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By Daniel Ghinn
 What are the trends for 2010? Fellow FUMSI editor Martin Belam thinks that social media tools have
been
hot news in 2009 and will continue to be in 2010. But is the hype
justified? The next three issues of the 'Use' practice contributions
will be case studies of specific industry sectors and their experiences
of
using social media. Part 1 focuses on
the pharmaceutical industry. -- contributing USE editor Joanna Ptolomey
The rise of social media has turned
the Internet from a platform being primarily used for one-way information
'broadcasting', to a dynamic, conversational 'Web 2.0' environment where
searchable two-way dialogue takes place in real time. In the world of pharmaceutical
companies, a revolution is taking place as researchers and communicators learn
the value of insights that can be discovered from information in this dialogue.
A wealth of information to
discover
Evidence shows that people discuss
their health online. According to Microsoft's search engine Bing(1),
health is one of the most popular topics searched for online with 45% of
people, across all age groups, using the Internet to research health issues. And
there is plenty of content for people to access; a search on Google for
'diabetes' returns the first of what Google says are about 16 million results.
Such results include information from health providers, charities, government,
and significantly, a vast number of conversations amongst people using social
media such as blogs and social networks.
Social media is used by healthcare professionals such as doctors and nurses;
patient groups and health campaigners; government health advisors and
regulators; and of course health consumers such as patients or their careers.
For pharmaceutical companies, conversations taking place about health-related
issues amongst people using social media provide a potential wealth of
information to be mined for market research and product development.
Pharmaceutical companies want discover information about the health issues that
matter to people, to gain competitive intelligence about their marketplace, and
to learn about the perception of their brand amongst stakeholders. They might
also want to be amongst the first to hear of problems people experience with
their medicines, although capturing and responding to this kind of information
is made somewhat more complex by the regulatory environment in which
pharmaceutical companies operate.
Discovering information
There are primarily two approaches
used by pharmaceutical companies to discover information using social media:
'external discovery', where information about conversations taking place is
measured and analysed remotely; and 'internal discovery', where an environment
owned or managed by the pharmaceutical company hosts social media activity.
Both approaches are necessary in order to gain a complete picture.
External discovery
The external discovery approach
provides breadth of information, but not the depth of insight that comes from
hosting social media activity. Nevertheless, the richness of information that
can be gained by external discovery makes it a highly valuable activity and an
essential starting point for pharmaceutical companies seeking information.
A range of free tools exist for external discovery that will measure and report
on conversations taking place in social media. For example, tools to monitor
Twitter include simple search tools such as Twitter Search(2) which
will simply return all current conversations taking place on any topic, and
automated services such as SocialOomph(3) which will email a summary
of 'tweets' containing specified keywords.
Extract from SocialOomph's Twitter Tweets Keyword Alert Digest email
With the volume of conversations taking place at any time on any health issue,
collecting and analysing information from a wide range of social media
platforms can be a daunting task. The solution to this is provided by
commercial social media monitoring tools which index conversations taking place
across social media platforms and allow extensive analysis of the data.
One such tool is Radian6, which provides a graphical interface for illustrating
information trends. For example, the chart below illustrates how the majority
of conversations relating to 'stop smoking' in a given period took place in
forum replies.
Radian6 analysis of media types for conversations relating to 'stop smoking'
Amongst Radian6's tools is a topic trend analysis tool which illustrates the
correlation between different topics discussed in social media.
Radian6 analysis of mentions of smoking and smoking-cessation medicines over
time
Other social media monitoring tools used by the pharmaceutical industry include
the recently launched ScanBuzz which focuses purely on medicine products, and
Techrigy's SM2. SM2's features include an analysis of 'emotions' expressed
through social media conversations on given topics, as illustrated below.
SM2 analysis of emotion expressed in social media discussions on a health
topic
Internal discovery
The opportunity to gain internal
insights through hosting social media activity presents a dilemma for pharmaceutical
companies. On the one hand, if they can establish the trust of patients and
healthcare professionals and host open conversations about health and
medicines, they can potentially be the first to gain new insights. On the other
hand, there is a burden of responsibility for content that is generated by such
conversations on sites owned or managed by the company. In the
heavily-regulated world of pharmaceutical communications, this is the subject
of much controversial debate including a recent public hearing by US government
regulators the FDA.
