Are Marketers Artists or Mathematicians?

How many marketers does it take to calculate ROI?

None. There's a lot of talk about ROI, but no one's got the time, money or the inclination to do the math.

Sorry, just thought I'd open with a little joke as in a live presentation.

Speaking of live presentations, have you ever accepted an invitation to make a presentation on a subject with which you have very little personal experience or knowledge?

That is currently my predicament.

I am presenting a keynote speech at the Measuring Marketing ROI conference in London next month. The title of my presentation is "Why many pharmaceutical marketers ignore ROI and rely upon anecdotal evidence."

I've had plenty of time to prepare my presentation, but I have done practically nothing so far to put my slide deck together. I'm beginning to feel the pressure building and I need help.

Of course, although I have practically no experience measuring marketing ROI, that doesn't stop me from having an opinion based on conferences I've attended and watching marketers ignore ROI. In fact, I've commented on this issue in at least several posts to this blog. See, for example, "Do Pharma Marketers Need a Thick Skin or Will a Thick Skull Suffice?" and "Rozerem Ad Spending Exceeds Sales!"

But that is the limit of my knowledge. So, I would really appreciate your insights on this topic, which I also hope to write up in an article for the Feb issue of Pharma Marketing News.

Here's my keynote outline:

Why many pharmaceutical marketers ignore ROI and rely upon anecdotal evidence

• Are marketers artists or mathematicians? [It's obvious (or maybe not): Marketers are not daVinci's -- they are not good at combining art and science.]
  
• Right brain vs. left brain thinking
• Creativity vs. accountability
• There are very few awards given for the latter, but many for the former
• Can six sigma be applied to marketing?

If you have any insights into these bullet points, please post them in the comments section of this post below.

If you are a member of the Pharma Marketing Roundtable Forum, you can participate in the discussion thread located here. (You have to be a member to access the forum. To join the Roundtable Forum, fill out the Roundtable Membership Request Form.)

If I use your pearls of wisdom in the article or presentation, I will be happy to give you credit if you identify yourself. Anonymous comments are also welcomed (don't worry, I won't tell Congress).

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Full disclosure: I am working with the event organizers (ViB Events) to help them promote this meeting. I am not getting paid to be a speaker or even to promote the meeting, but they are paying for most of my travel expenses -- not including food other than that included during the conference.

Social Media to Congress: "Piss Off!"

I love a Congressional investigation as well as the next guy, especially when it involves purported wrong-doing by pharmaceutical company bigwigs.

The House Committee on Commerce investigation into "who knew what when" about the ENHANCE clinical trial is a case in point. Did bigwigs at Schering-Plough cash in stock options well ahead of the negative news?

As pointed out by whistleblower Peter Rost on BrandweekNRx, at least a few people inside SP knew that ENHANCE was a failure way back in March, 2007 -- about 10 months prior to the public announcement and a month or two before Schering bigwigs -- including president Carrie Cox -- sold stock (see "New evidence indicates Schering-Plough insiders knew the Vytorin trial was "a bust" on March 13, 2007").

These people inside SP were "anonymous" posters to CafePharma. On March 13, 2007, an anonymous CafePharma poster claimed that a "buddy" at "SPRI" -- an abbreviation for the research and development arm of Schering-Plough -- said that the ENHANCE study was a bust. "Adding Zetia to already maxed-out statin is useless," claimed this anonymous poster.

If this person knew, then so did Cox, seems to be the thinking of the Congressional Committee, which sent a letter to Sarah Palmer, CafePharma's Webmaster/mistress, and her ISP asking for the names, addresses, phone numbers, e-mail addresses, and Internet protocol addresses of anyone creating posts prior to January 18, 2008 regarding the ENHANCE clinical trial.

It also requested that CafePharma "not destroy, dispose of, or tamper with any files or records relating to Merck/Schering-Plough and the ENHANCE study."

CafePharma faces a dilemma: should it hand over information it has about "anonymous" posters to the House Committee on Commerce, which requested these names as part of its investigation of "who knew what when" in the ENHANCE investigation? Or should CafePharma tell the committee to "piss off!"?

At first it appears that handing over names, addresses, and e-mail addresses of "anonymous" posters is an oxymoronic endeavor -- anonymous means that kind of data simply is not available. Or does it?

Having had some experience with the dark side of CafePharma (see "Banned from CafePharma!"), I can say that it is amazing what technically-savvy people can learn about "anonymous" posters. CafePharma may know the IP addresses of such posters, which can be used to trace them back to their Internet service providers, which, in turn, will have names, e-mail addresses, and possibly other personal information. You might also be able to trace what web sites anonymous posters visited prior and after posting to CafePharma.

