The Alpha Mom

Chances are you know this woman, or perhaps are just like her - the "Alpha Mom". According to an article by Mintel/Oxyen, the Alpha Mom/woman asserts her role as an influencer, both in and outside of her family role, beyond just being a mom. The Alpha Mom, according to Mintel, is "the holder of power beyond traditional motherly activities" which includes product purchasing in addition to health decisions. This group can't just be targeted as the current norm, as the Chief Purchasing Officer. This woman breaks through boundaries beyond roles or gender - she is multi-dimensional.

From a marketing perspective this group's desire to self-define impacts channel planning. Word of mouth marketing certainly plays a role, but also just getting these mom's to try product and have it in their homes is key-- often Alpha Mom's do not have time to socialize product decisions - and they want to use what they see in other Alpha Mom households. For health decisions this may equate to more in-person word of mouth in addition to the Facebook's of the world.

Alpha Moms are choiceful in their product decisions, often looking for dual purpose products (e.g., hair + skin, baby + adults), and streamlining the number of products they use. This is especially true for repeat-moms or older moms, according to the Living La Vida Rapida survey by AOL and OMD. Increasingly, moms are boasting or posting about how they are streamlining or saving, as thrift is the new chic. Marketers are increasingly targeting this woman. Ninento pre-released their new Wii video game console to Tupperware-style mom parties, and timed the release of Wii Fit around Mother's Day. Kimberly Clark and P&G have created web sites and social media destinations focused on product innovation, coupons and offers.

As I was getting my haircut the other day, there was a heated conversation around childhood vaccinations next to me. Rather than being passive, I jumped right in and offered the "facts" that I knew to debunk the negative myths around immunizations. I know I influenced about 3-5 moms that day, and I felt satisfied by helping them in their decision making. So - I suppose I wear the Alpha Mom badge with honor then - so be it!

Intelligence: Social Media Objectives

"Garbage in, garbage out" is a popular agency phrase for what happens when due diligence is not aptly applied to a marketing initiative, from branding to promotional executions. This acutely applies to social media, a venue where companies often throw social media tactics up against the proverbial wall of audience targeting, to see what "sticks". Not thinking through social media outreach in the context of an integrated cross/multi-channel plan can weaken brand impact or even reputation. This necessitates a coherent mapping of objectives, audience behaviors, sustainable infrastructure, measurement and optimization -- to audience value.

The Social Media Road Map, just out from Marketing Sherpa, shows how social media wisdom is a function of social media stage and "maturity". Brands that have been hazed through the initial trial and transition phases, are more likely in the seasoned strategic phase to map their measurement back to accurately defined objectives:

Social media can not be treated like a campaign. It is not an event-specific commodity. Social media, whether earned or owned, feeds off of reciprocal value between the company and their audience, not the advertiser and their customer. Starting with a "gut check" of what your social media objectives are and how you are going to go about them -- is worth the time investment both from an brand ROI, and an audience engagement perspective.

Nick Jonas and Diabetes

As someone who is inundated with the Jonas Brothers by my children and their friends, I was surprised how refreshing Nick Jonas' contribution to childhood diabetes was when he lent a hand to Bayer's resource site, NicksSimpleWins.com. Bayer has always been an innovator in diabetes monitoring devices, and has been visibly and effectively leveraging social media as a company.

Bayer had already established SimpleWins for people living with diabetes. Tapping Nick Jonas was a very purposeful nod toward being more relevant, and adding value, to children and teens with diabetes. Debunking the stigma, Nick embraces the teen or "screenager" tendency towards social connectivity and expressionism to make managing diabetes more hip. This includes the "Express Your Simple Wins" contest and color-skins for Bayer's monitoring device. In addition to submitting your own story to share, Nick also invites connectivity with his Facebook page for sharing your custom diabetes "dog tags" and his own cause page on Facebook.

All in all, this is a nice example of a integrated disease state and product initiative, rooted firmly in audience insights and executed with relevancy and value to their target audience. Nice job!

Tech Trends: Patient Compliance

Patient compliance as an issue is nothing new. Patients believe they are more compliant than they are, and physicians know this. While there have been some attempts to enable compliance and adherence, they have fallen short in some measure. GlowCap by Vitality takes an interesting spin on applying technology to help patient compliance. By using chip technology, the GlowCap reminds patients when to take their medication via a tone, light and even phone call. A standard pill bottle is dropped into the GlowCap, available via pharmacy or even Amazon.com for $99. What's different about this versus other attempts is that the GlowCap seems to be easy to get and use.

There are other products offering similar technology, however GlowCaps have a unique advantage of pulling through on compliance, even if the patient chooses to ignore the reminders. Updates and communications may be sent to caregivers and physicians, and pharmacies can be notified for renewals. One Amazon reviewer noted, "It's an ultra helpful pill bottle and a net based wifi system for your medication."

