Medicine’s journey through the body served as inspiration for the project, according to Rashid.  I think Oaza Zdravlja pharmacy would inspire me to forget my sniffles for a few minutes when stopping by to pick up my Tamiflu.

The design may not be to everyone’s taste, but you can’t deny that it is refreshing to see such an innovative approach.  There’s no reason a pharmacy needs to be sterile, at least figuratively speaking.  And that’s exactly our approach to pharma: it’s serious subject matter, but that doesn’t mean we can’t have a little fun with it.  And there’s no question in our minds that a big visual impact drives customer preference.  Rashid’s design demonstrates a keen understanding of the need to “own the minds” of his audience.  The importance of this can’t be stressed enough.  I know where I would fill my scripts if given a choice between Rashid’s appealing apothecary and the bland, beige drugstore around the corner.

So to this end, I am calling on all CEOs to take the lead. This is where this problem should be solved. They are the ones who should be setting the tone for the company at large. We ask them to speak at our shareholder meetings and address the entire organization when needed. Why shouldn’t they take the lead in representing the voice of the company on the Internet? I am not suggesting they spend all day tweeting. I do, however, think that CEOs are best positioned to get this job done. Taking risks, motivating stakeholders, setting the agenda, and leading the industry—it’s their job.

Having just returned from a medical conference this past week, I decided to reflect on my experience from last year at the same congress, just before the promotional guidelines went into effect.  I admit, I have vivid memories of convention floors and seeing the mass of colored bags, each bigger and better than the last one.  I also must confess, that I have seen a particular “giveaway” and asked where it came from, and headed off to that particular company’s booth—not because I was at all interested in their product, but because I was lured by the attractive bag, backpack, or whatever.  I dutifully listened to the message and collected my “treasure” and felt obligated to fill it with literature or other giveaways, only to return to my hotel room and realize there was no way that this collection would fit into my luggage, and was certainly not worth the extra baggage charges if I had to check it. So I abandoned several items of my treasure as I checked out of my hotel.  I am sure I am not the only one who has done this, but I may be one of the few who will ’fess up.

So does the current environment stimulate healthcare professionals’ interest in the exhibit hall?  The primary shift I observed was an increase in pre-meeting invitations to visit a company’s exhibit booth to learn about a procedure, or a product’s place in a therapeutic algorithm, or to participate in a drawing for a medically relevant prize. There are fewer colored bags filled with literature slung over shoulders of congress attendees tempting me to ask, “Where did this come from?” This does, however, make it easier to negotiate the convention floor.  Overall, I found myself more selective of the exhibits I visited and more focused on the content.

It’s not often that I think that enacted legislation is beneficial, but the bottom line is, I think we have managed to elevate our profession and focus on the content— the real reason we come to the exhibit floor.

Here’s a recent example of our Friday afternoon ritual: this time it involved a little jack-o-lantern-ing.

Some of us look a little too at home wielding knives.
The art directors were careful to sketch out their “concepts” before taking a stab, of course.	It’s all fun and games until someone loses his mind.
The payoff.

So my question is, “Is the printed page dead or dying?” We certainly have the need, and, in fact, increasing demand for information from publications. How are we getting this information? Are we all going online to retrieve the information we want? And is it available online? Where are the ads?

Certainly the recent trend of exclusively online journals and open access articles has impacted medical publishing. Online journals have challenged the publishing industry, forcing many journals that were print-only to offer their content online as well to be competitive. If you don’t have a subscription and access to the journal, you can usually pay for a download of the article, again minimizing the need to have a printed journal subscription. A significant number of journals provide free access to many, if not all, of the articles through author-paid fees or decision of the publisher to provide open access. In keeping with our immediate need to know, many journals provide “provisional” pre-publication downloads, so articles can be sourced even before they are officially “published,” again reducing the need to read the printed journal.

This shift affects advertisers and publishers, for sure, but it has a broader reach. Many associations include with their membership a subscription to their respective journal and believe that this offering is the primary reason for membership. If they are forced to put the journal online and provide open access to be competitive, what happens to the membership of the association? Can they bring value to their members beyond the publication? Many associations are re-thinking their business model in light of this shift.

So the questions remain: Is it necessary to maintain subscriptions to specific journals? Will we need libraries to house periodicals? In the future will we download everything to a PDA or a Kindle? If so, where will advertising go? Will there be more banner ads and fewer print ads? Will the highly regarded scientific journals that now publish without advertising succumb to pop-up, Flash, and Google AdWords? Are we seeing the end of the printed page as we know it?

Having gone through numerous RFP processes throughout my career at various agencies, I can confirm that not all RFPs are met with glee when received. Many agencies have a sneaking suspicion that they are part of a cattle call where a dozen or so other agencies made the ‘short-list.’ Others are resentful that they are providing their best thinking and ideas without really knowing the evaluation criteria or scope of work.

RFPs also tend to be unclear and with limited information. Having worked on the client side myself, I don’t really know the rationale for it other than to serve as a medieval torture device. Despite an agency’s best effort to glean more information from the client, many times the information is not forthcoming. This forces the agency to invest time and money into conducting costly research on their own and to blindly go about addressing the request.

