the title 'marketing with meaning' Why? Because I think there is a tension between what people understand 'marketing' to be and the (valuable, contemporary) concepts your campaign iterates. Is 'marketing that people engage with' marketing at all in the traditionally understood sense? As business transitions from the transactional to the relational, isn't the use value of marketing-as-a-concept diminishing to the point where we can discern a qualitative opposition between the effective deployment of the ideas you alight upon above, and a desire to recuperate them on behalf of, and incorporate them into, marketing-as-a-concept? Unpacked, what I am positing would requires us to believe that 'an effective SM-driven marketing campaign is not a marketing campaign'. That's an apparent (but not actual) tautology I'm prepared to defend. In fact, you could say the Dove campaign above is its archetype. We need to find new terms of reference for new conditions of possibility. There’s so much to like about this body of thought, but I wish it wasn’t lumbered with the title ‘marketing with meaning’

Why?

Because I think there is a tension between what people understand ‘marketing’ to be and the (valuable, contemporary) concepts your campaign iterates.

Is ‘marketing that people engage with’ marketing at all in the traditionally understood sense? As business transitions from the transactional to the relational, isn’t the use value of marketing-as-a-concept diminishing to the point where we can discern a qualitative opposition between the effective deployment of the ideas you alight upon above, and a desire to recuperate them on behalf of, and incorporate them into, marketing-as-a-concept?

Unpacked, what I am positing would requires us to believe that ‘an effective SM-driven marketing campaign is not a marketing campaign’. That’s an apparent (but not actual) tautology I’m prepared to defend. In fact, you could say the Dove campaign above is its archetype.

We need to find new terms of reference for new conditions of possibility.

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