Regardless of what personal information CafePharma has about its posters, I hope it refuses to comply with the Committee's "request." I am not sure what legal rights CafePharma has to refuse to comply, but this request is a serious issue for CafePharma and other "social network" Web sites whose members depend upon the owners to protect their anonymity in the exercise of their free speech rights.

Of course, it isn't it enough for Congress to know that thanks to public postings on CafePharma it is likely that Cox and other SP employees knew of the ENHANCE trial problems well before the public announcement. What Congress wants is some kind of evidence that Cox et al actually did know and used that information to trade on. They want to know who the anonymous posters are so they can be called to testify and name names.

I am not telling CafePharma what to do, but I think anyone who owns a blog or social network that publishes "anonymous" comments should speak up against this request. It's one thing if the information was required for national security or if the postings were death threats, but it's quite another when we are talking about insider trading.

The Committee's request -- if left unchallenged -- could further frighten the pharmaceutical industry away from social media marketing. Already the industry is concerned about what users publish on social media sites -- especially if it contains off-label drug information or adverse events. The worriers don't also need to add Congressional investigations and privacy risks to the list of their concerns.

I propose that the Pharma Blogosphere^TM community draft a letter to John Dingell, Chairman of the House Committee on Commerce, protesting the committee's request and defending the right of CafePharma to refuse to hand over private information about its members. Please join the discussion on the Pharma Marketing Network Forum I set up to get some input in creating this letter. Or send me an email: johnmack@virsci.com


P.S. Speaking of Social Media Marketing, have you taken the online Social Media Marketing Readiness Survey?

By filling out this questionnaire, you will discover where you may need to augment your knowledge about social media and the hurdles you may need to overcome within your organization to implement a social media marketing program.

When you complete the questionnaire, you’ll be able to see the average of all responses to date and get a better idea of how you and your company compare to that average.

You will also have the option of supplying your contact information if you would like a personalized evaluation of your responses. This evaluation adds up your score in three different categories: corporate culture, knowledge, and regulatory risk, to determine how aggressive your strategy could be.

Take the survey here and Rate Your Social Media Readiness!

Jarvik Can't Prescribe and Can't Row a Boat, But Can He Sell?

"He can't row," said Dr. O. H. Frazier of the Texas Heart Institute of Dr. Jarvik, Pfizer's Lipitor celebrity spokesperson. And Dr. Frazier should know -- he's a "longtime collaborator" of Jarvik's, according to a NY Times article.

The fact that Jarvik is not actually rowing in those old Lipitor commercials was pointed out by me back in August, 2006, when I was practically the only Pharma Blogger in the US. Here's what I wrote in the post "Confusing Creativity with Mission" back then:

... a body double rowing expert does the rowing in those Lipitor TV ads, not Dr. Jarvik (see "Lights ... Camera ... Attention ... Row!"). In the photo in that article -- taken by Jarvik's rowing stand-in during filming of the commercial -- Dr. Jarvik obviously is not far from shore in a rigged-up canoe.

I'm not surprised that a more experienced rower was used for the action shots -- but it seems a little disingenuous. I admired the skill of the rower, turning the blades of the oars just right for minimum drag between strokes. Because I thought Dr. Jarvik was the actual rower, I admired him all the more, which in turn made me more prone to trust his statements about Lipitor ("When diet and exercise aren't enough, adding Lipitor significantly lowers bad cholesterol. It's your heart. Ask if Lipitor is right for you."). Of course, the fact that he knew a thing or two about the human heart also impressed me!

On the other hand, in another Lipitor TV ad, that guy in the natty suit and purple tie is pure Jarvik! No body double.

Back in those days, reporters and Congressmen didn't even know what a blog was, let alone actually read one, and my post remained under the radar. Of course, not being able to row in and of itself isn't worthy of a Congressional investigation.

We now know that Jarvik can't prescribe Lipitor either (see "Jarvik -- Lipitor spokesperson -- 'outed' as an unlicensed physician!"), but he defends himself in a statement posted to his Jarvik Heart corporate Web site (see "Statement by Dr. Jarvik Regarding his Role as Lipitor Spokesman"):

"I have the training, experience, and medical knowledge to understand the conclusions of the extensive clinical trials that have been conducted to study the safety and effectiveness of Lipitor."

Along with a gazillion other "doctors"! What makes Jarvik so special then? It's the oft-quoted "fact" that Jarvik is the inventor of the "first" artificial heart. According to Robin Koval, president of Kaplan Thaler, the agency Pfizer hired to create the Jarvik ads, "We think Dr. Jarvik is an amazing spokesperson, [as the inventor of the artificial heart] he's beyond a celebrity spokesperson." But is he the inventor of the artificial heart?

