State of the Brand

Author: Jason Voiovich Ecra Creative Group

Key Points: 1. The US Justice Department fined Pfizer $2.3 billion for illegal marketing practices; taking doctors on golf trips, paying for massages, and the like to encourage off-label prescriptions of popular drugs. 2. With such a hefty penalty, conventional wisdom would say Pfizer’s market perception should suffer. By objective measures, that is not happening. 3. Pfizer has insulated its corporate brand by positioning its blockbuster drugs as the stars, and not marketing itself. That seems to be working. For now.

Remember the dad in “My Big Fat Greek Wedding”?

He used Windex® for everything. He went so far as to carry around a bottle at all times, spraying things (and people) at comically inopportune times. Clearly, neither the FDA nor our friends at S.C. Johnson and Company in Racine, Wisconsin endorse Windex for the treatment of cold, flu, arthritis, and acne. The depiction was so ridiculous, most (reasonable consumers) wouldn’t take it seriously.

Now, let’s change the scenario.

Imagine you are recovering from a surgical procedure. Let’s pick appendix removal, but it could be anything. Clearly, you’re in pain, and your attending physician prescribes a medication - in this case, Bextra®. She tells you to take the prescribed dosage as needed and come back in three weeks.

Let me ask you something: In that scenario, do you look up the drug name in the formulary? Did you learn your doctor just prescribed well beyond the recommended dosage? Did you also learn Bextra; was not approved to treat post operative pain? That is was really an arthritis drug? And a Cox-2 inhibitor? The same Cox-2 inhibitor class of drugs you’ve heard about?

But your doctor knows best, right? (more…)

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Author: Jason Voiovich Ecra Creative Group

<em> Key Points: 1. Petey (the urine cup) and Pokey (the syringe) take an ironic twist on the kids’ mascot theme in order to grab attention. 2. They could be particularly effective with young adult healthcare consumers who don’t tend to pay attention unless they need to.  We’ll see. 3. Compared with poor generally healthcare advertising, HealthPartners made the kind of gutsy move the system clearly needs more of. </em>

The look on my wife’s face was priceless.

Last weekend, our family decided to brave the road closures around Lexington Avenue in St. Paul to visit Como Park.  Even though the family favorite polar bears are off exhibit until next year, the park has come along way since lions were kept in the rusty metal cages up front when I was a boy.

Outside of the new visitors center, rounding the corner to the sea lion tank, stood - no joke - a walking urine cup mascot.  Trailing close behind was another HealthPartners employee handing out cards promoting same day test result services available at HealthPartners clinics.

Needless to say, there was plenty of pointing and laughing. <!–more–>

I asked the kids if they wanted their picture taken with Petey P. Cup (also, no joke).

No takers.

Now before you laugh too hard, when was the last time you paid close attention to any health plan advertising?  Ordinarily, it’s just plain ordinary.  We’re the best hospital.  We’re the best clinic.  We have the best doctors.  You’ll get the best care.  Pretty cringe-worthy stuff at best.  Forgettable at worst.

You are unlikely to forget Petey or his cousin Pokey, the walking syringe.

Crafted by local ad shop Preston Kelly, the funky mascots have their own website and even their own Facebook page (now boasting over 1400 fans).

According to the word in the biz, the mascots are targeted at younger healthcare consumers - late teens to late twenties - who are conspicuously absent from their yearly physicals.  They say young adults understand the obvious irony, and the abruptness of the campaign will break their complacency and get their attention. More to the point, it will get them into the clinic.

Undoubtedly, a walking urine cup is hard to miss for those of us outside that age bracket as well.

Color me iffy on the whole premise that all young people need is an awareness boost to get into the clinic.  The fact remains that unless they have a specific (or chronic) medical condition, the invincibility factor is still pretty strong.

I’m sure HealthPartners is tracking the numbers, though.  If the data prove me wrong, kudos.

What might be more interesting is the juxtaposition between this effort (collectively part of HealthPartners “A new way to look at healthcare” campaign) and its rival Blue Cross Blue Shield of Minnesota and its well-underway “Do/Groove” campaign.

Yes, the aims are quite different, but clearly Blue Cross took the more conservative approach.  Not that it is not a creative or appropriate effort.  As we say in the trade, the campaign has legs.  We’ve seen neat television spots with people spontaneously dancing waiting in line, dozens of outdoor/billboard spots, and countless specific reminders of fun ways to get exercise each day.

What makes the Blue Cross campaign successful is its longevity and its flexibility.  And it is very, very good.

All in all, I’m not sure HealthPartners’ effort quite (yet) gets to that level.

We’ll have to wait and see.

But here’s why Petey and Pokey are so important to healthcare advertising.  They represent a pretty gutsy move on the part of a major healthcare player.  Just put yourself in the pitch meeting, suggesting to one of the largest healthcare providers in Minnesota that they send a walking urine cup and syringe into public places with the “HealthPartners” name all over them?  I could name a half-dozen large organizations town that would have quickly shown you the door.

