Digital

Industry group releases digital best practices

Matthew Arnold February 06, 2012

Weary of FDA foot-dragging on digital and social media guidance for pharmas, a group of 60-some industry digerati have put together guidelines of their own.

P&G signals plans to cut ad costs by shifting to digital media

Matthew Arnold February 01, 2012

Procter & Gamble is looking to lower its promotion costs by leaning more on digital media, Chairman and CEO Bob McDonald told analysts in an earnings call.

Victoza effort featuring Southern cuisine queen Deen draws flak

Matthew Arnold January 17, 2012

Novo Nordisk is courting controversy with a Victoza-branded type 2 diabetes education campaign featuring Southern-fried celebrity chef Paula Deen and her sons.

WebMD calls off sales plans, CEO steps down amid ugly forecast for 2012

Matthew Arnold January 10, 2012

WebMD scrapped plans for a possible sale and announced that president and CEO Wayne Gattinella is stepping down after 11 years in that role.

Healthline lands Drugs.com ad sales deal

Matthew Arnold January 05, 2012

Healthline Networks has secured a deal with Drugs.com giving it exclusive rights to sell consumer ads on the site, which boasts 8.8 million unique visitors per month.

Merck takes stake in Physicians Interactive

Matthew Arnold January 05, 2012

Merck's Global Health Innovation Fund (GHIF) is investing up to $17 million in Physicians Interactive, a company that develops digital products for doctors such as e-sampling and interactive education programs.

A targeted mobile effort for a thermometer shadows the flu

Matthew Arnold January 04, 2012

Mobile campaigns are getting increasingly targeted through layering of identifiers like location, age and gender. An effort for a new thermometer serves ads only to expecting moms and those with children under five within two miles of a store selling the device and only when influenza is running rampant where they live.

Behind WebMD's PE courtship, a business model under pressure

Matthew Arnold December 23, 2011

WebMD's talks with private equity firms come amid an advertising slump, and going private could buy the firm time to retool its business model while insulating it from activist investors like Carl Icahn.

Bon Jovi enlists in Advil's battle with Tylenol

Matthew Arnold December 21, 2011

Jon Bon Jovi is the latest celebrity pitchman for Pfizer Consumer Healthcare's Advil.

Consumers may be savvier, less fearful about online privacy and advertising than you think

Matthew Arnold October 27, 2011

Consumers are as worried about online privacy as they are about terrorism, but marketers tracking their surfing habits or mining their emails for insights is the least of their worries, according to a survey by McCann Truth Central.

Boehringer's Pharma-ville could salve industry's bad reputation

James Chase October 26, 2011

Boehringer Ingelheim is hoping to create a new Facebook phenomenon with the development of a pharma civilization game that could give industry reputation a shot in the arm.

Study of diabetes social networks finds an advertising Wild West

Matthew Arnold October 13, 2011

More than a quarter of posts on Facebook sites for people with diabetes are promotional in nature, many touting products unapproved by the FDA, according to an analysis of diabetes-focused social networks.

Friends and family top health influencers, says survey

Matthew Arnold October 12, 2011

Underscoring the importance of social media in public health, patients say friends and family are as responsible for their health as are medical professionals, according to Edelman's 2011 Health Barometer study.

Advertising as dating game: It's the brand.com where things get serious

Matthew Arnold October 05, 2011

A survey by Yahoo! and advertising giant BBDO says advertisers need to raise their game in "owned media" like brand.com sites to woo consumers.

Merck web widget points to future adherence fix

Matthew Arnold October 04, 2011

Asking consumers to gauge their risk for non-adherence, Merck is deploying a one-minute survey dubbed the Adherence Estimator that may be the way forward for keeping patients on-treatment.

Lipitor.com gets Bad Ad slap for cross-promotion sans risk info

Matthew Arnold September 06, 2011

Pfizer's Lipitor website touted the efficacy of Caduet, Chantix and Norvasc but failed to balance those claims with risk info for the drugs, according to an "untitled letter" from FDA's Division of Drug Marketing, Advertising and Communication (DDMAC).

EMD Serono brings back "Birds & Bees" infertility effort

Matthew Arnold July 27, 2011

EMD Serono refreshed its "Birds & Bees" fertility issues awareness campaign with a Facebook page and a music video.

Ethnically insensitive Summer's Eve ads draw eyeballs and brickbats

Matthew Arnold July 20, 2011

A feminine hygiene brand known for its boffo advertising is back with an anatomically-explicit ad campaign that's generating tons of publicity but also charges of racism.

FDA guidance exempts most pharma apps from scrutiny

Matthew Arnold July 19, 2011

FDA issued draft guidance on mobile medical apps, focusing narrowly on those programs that augment regulated medical devices or turn mobile devices into medical devices.

Pharma digerati push for online guidelines

Matthew Arnold June 16, 2011

Frustrated by FDA inaction on guidance for digital marketing and social media, a host of industry players are banding together to form a nonprofit that can hammer out consensus on a way forward.

Lilly refreshes patient ed portal, launching YouTube channel

Matthew Arnold June 15, 2011

Eli Lilly & Co. refreshed its Lilly for Better Health program with a multichannel platform and a YouTube channel.

Facebook: pharmas must enable comments by August 15

Matthew Arnold May 24, 2011

Facebook sales reps told pharmas last week that they can no longer disable commenting on their non-brand-specific pages, potentially exposing them to flame warriors, spammers, adverse events reports and discussion of off-label uses that might call down the wrath of DDMAC.

Seeking "savoir-faire," Publicis buys Rosetta for $575 million

Matthew Arnold May 17, 2011

Publicis is padding its digital health agency supergroup with a $575 million-plus acquisition of Rosetta Marketing Group.

Social media gurus Gwee and Monseau move on to new jobs

Matthew Arnold May 12, 2011

Two of the drug industry's brightest minds in social media, Shwen Gwee and Marc Monseau, are changing jobs, with Gwee leaving Vertex for Edelman and Monseau exiting J&J to open his own firm.

Patients prefer health media sites to user-generated content for medical info, says survey

Matthew Arnold May 03, 2011

Consumers continue to trust health magazines, websites and WebMD more than user-generated contribution sites like Wikipedia, Facebook or Twitter for medical information, according to a survey.

FDA to probe website DTC risk/benefit presentation

Matthew Arnold April 28, 2011

The FDA announced plans to study online consumer advertising for prescription drugs in order to resolve "a number of questions surrounding how to achieve 'fair balance' in online DTC promotion.

Pfizer texting campaign plugs vaccinations

Matthew Arnold April 27, 2011

Pfizer is piloting a mobile education campaign promoting awareness of the value of childhood vaccinations through texting.

AstraZeneca adds live chat option to Nexium, Crestor sites

Matthew Arnold April 27, 2011

Visitors to Crestor.com and PurplePill.com can now hit a "click to chat" button to chat with a live AstraZeneca customer service rep.

Global healthcare pros prefer live reps, survey finds

Matthew Arnold April 15, 2011

For all the talk of e-detailing and digitizing the sales force, a plurality of international healthcare professionals would rather get info about new treatments from flesh-and-blood reps than through any other channel, a survey found.

Havas launches "#a11y" digital practice for disabilities market

Matthew Arnold April 05, 2011

Havas Drive has launched a practice focused on developing digital products for persons with disabilities and those undergoing rehabilitative therapies.