Did Jarvik Invent the First Artificial Heart?
On his Web site, Jarvik not only defends himself as a qualified Lipitor spokesperson, but he also defends himself against claims by ventriloquist Paul Winchell (1922-2005) that he [Winchell] invented the first artificial heart. This claim was cited in a comment to my blog post in 2006 (see "Lipitor's Jarvik: Fop or Flop?").

"Certainly, he [Winchell] did not invent the first artificial heart," says Jarvik. "The Winchell device was not the prototype for the first permanent total artificial heart -- the Jarvik-7 heart," he says. "The mechanisms described in his [Winchell's] patent are crude and impractical," Jarvik says.

What Jarvik does not say -- but what he allows many news reporters to say -- is that he [Jarvik] invented the first artificial heart. The ABC News story cited above, for example, describes Jarvik as "the creator of the first artificial heart." But Jarvik admits he did not invent the first artificial heart by citing prior inventions to Winchell's and his own invention: "Internal artificial hearts were developed and implanted into experimental animals by Akutsu and Kolff at the Cleveland Clinic, beginning in 1957," says Jarvik, "although their early work was published and not patented, which was customary for inventors from academia."

But Can He Sell?
When the Jarvik Lipitor ads first came out, I asked if Jarvik was "Fop or Flop?" (here). I knew from the way he dressed, talked and walked that he was a "fop" and I thought viewers would not respond to a "cardiologist" who looked, dressed and acted like Jarvik. Of course, back then I didn't realize that Jarvik was not a cardiologist in the first place!

According to the NY Times article, "His recent invention, the Jarvik 2000 FlowMaker, [which I assume was "invented" seven years ago in 2000] is a pump the size of a C flashlight battery that is implanted directly into an intact human heart. It has been used experimentally on nearly six dozen patients at the Texas Heart Institute. The Food and Drug Administration has authorized those experiments, although Dr. Jarvik has yet to receive F.D.A. approval to sell the Jarvik 2000 for widespread use."

So he's having a hard time launching his newest invention for sale.

But can he sell Lipitor?

It's difficult to know if Jarvik helped Pfizer sell more Lipitor in the past. Jarvik was "guaranteed" $1.35 million for appearing in the advertisements ("considered a lot by most people," said Jarvik).

I have to assume Pfizer thought it was worth it, although $1.35 million is a pittance compared to the hundreds of millions Pfizer spends on Lipitor DTC advertising and the $12.7 billion in Lipitor sales last year.

But can he sell Lipitor NOW?

Is the Jarvik era of DTC over? Jarvik was the first "real" doctor to appear in DTC ads. Maybe that wasn't such a good idea and it is unlikely that any other real doctor will now have the cojones to follow in Jarvik's (foppy) footsteps -- no pharma marketer would even suggest such a scenario these days!

Given all the negative publicity surrounding Jarvik as a Lipitor spokesperson, it may be time for Pfizer to retire the good doctor (72% of respondents to a Pharmalot poll agree that Pfizer should fire Jarvik).

In my personal opinion, it's time for Pfizer to dump the Jarvik commercials and move on. But, given the "circle the wagons" mentality of pharmaceutical companies, I don't expect this to happen any time soon.

On the other hand, Jarvik may consider it wise to negotiate his way out of the Pfizer/Lipitor contract as it may now be a liability for him in his effort to get more investors and launch his latest invention.

Making Fun of Pharma Marketing is Easy

I've just returned from a few days vacation on the beach in Sunny Isles, Florida and I haven't yet recovered from the Motivational Deficiency Disorder (MDD) symptoms that resulted!

Haven't heard about MDD? You might want to take a look at the following video produced by the folks at Consumers International (CI) . The video explains what MDD is, how it's treated, and -- most importantly -- how one pharmaceutical company markets Strivor, its new MDD treatment:



I particularly like the part about 4 minutes into this video where the good doctor talks about clinical trial results on sloths.

"You've seen nothing," says the doctor who invented Strivor, "until you've seen a sloth that's motivated, I'll tell you!"

Ba Boom!

Ha, Ha, Ha.

The anti-pharma marketing shenanigans of CI have only recently caught the attention of blogs like the WSJ Health Blog (see "Striving for an Antidote to Drug Marketing") and Pharmalot (see "Do You Have Motivational Deficiency Disorder?").

