Jonathan Richman wrote a killer posting on the 10 things he’s tired of hearing in pharma social media and Sweet God was this needed!! Jon, you can’t see us, but I promise I am not the only one genuflecting in your general direction – THANK YOU!! So, take the kick in the ass folks, and then take a hard look at your brand goals – and go from there.

I actually was thinking about my relationships with pharma and pharma brands this morning on my run. I didn’t really think I had a personal relationship with pharma or brands, but that is not true.  Yeah, I’ve worked in pharma 22 years, but the real relationship is that pharma has kept my mother and my brothers alive – they all have familial hypercholesterolemia – total cholesterol over 750. Bottom line, without meds they would all have died from heart attacks. Funny that I never really thought of pharma in those terms, but I’m sure grateful that Lipitor and Crestor have kept my family going. Will I “friend” AZ and Pfizer – probably not – will I blog about the meds and how it changed the course of life in my family – you bet. Which is more powerful??

We can do better pharma – figure it out.

I had an amazing experience last Friday at the CBI “Next Generation Rx Sampling Strategies” conference. Michael DePalma (Senior Director at Healthbridge) and I sat down the night before we were to give our 8:15 a.m. speech on “360 Degrees of Sampling”. We had the unsettling realization that our speech was not that groundbreaking and we were even using many of the same statistics others had presented the previous day. Most people would have panicked, stayed up late and re-written it. We dumped the whole presentation and decided to take a different path. We KNOW the hot topics, the taboo topics and the have a pretty good view of the future of sampling, so we decided to lead the audience in a spirited discussion on those topics, offering everyone in attendance an interactive learning forum. That was the plan, anyway. So, we created 3 slides and went to have dinner with colleagues.

When I woke up at 6:45 a.m., I realized that this presentation would either soar with the eagles or drop from the sky like a wounded buzzard – it was about 50/50. Fortunately, both Mike and I are strong speakers and good on our feet – it went beautifully, the audience was really engaged, we ended up having a completely different conversation – and we had a blast.

I give great credit to Mike – who gamely went along with my idea and was the catalyst that made it work. Thanks, Mike!!

I recently had the pleasure of acquiring a MINI Cooper Clubman. The car is zippy and fun. One of the things I noticed was the way the controls in the car were thoughtfully designed, making the experience of driving the car absolutely top-notch.

For example, behind the steering wheel to the left, the paddle controls the headlights. The paddle to the right, controls the windshield wipers. On the steering wheel itself, the left buttons the CD player and cellphone interface, while the buttons to the right serve as the stereo system’s volume control.

While this seems like pretty simple stuff (that you can find on other cars), there is something about the way MINI has implemented these features that actually increases the net experience when you drive.

The MINI’s user experience got me thinking about the optimal mobile user experience, since mobile is quickly becoming a ubiquitous channel for directly delivering health-related content. For pharmaceutical companies, mobile offers a much wider reach and anywhere/anytime interaction for the 65% of all physicians carrying mobile devices on their hip.

To create an optimal mobile user experience, companies need to be aware that development for mobile is not always straightforward because of a variety of devices (BlackBerry, iPhone, Palm, etc.), number of browsers, platforms and a number of networks that may or not be compatible. In other words, merely adapting desktop applications to mobile devices isn’t going to work.

Mobile users want faster, shorter transaction times, a secure environment and a user experience that is simple and positive.

There is no question that developing for mobile can be a challenge, but one approach is to develop a personalized user experience that takes into consideration the device being used, where it will be used and how.

That means, one size does not fit all, but – with a little investigating – you can uncover one best approach that works specifically for your target audience.

Good grief – got another one of those “sponsorship for speaking gig” calls again.  I’m always so optimistic when they call – maybe this one will just want a really good speaker…yeah right.  So I protested and made my point (on bored ears) – to which the person responded that if I wanted to sponsor a notebook (really, a notebook??) then I could stand up and pimp away.  I politely thanked her for the stunning opportunity, but declined.

Here is the follow up email I got:

Janet, I understand your frustrations with the pay to play type mentality. As I mentioned XXX’s primary objective is to create the most comprehensive, topic relevant agenda, addressing the bio/pharmaceutical industry’s top concerns/needs.  As such, our first goal is to identify the most qualified thought leaders to participate as part of our elite faculty within the bio/pharmaceutical industry,

Having said that, when all is equal, we do look to afford our sponsoring organizations the opportunity to participate on the agenda, especially, when we have significant interest from the sponsor community – as is the case with this event. Unfortunately, we are in a position where we are approached but many great vendor, consultant, and law firm speakers who want a place on our agenda . In order to choose we tie it into sponsorship and XXX provides a marketing and business development component which some Companies want  and understand. I completely understand it that doesn’t make sense for you.

Janet, I have attached the brochure and please let me know if you have any questions or possible interest in even attending the event.

So, if you are a “great vendor, consultant, or law firm speaker” – there is a great opportunity to sell out, sponsor a notebook  and put your audience into a coma – and hey, good luck with that!  I’m sure you’ll win tons of new business.

I’m glad she understood that this approach doesn’t make one bit of sense to me.

We have landed some big-@$$ clients, and are we proud!  I’d like to crow from the roof tops, brag in a few magazines, send out some nice PR announcements and tell my mother.  But our clients have policies that prohibit vendors from telling they won business – what the ????  What’s the point of winning if no one knows?  Ok, the check in the bank, I get it, but truly, half the fun of getting the big fish is to have the bragging rights – plus, other companies take notice and you get more work.

