Archive | March, 2011
Mar 21st 2011 

Wiki Update (Finally) and 2011 Dosie Awards Info

Okay…I’ll admit it. It’s been way too long since I updated the Pharma and Healthcare Social Media Wiki. I won’t say exactly how long, but let’s call it 24 weeks (sounds better than 6 months). Thank you all for continuing to send me updates and for accepting my promises that I’d be updating soon. If you’d like to submit something for the Wiki, there’s a form at the end of this post. Please feel free.

Please take a moment and read through the entire post. I’ve got some information in here about this year’s Dosie Awards at the end of this post that I’d like everyone to take a look at (including how to become a judge or sponsor). Read More…

Mar 18th 2011 

Your Computer Is the Next Wonder Drug (Video)

For those who have been following the blog, you know that I recently spoke at the SXSW conference in Austin (more details here including why pharma companies should care). My talk was entitled: Your Computer Is the Next Wonder Drug.

The idea is simple and here’s how I described the talk on the SXSW site:

A few times each year, the press buzzes about the latest scientific advance that will someday cure any one of the diseases we fear the most. Nearly every one of these will turn out to be nothing more than a news story and far from a pill that can help improve our health.

We spend hundreds of millions of dollars every day on research, as we struggle to find the “magic bullet” that will rid the world of conditions such as cancer, heart disease, and diabetes. We almost never find the magic.

While the big, historic scientific advances may be what dominate the headlines, in the end, it’s the small improvements and better utilization of the technology we have already have that will ultimately lengthen ourlives and improve its quality. These technologies don’t come from labs filled with test tubes or cell cultures, but rather from labs filled with computers and the programs that run them.

In the future, it will be digital technologies that prevent, treat, and finally cure diseases and not the latest “blockbuster” drug that has yet to be discovered (and might never be). Digital technologies can already help us understand which treatments are best for us, what diseases pose the greatest risk, and how diseases spread among us. They can improve our interactions with doctors and improve access to care for everyone.

Instead of waiting for the next miracle drug to be developed, you might find the miracle was there all along right inside the computer you use every day.

You’ll be hearing and seeing more about this topic on Dose of Digital in the future. It’s going to be the focus of a book I’m working on that I hope you’ll get to see sometime in the not terribly distant future (but think in terms of years, not months).
Read More…

Mar 10th 2011 

I’m Off to SXSW…So Why Should You Care?

Tomorrow morning (6am flight for some reason), I’m off to the annual SXSW conference in Austin. For those who read this blog and work in healthcare and always have, you might not even know what the conference is. You should. It’s become the premier digital technology, media, and marketing conference in the world over the past few years. While there are film and music tracks to the conference, the biggest part is now the interactive track. So, if you have anything with digital technology (including using a computer), you might look into this conference. CNN actually had a nice article today about why SXSW matters. And for the first time this year, there’s actually a dedicated group of health-related sessions.

That’s one of the reasons I’m going. I’m interested in a few of the health-related sessions, but I’m not going to solely focus my time there. I’ve heard a lot of it already. Instead, I’m going for two big reasons. First, I’m speaking there (that’s slide number 1 at the top of this post). More on that in a minute. Second, I’m always on the lookout for what other industries are doing and what’s up and coming and trying to figure out how pharma and healthcare companies can leverage it. It’s usually years before healthcare companies adopt things that are old hat in other companies. This is especially true when it comes to digital technology and marketing. Looking at what other pharma companies are doing in digital in hopes of learning something will teach you one thing:

Nothing. Read More…

Mar 8th 2011 

Forget Social Media, Start Here

A few weeks ago, I shared with you my slides from a presentation I was giving at the ePharma Summit. My topic was “10 Things to Do First in Digital Marketing.” That is, 10 things you should try first before spending a bunch of money and time on social media. Let’s face it, social media isn’t easy to pull off if you work for a pharma company or any other company in a highly regulated industry. So, it makes sense to me that you should look at doing things that are both simpler to execute (i.e., less roadblocks to internal approval) and likely will bring a larger and more measurable return on your digital marketing dollars. I could put together a list of 50 things, but lets start with 10.
Read More…