The top executive at McKinsey & Company appeared before Congress to answer for the consulting firm’s role in fanning the opioid crisis and came under intense criticism from lawmakers. One likened the firm’s earnings from advising Purdue Pharma and other pharmaceutical companies to “blood money” from drug traffickers. Yet, pharma continues to be aligned with MBA spreadsheet consulting.
Category Archive: As I See It
Gadget firms — starting with Apple and now Fitbit, which Google owns — are selling wearable devices that check heartbeat rhythms and alert users when something is out of sync, according to KHN.com. Although the gadgets are a technical achievement, some cardiologists say the information the devices produce isn’t always helpful. Notifications from the devices aren’t definitive diagnoses.
The value of health literacy extends far beyond the boundaries of COVID-19. Education leads to fact-based empowerment, and an educated healthcare consumer can be a potent change agent. Poor health literacy is one of the reasons why life expectancy is lower in Republican-led states, and the problem has been growing worse for decades. The highest rates for covid-19 deaths and murders are found mainly in red states.
TV creates awareness quickly when you have a big audience, but TV is a waste of money when your audience is small. I can get better results using digital laser targeting and targeted print ads, but DTC marketers are like TV because it makes them feel important within their company.
Before most drugs are launched, much time and effort are spent developing marketing plans and getting approval. However, given the rapid changes in the market and the realization that too many tactics are more hype than reality, fixed marketing plans are a waste of time.
Over 70% of people have been exposed to medical or health-related misinformation. Of those exposed, almost half are not confident in their ability to discriminate between accurate health information and misinformation. Social media is cited as the most common source of misinformation.
It’s time to stop using worthless online ad metrics. Click-through rates are the most used KPI in marketing, but they are useless. Click-through rates don’t correlate with any meaningful brand metrics. Billions of dollars are “optimized” based on nothing but noise. “One impression’ is one web browser making one server request for one advertisement. Human eyeballs have nothing to do with it, so it’s all useless.
DTC marketing has evolved. Those DTC managers who use the exact roadmap will waste a lot of money when accountability is increasing. Challenges await, and there isn’t one set of guidelines for every product category.