And in spite of the efforts put into a pitch, which include time, resources and finances, at the end of the day, the best and smartest agency doesn’t always win. Clients may have been looking to give the incumbent a wakeup call or to keep them on their toes, or they select an agency that they feel most comfortable with – and that’s not necessarily the agency that demonstrated strategic strength or ability to challenge the norm and push the envelope.

While I appreciate that this system will weed out the weaker agencies, it is still a very archaic and more often than not, unfair process. So, in its place, I’d like to propose a different approach. One that allows both parties, client and agency, to start off on equal footing. One that allows the agency to issue a Request for Client (RFC) asking the client to also submit a proposal elaborating on why the agency should work with them, and what their anticipated scope of work would be now and over the next few years. Additionally, the RFC would address how the client expects to work with the agency; what makes the client an ideal partner; what makes their business interesting to the agency; why they are considering the agency as a potential partner.

So what’s the benefit of this approach? Well, I see both parties benefiting. First, it will initiate a relationship that is based on mutual transparency and respect. Second, it will ensure a fair process where those agencies that are selected to participate in the RFP and who ultimately choose to participate are clear that they will be evaluated on the same criteria and scope. And last, the RFC will work to ensure that the selection process will consider not only strategic smarts but will also emphasize the value of a match between the client and agency based on mutual expectations, work styles, skill sets and chemistry. Weighing all these factors will increase the likelihood for long-term partnership success and minimize the agency churn that many clients go through every couple of years or so. Further, this approach will allow both parties to pull together the right talents and resources, and ensure the appropriate amount of time and finances are invested into the effort.

I read an interesting article in AdWeek recently about the Zappos’ agency search and the many frustrations expressed by the agencies involved. It sheds more light on why this process doesn’t have to be as painful as it’s become. To read this article, click here.

Also just for kicks, click here for a hilarious take on dysfunctional client relationships posted on YouTube.

What if the healthcare we get were to change so drastically that we no longer had primary care as a service point? I suspect that this has started to happen already. I personally have used a walk-in urgent care clinic (more than once), as well the in-pharmacy clinic at my local pharmacy. These customer service-oriented centers have to be either pulling “share” from PCPs or are at least picking up the overload. If our healthcare model were to go this way, I presume we will need more specialists, as they are likely to get more referrals faster. If we develop more specialists, then we could see a more competitive environment where they are competing for business with each other. Proliferation of these medical specialists would take time, of course, and perhaps we would see more healthcare professionals choosing to work in the walk-ins and urgent care clinics—possibly more Physician Assistants and Nurse Practitioners. Hey, I’m just projecting here. I don’t have the data to support this.

If the way healthcare gets delivered changes, then it makes sense that the way we promote products would change too. It stands to reason that we may need more DTC, in part, because the consumer may be less “gatekept” and partly due to the fact that we will need to educate them better. So there may indeed be more opportunity to promote to consumers. This, of course, will only flourish if we can see proof that it works (again, see prior blog entry). I would advocate for a “promocational” message that not only delivered features and benefits, but also helped the consumer gain a much better awareness of the disease risk factors, signs and symptoms. This would take more time than a traditional 60-second or even worse, 30-second spot. But the Web allows us to do just about anything. If only I could say the same for our regulators. Lets call it Accurate, Honest and Thorough consumer promotion. So can “AHT” be the new DTC? Remember you heard it here first. I think.

These modalities are acceptance, enjoyment and enthusiasm. At Brandkarma we are vigilant in ensuring that one of these modalities operates whenever we are engaged in doing anything at all—from the simplest task to the most complex.

ACCEPTANCE
Whenever we are dealing with a situation or a task that one simply cannot enjoy doing, we at least accept that this is what we have to do. Acceptance means: this is what this situation, this moment, requires me to do, and so I do it willingly. For instance, I don’t know of anyone who would be able to enjoy changing a flat tire at night in the pouring rain in the middle of nowhere, let alone be enthusiastic about it. But we can bring acceptance to it. Performing an action in the state of acceptance means you are at peace while you do it, which relieves any underlying negative energy.

ENJOYMENT
The peace that comes from acceptance turns into a sense of “aliveness” when you actually enjoy what you are doing. What a novel idea, right? Joy is the dynamic aspect of being alive. Expansion and positive change is much more likely to come into your life if you can enjoy what you are doing already, instead of waiting for change so that you can start enjoying what you do; in other words, the “wait to start living syndrome.” We don’t ask our mind for permission to enjoy what we do, because all we would get are plenty of reasons why we can’t enjoy it. “Not now,” the mind will say. “Can’t you see I’m busy? There is no time. May be tomorrow you can start enjoying…” That tomorrow will never come unless you begin enjoying what you are doing now. This is a spiritual practice that brings empowerment and creative expansion into our work. We are very lucky to be in an industry in which we can enrich the lives of many others through our creative action and work.

ENTHUSIASM
Enthusiasm is the deep enjoyment of what we do, plus the added element of a goal or a vision to work toward. When you add a goal to the enjoyment of what you do, the energy-field or vibration frequency changes. At the height of creative activity fueled by enthusiasm, there will be enormous intensity and energy behind what you do. You will feel like an arrow that is moving toward the target—and enjoying the journey. As Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, “Nothing great has ever been achieved without enthusiasm.”