Industry Trends

Thirty Years and Counting

December 1, 2011 By lgoodale Leave a Comment

Tiffany Ryan, VP, Account Services, Palio

Thirty years of HIV.

Today I wear a red ribbon for HIV. I wear it with reflection, empathy, understanding, and a desire to do more.

For the early sufferers who spoke up and brought awareness to a disease in the midst of stigma, hatred and misunderstanding. I wear it to honor people like Elizabeth Glaser, Joey DiPaolo, and Ryan White. I wear it to honor their bravery, compassion, and dedication to addressing the issue, speaking up for what is right, and holding true to their beliefs.

For those who bring awareness, support, and information to the communities impacted with HIV every single day. I wear it to honor these individuals – doctors, nurses, case managers, AIDS support groups, peer educators, and counselors. I wear it to honor their passion and dedication to making a difference.

For those living with the virus. I wear it to honor their personal fight against HIV.

But most importantly, today I wear a red ribbon because even after 30 years of information, activism, awareness and education, we still have a long way to go. Because even after 30 years of evolution in treating HIV, we still haven’t cured it. Because even after 30 years of understanding HIV and how to prevent transmission, we have more work to do. The epidemic grows. The stigma grows.

This week the CDC released estimates from three surveillance datasets about the HIV care continuum in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.

- Today there are approximately 1.2 million people living with HIV. And 20% are unaware they are infected.

- Out of the 80% aware of their status, 77% of HIV-infected adults are linked to medical care for their HIV treatment, but only half of them remain in medical care

- Transmission reduction strategies are limited, with less than half of HIV patients indicating that they received prevention counseling

Couple these figures with the fact that the incidence of annual infections remains stable at approximately 48,000 new infections each year, it’s clear that more needs to be done.

The National HIV/AIDS strategy has several measurable goals which, if achieved, could have tremendous impact on this issue. Goals include:

- Lowering the annual number of infections by 25% by 2015

- Increasing the number of people living with HIV who know their status to 90%

- Reducing HIV transmission rate by 30%

- Increasing the number of patients linked to medical care within three months of their diagnosis

The strategy aims to increase prevention efforts, access to care, and reduce HIV-related disparities in high risk communities. It’s a start. But we won’t beat this epidemic until HIV and AIDS once again becomes part of our consciousness. When we reduce apathy and take action. All the government agencies, special committees, and strategies can’t solve the issue. We all must take responsibility for our part.

It’s hard to some up what 30 years really means to this epidemic. For me personally, it’s going to be a day of reflection and remembrance. It’s impossible not to acknowledge the history, evolution, and growth in understanding the disease. If you have four minutes today to reflect and remember, check out The Kaiser Family Foundation video – summarizing thirty years of milestones. We’ve made huge progress so far. I’m hopeful that in my lifetime I’ll witness many more positive milestones leading us toward the eradication of this disease.

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Filed Under: Advertising, Family, Industry Trends, Lifestyles, Media, Research, Technology Tagged With: AIDS, CDC, HIV, World Aids Day

Are all Calls Created Equal?

November 30, 2011 By lgoodale Leave a Comment

Rob Kempton, VP, Brand Planning Director, Palio

Anyone who has spent a day in pharmaceutical – or any other type – of sales, will tell you the answer is an unequivocal “no.”

There are cold calls to warm leads and warm calls on glacial leads. There are follow-up calls on established accounts and first-time calls to what may be your next strategic account. There are calls where you get the hand-off, the brush-off or even the flip off, as well as those where you close the deal, make the sale and bring home the cheddar.

Against that backdrop, why would you use the same digital tools for every sales call? The answer is: You wouldn’t.

Now, there are some exceptions: Chances are your organization has an established CRM platform like Salesforce CRM or industry-specific solution like StayinFront EdgeRx. That central repository of prospecting data, notes and follow-up activity should be part of every call – in fact, chances are your sales management demands it.

