White Paper Provides Strategy to Help Drug Firms Leverage Social Media Safely

Over the past year and a half, we have met with marketing executives, compliance officers, and lawyers from more than 20 of the world's top pharmaceutical companies to discuss how they could and should be using social media to join the conversation and connect better with patients.

We felt there was (and still is) a significant opportunity for them to leverage the power of social media to share information and education to try and bridge the massive divide that currently exists between Big Pharma and the people who buy their products.

But meeting after meeting, we would be met with resistance to the effect of, "We don't do social media; We don't want to lose control; We can't use blogs..." and so on.

Being the resilient entrepreneurial types that we are, we pressed on determined to convince these companies that a healthy dose of transparency and openness would go a long way in improving relations with customers. We even developed a presentation called Pharma-Friendly Social Media to try and bridge the gap between these companies and their customers. Still, it was always an uphill battle trying to get these companies to start listening and communicating to their own customers. (If they listen, they might learn about adverse events, which is a big no-no.  Then they have to file lots of paperwork and disclose issues that may impact their drugs, etc.).

One of the biggest challenges was that the FDA has yet to issue guidance on how to conduct monitoring and marketing practices in social media so pharmaceutical companies are unsure how to proceed. And as we quickly learned, no one wants to be the guinea pig with new innovations in the pharmaceutical industry. And for good reason, Big Pharma must be cautious, conservative, and follow the letter of the law.

It is unclear when or if the FDA will issue guidance on the many new issues that have come up as a result of social media, the Internet, and online marketing. Until the waters settle, we recommend each company take baby steps and get involved. Bring your marketing teams and compliance teams together to figure out how to take the first steps.

And step one should be reading this new White Paper just co-authored by Fard Johnmar from Envision Solutions.