Manage Your Online Reputation Or I Will
I generally don't like to include threats as the title of my posts, but once again I thought it would be dramatic enough to get your attention.
By on Mar 9, 2009I generally don't like to include threats as the title of my posts, but once again I thought it would be dramatic enough to get your attention. So, don't worry that I'm going to steal your online identity or otherwise "manage" your reputation, however, I can't promise that everyone else out there online is going to do the same. Even as more and more pharma and healthcare companies dip their toes into the world of social media (see the growing list here), there is still a lot of uncharted territory that they haven't investigated and may not know exists. All of you social media experts know what I'm talking about. While a company YouTube channel is nice, do you know what's happening with your brand on the countless other social media sites?
I read a great article from LOTAME a couple weeks ago and I thought it was important to see how it applies to pharma and healthcare companies. The purpose of their article was to make marketers aware of all the social media sites out there where people may be discussing their brand. They recommended some basic steps that marketers could take on each of these sites to ensure that they could, at the very least, respond to a crisis. So, a special thanks to LOTAME for putting this together. I've kept their tier approach to dividing these up.
Most Important, Tier One.
In other words, check these out first. If you only have time to get started with a few, this is where you should go. From the point of view of a healthcare marketer, at the very least, you should have a profile on each of these so that you can review what's happening. In addition, should you need to respond to something later, it's important that you have an established profile so it doesn't appear that you simply are getting involved because you're in trouble. If you don't know what some of these are, I recommend you spend a little time on each. One of the additional bonuses of setting up your profiles on all these sites is that you'll also get a feel for what they are and what they can do. You should be able to use this knowledge later on. For each site, I've written some specific activities you should be doing.
Del.icio.us - search for your brand and set up a feed to see what articles or information people are finding useful
Facebook - you should have a personal profile, but also see if anyone is talking about your brand, step 2 is setting up a brand page
Flickr - see what pictures are out there including people using your product (you'll be surprised), feel free to add your own
FriendFeed - follow people you know in the industry who seem to carry a lot of weight and monitor the conversation
LinkedIn - set up a professional profile just in case you need some networking later on (pretty tough time for pharma marketers)
SlideShare - search for presentations about your products and competitors, you'll be surprised what CI is available here
StumbleUpon - search for what's out there and let the site send you to new sites related to your interest, you might find a winner
Twitter - you need a personal account and also see if you can get support for a corporate level one as well (list of companies with profiles here)
Technorati - if you have a personal or company blog, you should claim it, as it moves you up the update (ping) queue
YouTube (along with other video distribution platforms: Vimeo, Viddler, Revver, Yahoo video, etc.) - search for your product and competitors, see if there's support for creating a channel for your company (if you don't have one already)
Scribd - similar to SlideShare but more document focused, see what you can find, post brand related documents (that are for public consumption such as patient education materials)
Second Tier
You can pay a little less attention to these, but they are worth knowing about. You should have a profile, but also be familiar with how these sites work. Monitor them from time to time for information or chatter about your brand.
Digg - social bookmarking allows you to see what articles and sites are getting a lot of buzz, get a profile and search for your brand
Windows Live spaces - like a combination of a blog and Facebook profile, you can set up one for yourself and your brand
Yahoo Groups - join and monitor the conversation, be honest who you are, if you're not an authorized rep of your company be careful, your company might not appreciate the "help"
Google Groups - same as above
Third Tier
Set up a profile and check from time to time. Depending on your brand's target demographic, one or more could be a promotional platform.
Bebo - set up a profile for all of the following five sites and check out if there's any chatter about your brand. They're all in the same vein as Facebook each with different demographics
Ning - set up a profile and search for groups related to your brand or disease state, consider Ning as an inexpensive way to start a very basic community for your brand if you're interested in pursuing this tactic
Healthcare Related
I don't have these in a particular tier as they may be more or less important depending on your specific brand. Please check out the Healthcare Social Media Wiki for a longer list. You should set up a profile on all of these related to your disease area and see what people are saying about your brand. DO NOT pretend to be someone else if you decided to participate in discussions. I guarantee that you'll be outed. How? Just trust me. Be authentic, but also be sure your company doesn't mind you representing them in making what amount to official statements. Here's the list directly from the Wiki. These are in no particular order.
Patients Like Me -- unbranded, 3rd party company, supports ALS, Parkinson's, MS
Alli Circles -- support community for Alli, weight loss product from GSK
BreastCancer.org - breast cancer education and support site, large, strong community features
Children with Diabetes -- "The mission of Children with Diabetes, Inc. is to promote understanding of the care and treatment of diabetes, especially in children; to increase awareness of the need for unrestricted diabetes care for children at school and daycare; to support families living with diabetes; and to promote understanding of research into a cure." Purchased by J&J in 2008 for a reported $6-7 MM
Daily Strength -- includes patient reviews of pharma products.
dLife -- "dLife is the only integrated consumer/patient education and marketing platform that effectively targets and engages the diabetes community. dLife has become the premiere model to help companies communicate, educate and interact with millions of diabetes patients, consumers and caregivers."
Sugar Stats -- Diabetes support
Trusera -- "Trusera is an online health network with real-world experiences and insights from people like you."
WegoHealth -- "WEGO Health is the home of Health Activists - vigorous advocates, avid connectors, daily contributors and social media opinion leaders who bring the expertise of having been there, survived that. "
Organized Wisdom -- "the first human-powered, doctor-guided search service for health."
iGuard.org -- includes patient reviews of pharma products.
That's it. If you think I'm missing any sites, please leave a comment and I'll try to include it.
It's a daunting list, I know, but it's an important task as well. Don't look at it just as a "check-the-box" exercise. You are doing this to set up profiles and monitor conversations about your brand, but at the same time you are immersing yourself in social media. This really is the best way to learn what's out there and to do the critical thinking required to figure out which types of programs and platforms might make sense for your brands.
Good luck. Hope to see you out there in the ether.
Jonathan is Director of Business Development for Bridge Worldwide, a leading digital and relationship marketing agency, and regularly writes about pharma marketing on his blog Dose of Digital. Feel free to send him a tweet to @jonmrich