Even though Petey and Pokey do not cross the line from kitschy to poor taste, to move forward with this creative direction took real courage.

I’ll be the first to admit I would prefer the other health plans in town <em>not try</em> a game of shock-value one-upsmanship, but finding new ways to reach new groups of people is a critical element of improving the healthcare system for everyone.

Let’s hope we get that kind of courage to try new things in the ongoing healthcare debate.

Related Links: <a href=”http://www.peteyandpokey.com/”>Petey and Pokey website</a> <a href=”http://www.facebook.com/peteypcup”>Petey and Pokey Facebook page</a> <a href=”http://www.do-groove.com/”>Blue Cross’ Do/Groove Campaign Site</a>

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Author: Jason Voiovich Ecra Creative Group

Key Points: 1. FDA-approved eyelash enhancer Latisse may not seem like a big healthcare deal, but its ads are a great way to show how persuasive strategy works in big pharma advertising. 2. The ad uses classic techniques (primacy/recency, visual supremacy, and disassociation) to sell its message. 3. It uses those same techniques to downplay potential side effects. It may not be a big deal with Latisse, but other drugs are not so benign.

In the pantheon of big issues in healthcare, this has to rank near the bottom.

It’s called “hypotrichosis”, a medical condition in which the sufferer does not grow adequate eyelashes.

Now before you laugh, the eyelash serves a meaningful purpose. They protect the eye against foreign contamination; they are a first line of defense for one of the body’s most sensitive organs. Like most primates, humans are highly visual creatures, and the eyes are the center of that attraction. More specifically, human beings find large eyelashes attractive (evolutionary psychologists say) because they are a competitive advantage in a world of airborne dust and dirt.

For those poor souls who fail to grow eyelashes, or fail to grow them thick enough, medical science has come to the rescue with bimatoprost, the FDA’s first approved drug to lengthen lashes, marketed under the trade name “Latisse”.

But unlike its chemical twin used to treat glaucoma, Latisse isn’t meaningfully positioned as a medical product. Latisse ads are more reminiscent of a Revlon cosmetics pitch. (more…)

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Author: Jason Voiovich Ecra Creative Group

Key Points: 1. Conventional wisdom tells us the down economy should negatively impact Weight Watchers International and businesses in its category. 2. However, Weight Watchers has positioned itself ideally in the public mind and within the medical community. 3. When the times comes (sooner than we think) for sliding-scale, health-impact pricing, Weight Watchers will benefit from insurance plans who adjust premiums based on health metrics.

We all know what it supposed to happen in a “down” economy.

We all know discretionary purchases will take a hit. We all know recurring monthly fees in the household budget will get another look. We all know people will forgo expensive healthy food in favor of cheaper options and greasy comfort food.

Apparently, investors and analysts also know those things, and have pummeled Weight Watchers International stock (NYSE:WTW) over the past six months, down some 40 percent.

All of which begs the question: Are the analysts correct? (more…)

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Author: Jason Voiovich Ecra Creative Group

Key Points: 1. The pork industry feels the use of the word “swine” flu to describe this latest outbreak will hurt consumption. 2. In addition to short-term market data, they cite other examples of virus-induced hysteria. 3. All that said, long-term data for public health shocks in the poultry, tomato, and spinach markets (and even the last swine flu in 1976) show little impact.

Hog farmers were hog-raving mad.

Scientists just did what scientists do: In the midst of a cacophony of technical language most journalists wouldn’t understand, they mentioned the words “swine flu” to describe this latest swine virus that was able to mutate - just enough - to infect humans. Admittedly, the term “swine flu” is a bit inaccurate, but it’s catchier than H1N1, for sure.

Guess what name stuck? (more…)

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Author: Jason Voiovich Ecra Creative Group

Key Points: 1. Fibromyalgia is an example of drug company marketing at its best: Convincing the medical establishment to pay attention to real suffering. 2. Fibromyalgia is also an example of drug company marketing at its worst: Using emotional tactics to boost prescriptions. 3. Regardless of the final judgment, we cannot ignore the power of giving a vague set of symptoms a legitimate name.

Eli Lilly and Pfizer are sure trying hard to make sure you have.

Fibromyalgia is a medical condition characterized by widespread and persistent pain with a particular painful sensitivity to touch. Other symptoms include debilitating fatigue, trouble sleeping, stiff joints, difficulty swallowing, bowel and bladder trouble, numbness, abnormal motor activity, and even cognitive dysfunction.

As you could guess, making a definitive diagnosis is a bit tricky. Without that certainty, not everyone in the medical community agrees fibromyalgia actually exists. Its symptoms are often confused and muddled with other common ailments.

Why is it, then, that Eli Lilly and Pfizer have dolled out more in grants for fibromyalgia research ($6 million in the last 9 months of 2008) than to either diabetes or Alzheimer’s? And why is it that fibromyalgia ranks third on that recipient list behind only AIDS and cancer? (more…)

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