Pharma continues to neglect the web

Jan/05/2007 06:51 Filed in: Media (Internet)
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Well according to industry media spending on DTC the total percentage of dollars allocated to the web was just 1%. While I believe that the reported number is low, it is probably closer to 4-5%, it still tells me that most pharma DTC marketing people are living in the past and don't understand this unique channels ability to drive Rx behavior.


There are a lot of ways to spend money on the Internet. Search engine marketing, online advertising, eCRM programs and website development and upgrades can all add up to a lot of money yet pharma marketers would rather spend millions of dollars developing TV ads and testing messages for TV rather than allocate more money for the Web. This tells me that they don't understand how to measure their web initiatives and don't understand that web analytics can provide a picture of who is visiting their website, what they are looking at and the effect of a website visitor on intent to ask for a prescription. These analytics are all available and can be a valuable tool for marketers but they just don't don't get it.

As I have written previously on this site big world class marketers like P&G, Budweiser and Chrysler are all allocating less money to TV and more to the Web. Why? Because over the years they know that costs of TV have continues to rise, viewer-ship has declined and that TV does not provide the best ROI today. However, what really scares me is pharma marketers continued ignorance of today's empowered consumers. Consumers today have information available to them 24/7/365, talk to each other via consumer generated media, and mistrust marketers messages. Yet pharma marketers continue to push messages to consumers rather than engage them..they prefer to air horrible TV spots like Rozarem's "your dreams want you back" rather than think about talking to consumers one on one.

The lack of talent in DTC marketing is scary and I think it's time for pharma to start tapping some consumer marketing people to bring new life into DTC advertising. When I first started in the DTC world my manager told me "you need to learn more about DTC marketing" and my response was "no, DTC marketing needs to learn more from consumer marketing". Too bad that message is still true today.
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