This debate has not stopped some in pharmaceutical companies from encouraging
dialogue by implementing their own social media tools. Johnson & Johnson's
blog JNJ BTW(4) is a platform for dialogue between the company and
anybody who will engage with them. As Marc Monseau, a director of
communications with the company told me(5) after the site's first
year, the blog engages a wide section of the company's stakeholders:
'One of my biggest surprises was that the people who read the blog are not
who I originally thought they would be - they are not just members of the media
or healthcare bloggers - but include doctors, nurses, employees, competitors,
retirees, supporters of J&J and detractors. It's that the audience - and
this is important - the audience is defining itself - which is different from
how we've looked at the world in the past.'
Johnson & Johnson's corporate blog JNJ BTW (http://jnjbtw.com)
Whilst Johnson & Johnson's blog is a simple example of an internal platform
that engages people in dialogue with the company, other pharmaceutical
companies have gone further to create communities for people to connect and
communicate in social networks. One such example is Bayer Healthcare's
MS-Gateway, a resource and online community for people living with multiple
sclerosis. MS-Gateway encourages patients to register and take part in their
online community.
Bayer Healthcare's patient community MS-Gateway (http://www.ms-gateway.com/)
Rather than building their own platforms to host social media activities, many
pharmaceutical companies are engaging with people using existing networks and
communities on platforms such as Facebook and YouTube. These have the added
advantage that they present a familiar environment to millions of Internet
users who are connected to others.
Tools for internal discovery
Whilst the primary objective of the
social media examples above may be to allow the pharmaceutical company to
engage in two-way dialogue with people, the internal discovery opportunities
are significant and essential components for future successful ongoing
engagement. Direct insights may be discovered simply by monitoring questions
asked and topics discussed by participants, whilst Web analytics tools such as
Google Analytics(6) may be integrated with a company's own platform
to provide extensive data about the way people use the website or social network.
YouTube's Insights(7) analytics tool allows a YouTube video
publisher to learn about the demographic profile of those who have viewed and
engaged with its content, and to break this down by geography.
YoTube Insights provides a demographic analysis tool for video publishers
Applying discovered insights
It's one thing to research and
collect information, but the real value of information discovered comes when
pharmaceutical companies use this information to inform their business. One of
the most significant areas where insights from social media can inform the
business is in engagement strategy. Defining a strategy for successfully
engaging people requires a thorough understanding of the issues that they are
already discussing.
An example of such discovery-led engagement strategy can be seen in Pfizer's
'Get Real. Get a Prescription' campaign(8) which warns people about
the real risks of purchasing prescription-only medicine without a prescription,
form illicit Websites. Prior to developing the campaign's strategy for engaging
with people about the important health issues in the campaign, Pfizer carried
out research into social media discussions and search activity around online
medicine sales, analysing the tactics used by illicit Websites to attract
Internet users.
Through this discovery-led approach to strategy development, Pfizer partnered
with stakeholders including the UK Government regulator MHRA and key patient
groups, to achieve significant awareness of the campaign's important health
issues.
With a social media measurement framework already operating for the campaign,
Pfizer were able to monitor and respond in real time to Internet user activity.
This kind of discovery-led approach being adopted by some pharmaceutical
companies is leading to more effective engagement on healthcare issues and
ultimately, better health information for patients.
References
1.
Bing, searching for health information: http://digbig.com/5batxp
2. Twitter Search: http://search.twitter.com
3. SocialOomph: http://www.socialoomph.com
4. JNJ BTW: http://jnjbtw.com
5. Pharmaceutical blogs bring
customers closer: http://digbig.com/5batxq
6. Google Analytics: http://www.google.com/analytics/
7. Youtube Insights at http://www.youtube.com
8. Digital strategy combats
counterfeit medicines: http://digbig.com/5batxr
By Daniel Ghinn
Daniel
Ghinn is Director of Digital Engagement for Healthcare and Government
with consultancy Creation Interactive. He works with some of the
world's major pharmaceutical companies, helping them to make sense of
the way the Internet is changing healthcare, and is a regular
speaker, teacher and author on the subject. He lives in Kent with his
wife and three children.
FUMSI articles by Daniel Ghinn »
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