But what about the tools you use to pitch at a first-time informational meeting versus a drug-specific presentation for an existing customer? That’s where there’s room to change it up:

Start with a completely modular deck. Whether you’re using PowerPoint, Flash or one of the online presentation tools like SlideRocket.com, your sales organization should be able to piece together a presentation appropriate for the coldest of cold calls as well as a new-drug introduction to a longstanding customer – all on their own, guided by best-practices content suggestions from the marketing organization.

Use different tools for different lead scores. If your organization uses lead scoring to prioritize sales opportunities, consider WebEx or other online meeting tools for the lower-scoring leads. Time and travel are expensive, even if you have a local sales rep in place – why not save money with the leads that have historically poorer performance?

Be prepared for different types of learning: Sometimes, using the right tool means knowing when to put it away. For example, although the majority of people absorb information best through visuals, a significant number of individuals process and retain messages better through audio. Good salespeople are trained to recognize these traits and adapt to them – put the iPad or PowerPoint away if you’ve clearly got an audio-first prospect, and spend your time engaging in conversation.

Let some broad rules guide you: Generally speaking, dial the tech and the presentation glitz back on initial sales calls, increase it for informational meetings once a relationship is established. And, if you’re in a multi-call environment, dial it back again for the close meeting. The key: At the outset and at the close of a deal, you want the prospect focused on communicating and reinforcing their needs and how your product fits those needs – many sales are lost by over-communicating right past the prospect’s pain.

The rules for what digital tools to use on a sales call are no different than those for use in their non-digital counterparts. Choose the tools that will let you focus on the customer and their needs – not on your desire to lay out every feature and benefit or use the latest tech toy – and you’ll close more deals.

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Filed Under: Account Services, Advertising, Creative, Industry Trends Tagged With: CRM, digital, iPad, sales

9 Golden Rules for Optimizing your Social Media Presence

November 28, 2011 By lgoodale Leave a Comment

Heather Stone, Interactive Producer, Palio

Online or offline, we’re perceived by our actions. Because social media has become just “part of how business gets done,” it is easy to forget to be mindful of how we interact with others. In many religions and cultures, there’s usually some variation of the golden rule – do unto others as you wish to have done to you. Applying this rule to your online communications can help optimize your social media presence and contribute to positive perception of your company and personal brand.

Treat others how you’d want to be treated – Good relationships are the cornerstone of a successful social media presence. That requires listening to the needs of your audience and communicating with them in a way that resonates. Want to increase customer loyalty? Remember it’s about them, not you.

Be welcoming – If someone likes you on Facebook or follows you on Twitter, they’re open to having a relationship. Get them at hello, whether that’s offering a promotion, inviting them to subscribe to your newsletter or simply acknowledging the relationship (caveat: no auto-reply, please).

Be responsive, caring and thoughtful – Displaying empathy towards your customers is a valuable competitive advantage. If they’re having a service issue, show you care by being proactive in communication and problem resolution. If they’re looking for information prior to making a buying decision, go beyond product-specific information to connect them with a like-minded community.

Ensure interactions add value – Remember that social media is about conversations – not just opportunities to name drop your company, product or service. If you’re using Facebook to post the same discount offer or website link multiple times, you’re going to turn off your audience. There’s no shortage of information out there, either. Keep content fresh and make every conversation count.

Embrace opposing viewpoints – You can learn a lot about your customers by listening – especially when they’re disagreeing with you. Rather than run away from or get caught up in the argument, keep communication transparent and deliver messages that speak respectfully to contrarian ideas.

Think before posting – Even the best community managers can get emotional. Snarky replies don’t do anyone any favors. Not pausing before you post can damage your career, reputation or company. Word things carefully, and if you need to, walk away for a few minutes before responding.

Sharpen your listening skills – Paying attention to what customers and competitors are saying provides valuable business intelligence. Empower and collaborate with your audience based on the things that are important to them.

Share and share alike – If you want engage people as brand ambassadors, provide information that is worthy of sharing and make it easy. Something as simple as “please retweet” can move a message.

