Wednesday, October 20, 2010

Greetings from Digital Pharma East 2010

I am a conference n00b.  Some members of the diabetes online community have given talks and served on panels at BlogWorld, BlogHer, ePatCon, CWD, and on Roche's diabetes advisory board.  This is the first conference at which I've had the pleasure of speaking, and I'd like to thank the hosts for having me.

Thus far, it's been a great experience for me.  Not every seminar or experience has directly related to me as a patient, but I definitely enjoy being able to give my perspective when it's needed...or even when it's not needed.  Pharma industry reps and marketers need to learn that patients would like to build a trusting relationship with the people who make and provide the medications, devices and medical products which they require to live.  

Why should people in pharma care about what the ePatients of the world say?  Because we talk to each other.  Because we want honest conversations.  Because we get your messages from traditional marketing, but in this digital age, just telling me to buy something through a TV ad or a doctor's office is not enough.  If I can go onto the web and compare reviews for nearly every book, movie, piece of clothing or pair of shoes that I might want to buy, I can also go out and look for information on pharmaceutical products.

Pharma seems so reluctant at times to dip their toes into the waters of social media, ePatients, digital marketing.  Maybe regulations are the one thing standing in their way.  I hope pharma is listening to what the patients want.  

We are your customers.  Please...listen.

I will be talking more specifics of my experiences at Digital Pharma East in the next couple of days.  Thanks again to the Exl team who put this conference together and put me on their panel!

(Coming soon...The Animas Presentation, my brief encounter with Dr. Anonymous, and fun with Allison and Lee Ann!)

1 comment:

  1. Great advice. It is sad how something as simple as "treat me like a human" can be a revolutionary concept to some companies out there, especially when the problems that their business is trying to solve are so personal.

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