This MDD spoof may be new to some bloggers, but I highlighted the first MDD video spoof back in January, 2007 (see my post "Disease Mongering and Pharma Credibility"). I thought this first video was quite well done. Some of the recent MDD videos produced by this group, however, merely remix scenes or recreate similar scenes. The latest iteration features a woman sufferer of MDD (click here to see that video).

Frankly, I do not see any women sufferers of MDD, which I believe mostly affects young men between the ages of 14 and 28. The messy surroundings depicted in the video look EXACTLY like my son's frat room!

The problem is, the majority of men suffering from MDD do not want to change and get up before 2-3 PM. Consequently, the MDD spoof was funny the first time I saw, but not so much now.

Consumers International looks like it's based in Australia where direct to consumer (DTC) advertising is not legal. Physician marketing and working with patient organizations, however, is legal and the video above spoofs pharma "marketing" practices disguised as education.

Producing video spoofs of pharmaceutical marketing practices is all the rage these days it seems. Here in the U.S., Consumer Union also produces such videos (see "Consumer Reports Rip Rozerem Ad -- A New One!", for example).

It turns out that there's a connection between CU and CI. According to the FAQs on the CI Web site:

What sort of organisations are Consumers International members and where are they located?

Consumers International's members include a wide range of different independent consumer organisations.

At one end of the scale is the Consumers Union in the US, which was founded almost 70 years ago and has more than 300 staff and 4.5 million individual consumers as its own members. At the other end are semi-voluntary associations providing information and advice and concentrating on education and community development to improve access to food, water and other basic services in some of the world's poorest countries.

Government Affiliates similarly run from major competition and fair trading agencies to recently established government departments in small countries addressing consumer issues for the first time.

About two-thirds of member organisations are in Latin America, Africa, Asia and Central/Eastern Europe and in countries of the former Soviet Union, the other third in Western Europe and North America.

I suppose these spoofs are supposed to be educational, but like the DTC ads they make fun of, I get more entertainment value than educational value from them. It's easy to make fun of pharma marketing practices, especially when your goal is to end these practices. That's where my spoofs making fun of pharma marketing differ from CI's spoofs -- my goal is better, more effective, and more educational pharmaceutical marketing. Just thought I'd point that out.

What's Your Social Media Readiness Score?

Sometimes, pharmaceutical marketers must feel like they are doomed if they do or if they don't engage in new media marketing such as "social media" (aka, Web 2.0) marketing.

If they do it, they may be doomed to fail miserably because of lack of knowledge or experience or because their effort is shot down internally by legal/regulatory before it ever gets off the ground.

But, if they don't, they may be doomed to fall behind their competitors who have overcome the challenges -- conservative internal regulatory environment, incompatible corporate culture, and lack of knowledge.

It's a lose-lose situation. Or is it?

Before you give up all hope and resign to be dragged down to social media marketing hell, you might want to take the short questionnaire I have developed that will rate your company's readiness to engage in social media marketing.

By filling out the Pharma Marketing News Rate Your Social Media Marketing Readiness online questionnaire, you will discover where you may need to augment your knowledge about social media and what internal regulatory and cultural hurdles you may need to overcome to implement a social media marketing program.

The questionnaire asks you to answer a few short questions:

Regulatory Environment (applicable only to companies regulated by the FDA)

1. In your opinion, what is your company’s general regulatory climate?
2. There are a number of legal and regulatory issues associated with a drug firm’s participation in or sponsorship of social media. How well do you and your colleagues understand these regulatory risks?
3. How well do you think your company will be able to successfully address these compliance issues?

Corporate Culture

1. What is your company’s tolerance for risk (e.g., initiating new or untested marketing tactics, launching bold corporate initiatives, etc.)?
2. How does your company normally react to negative commentary from the media, physicians, politicians and other stakeholders?
3. How uncomfortable would your company be advertising in a publication or on a web site that often contained editorial content critical of the pharmaceutical industry yet whose readers very closely matched your target audience?

Knowledge & Opinion of Social Media

1. Rank your knowledge of social media in general – i.e., how familiar are your with various forms of social media and how they are used?
2. Rank your knowledge of how social media are impacting the pharmaceutical industry’s customers and other stakeholders – i.e., patients, consumers, healthcare professionals, policy makers, etc.
3. Have you ever personally used social media (i.e., read an online forum or posted a message to an online forum, submitted comments to a blog or written a blog post, edited a wiki, etc.)?

When you complete the questionnaire, you’ll be able to get your personal "social media marketing readiness" score and compare it to the average score of all responses to date.

Hopefully, this will give you a better idea of what obstacles you and your company need to overcome before you attempt a social media marketing campaign.

Access the questionnaire here.