Be authentic –Use your social media presence to let people know who you are and what you stand for by painting a picture across all your social networks. Take responsibility for your words and actions – even during difficult times.

Communication is a key to better relationships and long-term customer engagement. Follow the golden rule, respect and honor those you interact with and commit to listening and responding appropriately to optimize your social media presence.

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Filed Under: Career, Creative, Industry Trends, Media, Social Media Tagged With: empathy, golden rule, Twitter

Forgoing Face Time? Get Tethered!

November 23, 2011 By lgoodale Leave a Comment

Todd LaRoche, EVP, Managing Director of Creative, Palio

There is no slow season in health care. Whether seeing patients in between personal and professional appointments or a spike in patient visits during cold and flu season, doctors are always busy. For sales reps, this results in a greater challenge getting face time with doctors.

Sales reps may not be used to communicating in a two-minute window, but doctors, nurses and office staff are conditioned to interact that way. Last year on Pixels and Pills, I wrote about being brief and getting to the point when communicating with doctors. That still holds true, but with more doctors tethered to their smartphones and iPads, we need to use technology to change how we communicate with doctors.

Give them what they want. Sales reps need to get better at tracking information related to each sales call, including the doctor’s contact information and preferred mode of communication, patient population needs and prescription-writing activity. With a compressed amount of time to detail new medicines and deliver marketing messages, it’s important to address those most relevant to each practice. Having better information, sales reps can then implement more doctor-centric strategies and design more relevant campaigns.

Get your high tech game on. It’s important to identify creative ways to convey information. For doctors who are digitally savvy and prefer electronic communication, an interactive iPad app or digital brochure can deliver value and foster stronger relationships – all while providing an efficient and more cost-effective means of communicating beyond the traditional face-to-face call. And, physicians can review information at a time that is convenient to them – not when they have an office full of patients.

Speak in sound bites. If you can convey information in a 140-character tweet, you can do it in the real world. But if you have mere minutes of a physician’s time – whether in the office or at a virtual event – a succinct presentation style can be a real differentiator.

Recognize that it’s all in the details. While overall sales and market penetration matter immensely to the organization’s bottom line, at the individual sales rep’s level there are other metrics worth tracking in this limited-face-time environment. Average amount of time spent discussing products with a physician, requests for additional information, volume of sample product distributed or prescription-writing activity are just three of many ways to track messaging effectiveness by proxy measures. Understanding how physicians want to receive and interact information can help you determine the best technology solutions to facilitate information exchange and meet their needs.

Technology is creating new and exciting opportunities for communication that enable us to take evolving communication preferences into account when providing new product information, clinical alerts or product updates. By incorporating communication technology, electronic promotional activity, and virtual events into our communication arsenal and demonstrating depth and breadth of product knowledge, sales reps can provide valuable interactions with doctors and achieve their objectives.

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Filed Under: Account Services, Advertising, Brand Planning, Creative, Industry Trends, Medical Strategy, Social Media, Technology Tagged With: digital, Health Care, iPad, sale rep, Smartphone

Palio Tech Watch: 11/21/2011

November 21, 2011 By lgoodale Leave a Comment

Jon Fisher, Technology Manager, Palio

01. 23andme


Categories:	Home testing, genomic testing

What it is:	According to their site: “23andMe is a retail DNA testing service providing information and tools for consumers to learn about and explore their DNA. We utilize the Illumina OmniExpress Plus Research Use Only Chip which has been customized for use in all of our products and services by 23andMe. All of the laboratory testing for 23andMe is done in a CLIA-certified laboratory.”

Why it Matters:	We are at the dawn of personalized medicine. Up until now, testing and diagnostics have been in the hands of physicians. This is starting to change. With a growing geriatric population and sky-rocketing health care costs, there will be a trend in taking ownership of one’s healthcare. That, along with the coming trend of aging in place, proactively taking responsibility for one’s healthcare will not only take hold, it will become the norm. Look for encouragement from healthcare policymakers to take proactive steps not only in preventative care, but for long term disease management. And, very soon, the dialog will shift from “sick care” to “health maintenance.” The long view will shift will be from “healthcare” to “health lifestyle.”

