Healthcare communications and marketing news and information

Earlier this week, ePharmaceuticals published an interesting report focusing on pharmaceutical mobile marketing, "Opportunity texts: Mobile marketing and the pharmaceutical industry." I just ordered the report, so I haven’t gotten a chance to dig into it yet.  However, it’s very interesting that pharmaceutical marketers are concerned about some very familiar issues when it comes to mobile.  For example ePharmaceuticals observes:

“Although many industries employ mobile banner ads, it's harder for pharma to do so because there is often no room to include the FDA-required fair balance on the very small screens. Although there are ways for pharma companies to participate, many are afraid to be the first to use mobile in a campaign.”

Hmm . . . this sounds like what we were hearing about social media a few years back (wait, we’re still hearing it.).  The executive summary of the report highlights some basic mobile marketing “dos,” including:

-Be sure it's opt-in. Don't annoy consumers with unwanted messages.
-Provide an easy way to opt out. Merck's Tell Someone text campaign allowed users to text the word "STOP" to opt out.
-Use a 360° approach. Integrate mobile calls to action through a multimedia campaign.
-Build a database of the consumers who opt in to your campaign.

This sounds like a very interesting and informative report.  I can’t wait to read it.  To learn more about it, please click here.