Applications for this technology are obvious. Though it won't be a silver bullet for compliance, and adoption will certainly be slow - usage may increase if managed care benefits are found. For conditions heavily reliant on a caregiver, such as Alzheimer's disease, or where a parent is relying on a child to take medications for chronic conditions - it is a perfect fit. But it also makes sense for conditions where patients tend to stop taking meds when they feel non-symptomatic (Cholesterol), or where may have challenges (depression). Finally, being able to track and prove adherence to oral medications may provide a lift in the realm of oncology, where physicians can be skeptical of non-IV treatments.

This may be a slow burn, but with the increased emphasis on electronic medical records and performance based managed care - it's a trend worth watching.

Constant Reinvention

Agencies are at present in a "sticky wicket". Like most everything else in this economy, they are pressured to do more for less. But often this places them in a reactive, order-takers mode which in turn can render them obsolete over time. "Strategery" is certainly called for then. But given a tightening of the belts, many clients won't pay for the time and resources required to do this. In fact, I have heard one client say "we don't pay for strategic work, only deliverables that get approved for execution." Ouch.

For an agency, building an integrated strategy - whether that is for the brand positioning or the strategic marketing plan, or the strategy behind certain concepts or big ideas -- this is time consuming and requires a specific, custom set of skills and team members. So, agencies that seek to evolve will have to decide if they are in the service / communications business, or in the strategic consultancy arena. With both, clients get what they pay for. The former is a commodity, the latter is not. Consider that, as the below video echoes on the progression of technology, we as a society are "preparing college students for jobs that do not yet exist, using technologies not yet invented, to solve problems we do not know are problems." (This video was developed by Karl Fisch, Scott McLeod and Jeff Benmar.)

To be a valued strategic partner, we need to not only embrace this change but stay ahead of, or at least keep up with this staggering change. This requires almost constant reinvention and continual evolution. To enable this agencies or consultancies must continue acquiring a unique collective skill set that makes thinking differently both possible and pervasive -- every day into the future, not just today at this moment in time. As the MasterCard commercial states, this is priceless.

Intelligence: Earned Media

"Earned Media" is the new black when it comes to social networking replacing or rather - evolving from user generated content (UGC). But what is it exactly and what do we need to know about it as marketers? Short answer - it's not about marketing at all, it is about syndicating true, unsolicited and unbiased audience dialogue.

As noted by Forrester below, earned media is different from owned media, which can include your brand or unbranded web site and partially owned entities such as Facebook and Sermo. This has intrinsic value in that you are facilitating a true dialogue by providing the tools to do so. This is also often called word of mouth marketing (WOMM)- but again, the concept of "marketing" is attached to this. Earned media is organic, also called word of mouth, absent the marketing part. Earned media is a results of brand behavior, but as Forrester notes - it stems from the old PR notion of enabling free media or buzz. With today's social media "constant context" however, this term has morphed to include true transparency, relevant value or even participatory value, and instant feedback. This holds true whether the earned media is positive or negative. The 411 is as follows:
So how can we apply this to pharma and wellness marketing? It involves a shift in embracing the potential negatives along with the hopeful positives. This then requires well thought out approaches, processes and not only monitoring, but being able to react in real-time. Heidi Youngkin from Johnson and Johnson stressed in her webinar on how J&J has tackled and actually deployed a fully integrated social media strategy (successfully), that it starts with corporate governance and a well laid out business plan, plus having a welcomed value proposition to your target audience to begin with. Well said, and carpe diem!

Behavioral Targeting Backlash?

Backlash or confusion? A recent eMarketer article cites the rise in consumer backlash toward behavioral targeting employed by advertisers. As marketers increasingly fight the tide of diminishing advertising reach and effectiveness, behavioral targeting continues to increase as a way to increase relevancy and engagement. This then fuels consumer backlash.

Some context:
Facebook privacy concerns or "buzz" continue grow - especially in light of the new concern over Facebook's new privacy policy and the "everyone setting" that enables Facebook posts to be searchable by Google or anywhere on the Internet and not just those logged into Facebook. This has been very recently amplified by Google's new competition to Facebook - Google Buzz, and privacy concerns around this.

So what is a marketer to do? And how about the pharma marketer who is even more constrained by FDA regulations and consumer negativity? Stay calm, stay focused, and stay relevant. eMarketer's article goes on to say that some of the consumer "hostility" may be driven by confusion. When people are ill informed or misinformed about the implications and use of data collection, then it's reasonable if not expected for people to be confused or resentful. Perception is reality - as eMarketer goes on to state. I couldn't agree more. As marketers our obligation is around providing not only greater transparency and education around data collection - but on crafting and communicating a welcomed value proposition. If we illuminate the reciprocal value to our target audiences - e.g., increased content or tools that help them in their quest, then the value exchange is defined.

As I stated in a prior post on targeting, it's all in the context and execution. Behavioral targeting makes sense given the right relevancy, context and value exchange - and planning that out in advance is key. But we still can't expect everyone to welcome this, but at lease those who may be more open to this value exchange will not feel alienated.