02. Cure Together


Categories:	Social media, social medicine

What it is:	Disease state social media. According to mashable.com: CureTogether is not just for people with chronic illnesses; most people have medical issues, if only the occasional seasonal allergies. CureTogether helps you track symptoms, share information with others and, ideally, find treatment and cures.

Why it Matters:	This seems remarkably close to Patients Like Me, but the big difference seems to be built around sharing antidotal information around what works and what doesn’t, and allowing the community to share data that is aggregated into data visualizations that patients can review and form their own opinion about what’s working and what’s not. This is a further step toward participatory medicine. The important bit of information to note in these social disease state sites is that the conversation is moving further away from the doctor as being the sole source of healthcare and disease state information.

03. Withings WiFi Body Scale


Categories:	Medical devices, data visualization, personal healthcare

What it is:	A wi-fi body scale that graphs your weight, BMI, lean and fat mass so you can access it from your smartphone or web browser at any time. And, you can share your progress through your social media circles.

Why it Matters:	Again, what we are witnessing is a shift of passive avoidance in healthcare to a more proactive stance on the part of the patient. The bigger question for us in healthcare marketing will be how can we better align our clients to this mind set. Not viewing devices as a channel by which to deliver a message, but instead as a means by which our clients can become more active participants in affecting a positive change in patient’s lives. Shifting our clients from a product oriented mindset to a partnership mindset within our target audience’s healthcare lifestyle.

04. FitBit Tracker


Categories:	Medical devices, data visualization, personal healthcare

What it is:	According to the FitBit site: The Fitbit Tracker shows your real-time activity stats so you know how close you are to your goals. It’s with you every step of the day, motivating you to make small changes that add up to big results.

Why it Matters:	Are you starting to see a trend here? This is another device that allows patients to track various datapoints in their lives. Steps taken, hours slept, calories burned. What’s exciting about this device is that they have added a gaming level in the form of a flower. The more active and healthy you behave, the better the flower will grow. Another interesting bit they have added is the ability to name your device. The device will also asked to be “walked” or to engage in another activity. It brings to mind the Bandai’s Tamoguci products. But now instead of pressing a few buttons to take care a virtual pet, users will take proactive measures to take care of themselves.

05. Robotic Eye Surgery Currently in beta


Categories:	Robotics, assistive technologies, medical devices

What it is:	According to the website: Researcher Thijs Meenink at TU/e has developed a smart eye-surgery robot that allows eye surgeons to operate with increased ease and greater precision on the retina and the vitreous humor of the eye. The system also extends the effective period during which ophthalmologists can carry out these intricate procedures.

Why it Matters:	Okay, this is something that is definitely not for the “do-it-yourselfer.” Kidding aside, this is an important device to note because it amplifies the value of the technologies mentioned before in this article. Why? As the mundane part of medical care is taken over by patients, doctors will be able to more clearly focus on true healthcare, allowing them to be able to put their energies into doing what patients themselves can’t: expand the data, analyze the patient and make more effective diagnoses. They will be able to make use of far more advanced technologies that are beyond the reach of the patient. They will move from the role of “health monitors” and “mechanics” to highly specializes practitioners of the medical arts.

Happy exploring.

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Filed Under: Advertising, Creative, Industry Trends, Social Media, Technology Tagged With: diabetes

Who’s Responsible for This?

November 18, 2011 By tlaroche Leave a Comment

Gregory Alderisio, Senior Copywriter, Palio

Let’s say you see an ad in a magazine or on the Web and you absolutely hate the headline. Who do you blame? Naturally, the wretched, abominable writer. Or what if the art direction is so banal or so hideous you recoil in horror. Whose fault is that? Of course, the hapless, no-talent art director.

