There’s a recent article at the Baltimore Sun that describes how Doctors offices are trying services like Facebook, Twitter and even Groupon to attract new patients. In fact, through the use of Groupon, one Optometrist expanded their customer based and connected with other eye doctors across the country.

“Groupon has offered a growing number of deals for eye exams, teeth-cleaning and whitening, electrolysis and chiropractic services. Approximately 15 percent of Groupon deals nationwide are for health care services, says Julie Anne Mossler, a company spokeswoman.”

Obviously, buying drugs online not all healthcare services are practical for promoting through discounts. Who’s going to pick an emergency room or gynecologist because of a coupon?  But there are plenty of competitive healthcare services that can make good use of discounts through services like Groupon and reach an entirely new market.   Read the full story.

As companies evolve their marketing programs to digital and online, the pharmaceutical industry is hampered by a lack of clear guidelines from the Food and Drug Administration.  Advertising Age commented on a recent eMarketer study, “DTC Pharmaceutical Marketing Online:A Slow Shift to Digital” that “pharma marketers are waiting around”.  Not only is online marketing effective for growing pharma profits, but it’s where customers spend their time discovering, consuming and sharing information.

From AdAge:

“Pharmaceutical online ad spending is expected hit $1 billion this year and keep rising through 2014, according to report prepared by eMarketer. But until the Food and Drug Administration issues its draft guidelines for online pharma marketing, that growth remains limited.”

“U.S. health-care and pharmaceutical online advertising spending will reach $1 billion for the first time this year, up 10.6% from last year, according eMarketer. By 2014, online ad spending in the health-care and pharmaceutical industry, which includes direct-to-consumer and over-the-counter remedies, is expected to reach $1.52 billion. Yet despite those growth rates, pharma’s share accounts for only about 4% of overall U.S. online ad spending.”

Clearly, there’s a tremendous opportunity for growth in pharma online marketing.  At the same time, the FDA has its challenge in creating guidelines for an industry its still trying to understand.

Panel experts voiced their support for allowing drug and health care companies to access the power of social networks during the Food and Drug Law Institute’s recent Advertising and Promotion Conference in Washington, D.C.

These experts discussed how to communicate the message of drug and health care product safety and risk to the public as they wait for the Food and Drug Administration to set guidelines online pharmacy without prescription on how health care companies and marketers can proceed into the social-media space — regulation that are expected by the end of the year.

“The right patient, the right medication, at the right time, should be our goal,” said panelist Freda Lewis-Hall, the chief medical officer and a senior vice president at Pfizer. “We have narrowing opportunities to provide the best informed, most accurate information about our products.”

The problem, Lewis-Hall said, is staying within strict marketing rules set forth by the FDA, while advice from patients, practicioners and anonymous bloggers goes unchecked.

“We know people don’t know how to vet information available to them in cyberspace,” she said. “But the fact remains that we’re not the trusted source of information.”

Read the full post at SmartBlog on Social Media

A recent presentation from John Mack, Publisher of Pharma Marketing News and the Pharma Marketing Blog offers an excellent overview of the current state of pharma social media use, how social media can work with other Pharma marketing tactics as well as how to overcome common barriers.

This presentation also includes a handy Social Media Readiness Assessment Tool

There’s a new ebook on social media for the Pharmaceutical industry out from Chris Iafolla, of SHIFT drugs online without prescription Public Relations. Todd Defren, co-founder of SHIFT writes:

“Every Social Media program — regardless of the industry — is tasked with finding the right audience and engaging in a thoughtful and productive manner.  For pharmaceutical companies, other issues have to be considered … such as how to handle adverse event reporting; the need for fair balance; and how to handle off-label discussions.  On top of this, you are dealing with a patient audience that is more knowledgeable than ever and craving a give-and-take relationship with their doctors.  When they have questions that require a personalized response, many are as likely to turn to their online peers as to their physicians, which only further muddies that twisty road!  To help Pharma marketing execs navigate this journey, SHIFT today released an eBook aimed at offering practical advice on successfully implementing Social Media programs in the pharma space.”

To get the free, downloadable book, try one of the following options:

• Visit the SHIFT Communications website, leave your email, and the eBook will be automatically sent.
• Follow @shiftcomm on Twitter and tweet something along the lines of, “Looking forward to reading @shiftcomm’s Pharma Social Media eBook, via @prforpharma” and SHIFT will get in touch with the link.
• Join SHIFT’s Facebook Page and leave a message there.  SHIFT will be in touch with the download link.

