Millions of Americans are conversing online about their health. Pharmaceutical marketers are starting to listen.
Earlier this month, pharmaceutical giant Merck released the results of a clinical trial designed to gain FDA approval for a high-dose version of the cholesterol drug Zocor. The results were not what Merck was hoping for -- the trial failed to prove a benefit for the higher dose, and instead showed that it may actually be dangerous for some patients.
Almost immediately, online chat rooms, blogs, message boards and patient support groups were inundated with information about the tests. Participants posted thousands of messages offering suggestions, opinions and concerns. And all the while, word-of-mouth research and planning firm BuzzMetrics was sorting and analyzing these messages for clues to help Merck formulate its response to the potential crisis.
The mouth that roars
Welcome to the growing world of online word-of-mouth marketing. Also known as consumer-generated publishing or OCRA (online community relations and analysis), word-of-mouth is, well, generating a lot of buzz. Though the field is in its relative infancy, it already boasts a trade association (WOMMA) whose members (BuzzMetrics, Intelliseek and BzzAgent) specialize in delivering word-of-mouth's unique insights to marketers.
According to president and CEO of BuzzMetrics Jonathan Carson, online word-of-mouth is "the conversations and commentary that consumers create... including message boards, blogs, email lists, product review sites, chats, corporate gripe sites and personal home pages, among other things." For those who know where to look (and how to interpret what they see), these sources can deliver valuable information about consumers to marketers in many product categories.
And it seems that the word-of-mouth channel is starting to have a powerful appeal to pharmaceutical marketers in particular. BuzzMetrics, for example, counts 12 of the top 15 drug companies among its clients. What makes online word-of-mouth so compelling for pharmaceutical makers?
Why drug companies should pay attention
1. Quantity. The Annenberg Center for the Digital Future reports that fully 75 percent of Americans now use the Internet. Over half that number have accessed health care information online within the last 12 months. And, according to a Pew Internet report released earlier this year, as many as 44 percent of all Internet users have published some kind of material online. Taken together, those numbers add up to a lot of talk about pharmaceutical and health care brands.
To comb this vast haystack for relevant needles of consumer opinion, BuzzMetrics uses a proprietary "human-aided but machine-driven" process to find pertinent messages on health care-related forums, much as a search engine would do. In the case of the Zocor study, that process yielded close to ten thousand messages for company analysts to consider.
2. Quality. Unlike traditional market research tools such as focus groups and surveys, word-of-mouth provides spontaneous, unaided insights from consumers who are highly engaged in the topic they're discussing. Patients and caregivers are talking about topics that are incredibly important to them, at times in their lives when they may feel confused, nervous and vulnerable. As a result, conversations in healthcare-related forums like WebMD and Yahoo! Health are far from surface-level chatter.
3. Timeliness. People looking for health care information online tend to do so in occasional bursts (when they're first diagnosed with a condition, for example). Knowing what they're saying to each other at these particular points tells marketers what information consumers need through the various stages of making a decision about medical treatment.
Possible side effects
However, like any form of market research, word-of-mouth has its limitations. Among the caveats that health care marketers need to bear in mind:
1. They're responsible for what they know. Drug makers are required to act responsibly on any information they have about their products' adverse effects, and online forums are where many patients vent their gripes. Debrianna Obara, media director for i-FRONTIER, an interactive agency with numerous healthcare clients, warns: "This seems like a huge area of potential liability." If it becomes well known that pharmaceutical companies are seeking consumer opinions online, "eventually, they would be expected to respond."
2. The communication only goes one way. Marketers can listen, but they can't talk back -- at least not directly. That's because of the unique restrictions on pharmaceutical advertising. "Unlike other industries that can just go in there, become an active community member and say whatever they want, pharmaceutical marketers have to be very sensitive to those regulations," says BuzzMetrics' Carson.
Once drug makers have found their customers online, how do they answer their concerns without running afoul of the FDA? One method Carson recommends is to "work through the medical professionals or consumer experts that moderate or lead these forums" and develop relationships with them, much as they would do with journalists and medical experts in the offline world. That way, when big news about a brand comes out (like the Zocor trials), they have a place to send information and ensure that their point of view is represented.
3. Consumers could get territorial about their space. Considering the sensitivity of the subjects they're discussing, some may feel that marketers are trespassing in their online forums. This is mitigated somewhat by the fact that such sites are open to the public. As one frequent WebMD message board participant put it, "It's a free world as far as I'm concerned." Plus, information is only collected in aggregate and is not linked to any personal data. Still, with privacy concerns very much on many Internet users' minds, there's a chance that brands could be tarnished with accusations of inappropriate cyber-snooping.
Although the effectiveness of online word-of-mouth research remains to be proven over time, its influence is likely to grow. And as the channel continues to evolve, it's something that pharmaceutical marketers -- who, like their consumers, also need to understand the risks involved -- likely can't afford to ignore.
Justin Anderson is an integrated marketing copywriter living in Chicago, where he works for 141 Worldwide, a WPP agency. Read full bio.