Pretty much everything wrong with an ad can be laid at the feet of two people: the AD and CW. It’s the same with the glory. A good headline: well, obviously that came from the unique mind of a gifted writer. An inspired visual? Kudos to the innovative genius of the art director. Why would it be any other way? A pair of people did the ad so let’s praise/stone them depending upon how it turned out. And of course at their year-end review, the creative team with too many boring, dull, moronically-simplistic ads gets labeled as lazy, timid or unimaginative. On the other hand, the team with award-winning work gets a raise, a bonus and a big fat ego.

Because that’s the way many agencies are run, it’s got to be a good system, right? Well, maybe not.

What if instead of praising or blaming two people for the work, we praised/blamed everyone? Not just in words, but in more tangible ways. Planners, account people, medical directors, creative directors, producers – what if all their raises, bonuses, perks and promotions depended upon the creativity of the work their accounts produced? Overnight agency output would improve. Because it can’t be just the creative team who’s motivated to do good work, that’s not enough. Two people alone can’t push good work through a sea of indifference and nitpickers. Every department has to want the good stuff and have a vested interest in getting it sold and seeing it produced.

This may sound self-serving but ultimately it serves the client because clients get better work that attracts more attention. And brands that get noticed are brands that have a better chance to succeed and make clients happy.

If we’re comfortable calling out creative work that’s dull and lifeless, we should be just as comfortable doing the same with a dull key thought, a me-too insight, or a toothless medical claim. We can’t just sleepwalk our way through customer research, message development and strategy generation then sell ho-hum ideas to our clients and expect the work produced to be brilliant.

When work is great, chances are it came from an inspired insight or a focused strategy and that contribution needs to be acknowledged. Great work is also impeccably produced so we have to recognize producers and art buyers when a finished idea looks just as cool as everyone imagined it would when it was merely a line drawing.

In other words, we all sink or swim together. The sooner every department is held accountable for the creative output in a concrete way, the quicker the entire agency will be devoted to bringing truly memorable ideas to the market.

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Filed Under: Account Services, Advertising, Brand Planning, Career, Creative, Industry Trends, Medical Strategy Tagged With: creative brief

Innovation in HIV

November 9, 2011 By lgoodale Leave a Comment

Tiffany Ryan, VP, Account Services, Palio

What an exciting time to be working in HIV. After 30 years, the scientific community has deciphered the mechanism of viral replication, resulting in multiple drug classes targeting multiple points of replication. On the patient/provider level, therapies have evolved to meet market needs – efficacious drugs with improved tolerability and convenient dosing.

This disease state has grown and changed at unprecedented speed – shifting what was once a death sentence into a chronic, more manageable condition.

Recently, there have been some interesting new discoveries that could impact and shape the future of HIV medicine. Discoveries that intrigue, surprise, and potentially shift the future of HIV care.

Glowing Cats and HIV – Don’t let the whimsical (maybe a bit spooky) photo fool you. This is real science. Researchers at the Mayo Clinic conducted a gene-therapy based study that looked at the impact of inserting genes that are known for blocking FIV cell infection into feline eggs prior to sperm fertilization. A jellyfish gene was also inserted, to allow for tracking purposes, which caused the cats to glow green. The genes disable the virus’s outer shield during entry into the cell, thereby not allowing the virus to begin replication that occurs within the cell. The impact of this genetic defense approach will likely have applications for advancing future genetic therapies for people and cats alike with HIV/AIDS.

Cholesterol and HIV – An international team of immunologists published findings that could have implications on future vaccine development. Researchers found that removing the cholesterol contained in the viral envelope of the HIV molecule interfered with the way that the virus attempts to reprogram the body’s immune response to the infection.

Gaming and HIV – Fresh from the “complex problems are solved in creative ways” files, gamers have solved one of the many mysteries of HIV that have plagued the scientific sector for years. Foldit, a game developed by researchers at the University of Washington, is designed to help solve complex scientific problems through competitive games. In three weeks, gamers were able to create models that allowed for successful molecular replacement and subsequent structure determination of the protease enzyme. This information will be critical to informing new drug discovery and development efforts. However, maybe even more promising is that this game has been used to solve problems in other disease categories – namely cancer and alzheimer’s research.