We did convince one of our big wins to let us let the cat out of the bag within certain (and very specific) parameters – and we’re grateful – but c’mon, lighten up pharma – and I’m still telling my mom, no matter what.

I’ve been eagerly reading “How We Decide,” written by Jonah Lehrer, a neuroscientist.  Interestingly enough, it seems people fall into two camps:  you can make quick, good decisions on the fly or you can’t.  And being smart doesn’t have much to do with it.  You are probably wondering when I’ll get to the point of this blog posting – here it comes:

How do clients REALLY decide which vendor to go with – is it referrals?  Is it relationships?  Is it comfort level?  Does the pitch matter?  How much?  Price seems to be a factor, but randomly so.  I guess I’m studying this because we have won some really big pitches against some really big players and I want to really know why and how I can have it happen more often.  So, I am asking our clients for feedback, but I am also trying to understand the decision making process itself.  From what I am reading, it is pretty hardwired and a brain that has been “trained” will respond rather predictably in like situations.

I do get that we are not for everyone – we don’t wear suits, drag around lawyers or give PowerPoint presentations – if that’s your gig, I’d be happy to refer you to our competition.  We are looking for a few good people, those who do make their own decisions and are looking for people who can also think on the fly and are ready to really innovate – we’ll share the risks with you…and the benefits.

I’ve gotten invited to speak a fair amount over the years.   The deal was, I put on a great, educational presentation (no pimping One Eleven or our stuff) and the conference folks comped my attendance fee as well as expenses.  Somewhere along the line, someone blew it for all of us and insisted on selling instead of educating in their presentation – from then on, vendors were put in the position to pony up “sponsorships” or worse, a half-ass booth with crappy brochures – and then the vendor was allowed to speak.

I got another one of these “invites” this morning:

Hey Janet,

Hope all is well. You and I have discussed our conferences in the past so I wanted to get in touch regarding our 3rd Annual XXXX meeting in October. Attached is last year’s conference brochure for background as well as a draft agenda for this year’s conference.

Below you’ll find an updated list of confirmed and tentative speakers for this year; you’ll see we’ve already confirmed a bunch of great companies with more on the way. Would this be an appropriate venue for One Eleven Interactive to further spread the word about your services and work to the pharma marketers in our audience? If so there are a number of sponsorship/exhibit options available that could facilitate this, some including potential speaking roles at the conference.

See what I mean? Pay us and we’ll turn our heads while you bore our audience to death.

This model is old and broken and serves no one well – least of all, the folks who take time and money to try to actually learn something and engage with peers. So I guess I won’t be speaking for that group in October or any other time. If you want me to speak, I promise to rock it, entertain and educate, but save my sales pitch for the right time and place.

 Talked to a long time industry pal, who has been around the interactive mulberry bush a few times.  He was telling me a story of how he was starting to feel like the village “old man” – because any time his colleagues  with less experience than he got confronted with a problem, they tended to wring their hands, panic, then realize, “hey, we can go ask the old man, he’ll know what to do!”  So, they all come tromping into his office, seeking his advice – once given, they scornfully say, “that old man doesn’t know anything!”

But, grasshopper, he does.  The pharma industry goes hot and cold on healthcare professionals – for a while, they were our sun, our moon, our reason for being.  Then came DTC and we wooed the consumer – ah, here comes the kick in the pants.  The consumers think we are liars – and pretty much hawkers of drugs for faux diseases and if you see the TV ads, you kinda have to agree (I saw the latest one and just had to roll my eyes) and we realize DTC is going to drastically change or go away.  OH NO – okay, back to the docs – but we are eliminating reps and we have given them (at best) secondary positioning on our brand sites – it’s been like a “Where’s Waldo” or “Find the Pope in the Pizza” game – see if you can find the healthcare professional link on this site!!

We have an opportunity to make it right – doctors are looking to us for the latest information and updates and samples – let’s not let them down this time.  They deserve better.

I read an article in the NY Times over coffee this morning (I still like the paper version!) entitled “No More Easy Money” and was a bit surprised by the reaction to the bad economy by the executives  who were “born from a place where they knew no failure…”  Wow, I don’t know an entrepreneur (and I know a LOT) who can say they have sailed through the last two decades – where have these people been?

From my experience, I started earning my chops after 9/11, as did many of my entrepreneurial friends.  We sat down, blew up our company as we knew it and started over, in a new direction.  New, unproven paths are never easy – but innovating in pharma is brutal – but if you can actually pull it off – well, the world is (potentially) your oyster.  Patience is also required to “make” success happen – that for me is the hardest part.

Truthfully, I didn’t really know if the brass ring would be ours – we had come so close so many times, but hadn’t quite grabbed it – but now I feel we have an iron grip.  I wish those movie execs strength – they are kind of like trust fund kids, except now the funds have run out – they will have to learn how to stand on their own feet – and start learning how to really be leaders.

Focus is a beautiful thing.  It is very helpful when a company is focused on a specific area of business (like connecting pharma and physicians through interactive channels) you know what you have to offer and people know what they are buying from you.  Credibility comes into play, but once the “big players” in pharma have bought your products, you’re golden.

So, where do you go from there?  Focus is again key when a company has higher aspirations such as an industry wide sampling closet that is completely mobile and a global mobile sampling solution.  These do not pose insurmountable challenges, but they’re not easy either and that makes them interesting goals to have.

We’ll be making them happen, not just wishing it so.