Once you download and read the book, feel free to leave a comment back here or on the SHIFT PR blog with your opinion.

Physicians are increasingly looking to the internet for health care related information according to a recent study by comScore. However, the trend is not limited to physicians. Consumers are leading the trend towards finding health and medical information buying prescription drugs online online:

“While medical professionals remain a keystone of the US healthcare delivery system, patients and caregivers are empowering themselves in record numbers when it comes to managing their own health and the health of their families, according to new data from Manhattan Research, which revealed that the internet surpassed physicians as the most popular health resource for the first time last year.”

Read the full story on MarketingCharts

If you plan to use Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and YouTube, you might heed some of the following tips for your own credibility and online pharmacy without a prescription job insurance:

• Learn the platforms: Learn how to use each social media tool to your advantage, which means learning how to use privacy controls and other customizations.
• Keep professional and social relationships separate: By dividing social and business lives, a healthcare professional can maintain a professional demeanor on one hand and socialize with friends and family on the other. It is not appropriate to “friend” patients on Facebook or to follow them on Twitter.
• Watch your associations: You may want to connect with a patient on a blog, but you may not want to connect with that patient on Facebook or LinkedIn. On the other hand, you don’t want a friend with an offensive user name to appear on your list of people you follow on Twitter, unless you Tweet anonymously (possible by not revealing your real name, but a user name when registering).
• Keep politics and religion quiet: Unless you plan to be a journalist or an activist, it is best to keep those two topics in the personal realm, rather than the business realm. Activism, however, is up to you — if you, as a healthcare professional — want to campaign for clean water, then use your professionalism to temper your activism.
• Use social networking to say “Thank you” and to set up meetings in person: This Mashable article explains that social networking provides the perfect medium to extend your hand in business situations appropriately.
• Keep comments civil and don’t use social media while under the influence: The article about medical students explains succinctly how these comments can lead to expulsion from school — and in professional situations may lead to job loss or loss of clients.

Read the full post citing the Jobvite survey and Mayo clinic advice for healthcare professionals and their use of social media at: The Health Express

“… with health CIOs thinking about electronic medical record implementations, preparations for meeting the requirements of meaningful use of health IT, virtualization projects, HIPAA Buy Cialis Online Without Prescription regulations, and the explosion of patient data and how to store it securely, social networking guidelines may not be getting the attention it deserves.”

While some healthcare organizations choose to avoid social media altogether either in the name of avoiding industry regulatory issues or to ban workplace social media access as a simple solution, neither approach is anything more than an ostrich sticking its head in the sand.  Any organization operating any part of its business online is affected by the social web. Implementing and enforcing social media policies is certainly something that CIOs will be tasked with, but an effective social media policy requires interaction between legal, HR, marketing, public relations and business managers, not just IT.

Presentation from Bridget M. Forney.

At one point or another, 80% of Internet users have looked online for health information.  Social networking sites, blogs and podcasts have opened up two-way communication lines for patients and providers.  The days of patients merely listening to doctors, associations or even print advertisements appear to be diminishing.

But patients aren’t the only users benefiting from social media.  Hospitals and healthcare providers can and should us social media to their benefit, as well.

In this presentation, Ascension Health takes an in-depth look at healthcare social media by looking at examples of successful users on Facebook and Twitter, healthcare social media best practices and provides visuals and statistics to highlight “Smarter Healthcare Using Social Media”.

Hospitals have attempted to monitor employee social media use at work by blocking sites like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.  While this prevents employees from using hospital computers to access these sites, it can’t stop employees from using personal computers and smart phones to share information about work, i.e. your hospital.  When you can’t abolish social media usage, you can definitely implement restrictions.  Developing a social media policy for your hospital will outline the right and wrong ways your employees can engage with social media.

HealthLeaders Media shared these 5 tips to guide your hospital social media policy:

1. Keep it short
2. Keep it simple
3. Keep it encouraging
4. Keep it educational
5. Keep it transparent

While the guide can’t prevent employees from engaging in social media entirely, it can hinder the types of messages and information they are sharing.  Using this guide will help to ensure your employees are aware of the information they can and cannot cheap prescription drugs without prescription share and the repercussions they will face if secure information is exposed.

For hospital social media policy examples, enjoy this database provided by Social Media Goverance.