The possibilities appear to be endless when you take the best of technology and combine it with human intuition. I, for one, can’t wait to see what comes next.

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Filed Under: Advertising, Creative, Industry Trends, Medical Strategy, Research, Technology Tagged With: HIV, Mayo Clinic

PHARMA – at Cooper Union – Shows How it Was Done

November 8, 2011 By tlaroche Leave a Comment

Philip Reynolds, VP, Associate Creative Director, Palio

If you find yourself in downtown Manhattan this November with a little time to kill, go to the Cooper Union, walk down the stairs, and check out an inspiring show called PHARMA, on view at the Herb Lubalin Study Center through December 3d.

The focus is masterworks of pharmaceutical graphic design and advertising from the 1940s to 1960s. If you think “masterworks” sounds too lofty to describe even the best of our hard-nosed industry, consider that mid-century giants Paul Rand, Lester Beall, Will Burtin, and Ivan Chermayeff all did pharma work.

The show lightly traces the whole history of pharmaceutical advertising, from its pre-FDA quack origins to the present day. You’ll see Ur-executions of now-familiar pharma concepts: the original chessboard, rowing crew, and suit of armor. Anyone hoping for an exegesis of contemporary pharma advertising will be disappointed, though. A bit of wall is hung with some satires (with predictably subversive lists of adverse events), but that’s it. I would have liked to have seen a serious discussion of work by the design stars of today, and how the best manage regulatory meddling that would have made Herb Lubalin throw away his calligraphy brush in despair.

But anything in the show that’s pre-WWII or post-60s is just there to provide a setting for the real jewels. The Mad Men ads, brochures, and packagings on display evoke a time when graphic masters were inspired by a confluence of optimistic forces: Visionary corporations headed by Swiss chemist-capitalists. Wonder drugs that promised to ease the strains of modern life. Faith in the power of great design to support and even add prestige to the image of a benevolent industry. And what an image they created — all in spite of (or is it because of?) the lack of Illustrator, InDesign, and Photoshop.

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Filed Under: Advertising, Creative, Industry Trends Tagged With: Cooper Union, FDA, graphic design, Paul Rand

3 Simple Things Pharma Marketing Can Learn From The Consumer Space

November 7, 2011 By lgoodale Leave a Comment

Sean O’Donnell, Group Copy Supervisor, Palio

Consumer marketing may seem like the Wild West compared to pharma marketing which must live in the confines of regulatory requirements and an indecisive FDA when it comes to social media guidelines. Still, the two disciplines have much in common. Both require understanding the target audience and creating effective communications that address a consumer’s need or desire.

However, just because pharma marketing has more restraints doesn’t mean there aren’t lessons to be learned from the consumer space.

It’s about how you roll. People want to associate with a brand that resonates with their own values. And, they’re interested in more than having their current needs met; they want someone to help them envision something better.

Different brand personalities appeal to different audience segments, but if Apple has taught us anything, it’s that cool rules. They’ve successfully managed to tap into that persona by letting it shine in everything they do from developing cool products to providing super friendly customer service. They also never come out and say they’re a cool company – they let their brand ambassadors do that for them. They have an army of fans who genuinely love their products and use social media to share their experience.

People are doing more research. When it comes to shopping decisions, consumers are relying on the internet more than ever prior to making a purchase. The same is true for health care consumers. They’re researching physicians, treatment options, drug choices and networking with patients – often before they ever step foot into the doctor’s office.

Empowered patients are the new normal and they’re influencing sales and prescribing behavior. Use social media to provide credible and accessible information to support patient decisions, encourage brand advocacy and foster better communication with doctors.

Provide an experience. Getting a sale is only half the battle; building customer loyalty and repeat business is the other half. It’s no longer enough to just deliver a quality product. People want an outstanding customer experience and if they don’t get it from you, they’re going to look elsewhere.

That means getting employees to “live the brand.” At Starbucks, they’ve instilled a “Just Say Yes” company culture. They provided employees with a mantra – not a manual – to guide their actions. If a customer wants his caramel macchiato with skim milk, he’s going to get it.

For pharma marketers, it’s about taking time to listen to patients and practitioners to determine what they need and then exceed expectations with every interaction. Providing an experience also means staying in touch, whether that’s sending valuable information via an email newsletter or letting people know how to contact your company on Facebook, Twitter or the company website.

The consumer space has embraced the shift of the digital frontier from the Web to apps. Communication is changing; people want to feel like they’re part of the process and have achieved something. It’s shared, evolving and organic from the people around them.

Ultimately, marketers like it both ways: Everyone wants to talk about integration and being brilliant at the basics while at the same time touting the game-changing value of deep industry expertise. But if there’s value in such specific experience, there are also insights to be found by looking outside of your own industry for how other sectors grow their businesses. Go ahead – take a page from the consumer playbook!

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Filed Under: Advertising, Career, Creative, Industry Trends, Media, Social Media, Technology, Uncategorized Tagged With: Apple, consumer advertising

Client/Agency Series: Clients

November 2, 2011 By lgoodale 1 Comment

Jessica Goldsmith, Account Supervisor, Palio

In our “Client/Agency” series, we’ve talked about the different ways that clients and agencies view several different facets of their partnership – from time, to the bottom line, to expectations, to creativity to collaboration.

Now we’re going to talk about the fundamentals of the partnership: the different ways that the two parties view their clients.

In both cases, the most important relationship for the person involved is the one with their clients. If this were a tech situation, we’d call them end users. For the client in the “client/agency” pairing, their end users – the client’s clients – are often their marketing colleagues. They need to deliver ideas, plans, materials, collateral, strategies, campaigns: ones that meet the goals and objectives of the brand and of the company as a whole. If their deliverables don’t match those expectations, they have dissatisfied clients.

This much, so far, is obvious.

The problem arrives when agencies forget about this larger client base and think only of their client as being their end user.

Agency folks, here’s a reminder: our client is not just our client.

Our client is that person, yes. But our client is also their client.

We can’t just think only of our client’s personal preferences. We have to always take into consideration what we know about the larger brand team, the brand itself, the company itself, the competition, and the industry. Our recommendations have to be informed by all of those factors, not just by what might make our direct client initially happy.

It follows, then, that our responsibility is to know enough about all of those factors – not only about our immediate client – to use them in our thinking. If you can’t do that already, you need to seriously rethink your work and your research.

And we need to consider that every day. Are we alerting our client to information that’s relevant to them – or are we also adding information that they could be providing to their colleagues throughout the organization? Are we considering just how our work can help them – or how it can fit in with all of the other activities across the brand, and with all other marketing activities on other brands in their portfolio?

We are the ones outside of the organization. It’s our external perspective and creativity that make us vital to our client’s success. We can’t develop tunnel vision.

Don’t forget who your client is: and who else your client is, too.

Palio is an advertising agency revolutionizing pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing to create experiences that will Never Be Forgotten.

Filed Under: Account Services, Advertising, Career, Industry Trends Tagged With: business, clients, Relationships

Thirty Years and Counting

Are all Calls Created Equal?

Who’s Responsible for This?

Innovation in HIV

PHARMA – at Cooper Union – Shows How it Was Done

Client/Agency Series: Clients

Palio on Twitter

Categories

Blogroll

Meta

01. 23andme

Categories:

Home testing, genomic testing

What it is:

Why it Matters:

02. Cure Together

Categories:

Social media, social medicine

What it is:

Why it Matters:

03. Withings WiFi Body Scale

Categories:

Medical devices, data visualization, personal healthcare

What it is:

Why it Matters:

04. FitBit Tracker

Categories:

Medical devices, data visualization, personal healthcare

What it is:

Why it Matters:

05. Robotic Eye Surgery

Categories:

Robotics, assistive technologies, medical devices

What it is:

Why it Matters:

Palio on Twitter

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Categories

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