The latest from DTC Perspectives

Our Industry Is Alive and Well!

That is my takeaway from last week’s DTC National in Washington. I saw no indication that DTC is fading away as an accepted technique for pharmaceutical marketing. Of course much of the conference discussion was on the impact of Obama and his appointees on the drug industry. New FDA leaders raise the likelihood of increased regulation but no speaker predicted disaster in terms of bans or restrictions that would make DTC impossible to execute. It is probable new risk regulations or guidances will come out late in 2009 that may add requirements for information. That could make a 60 second ad harder to do but it is not going to be so onerous as to end mass branded television.

ROI seems strong averaging over 2 for the top 25 brands as presented by IMS. Although spending is likely to continue to drop in 2009 attendees seemed optimistic it would stabilize in 2010. There were the usual debates over the media mix. The new media advocates say drug marketers are too slow to adopt modern technology that can personalize communications. The mass media broadcast and print advocates say their media delivers scale and good ROI, and given the age of the target group, still deserves the majority of spending. My take is that drug marketers are open to greater use of modern technology but will move deliberately given regulatory uncertainty.

The recent warning letters over word search raised the issue of FDA not adapting old regulations for new media. The FDA is following the regulations written decades ago before anyone anticipated the explosion of technology. In questions to the FDA raised at the meeting, attendees seemed frustrated over FDA's lack of customizing the regulations for the medium. I sense this will change over time but for now the FDA will not bend on following the regulations as written. Congress is looking for FDA to clamp down on enforcement and this is not an ideal time for FDA to bend the rules.

I also became enamored with the instant feedback of Twitter. My 23 year old daughter, attending the conference to meet potential employers with her new Masters in Advertising, called my attention to feedback on the conference being twittered around. This twittering was between attendees as well as attendees to colleagues back at their companies. Any speaker comment or attendee question was instantly dissected, criticized and shot across the electronic highway.

What I came away with most was the quality of the people working in DTC. Despite the image of pharma marketers as being profit mad corporate tools, nothing could be further from the truth. I never heard any cynical comments publicly or privately which in any way reflected an anti-consumer tone. These people are dedicated to what they do and care about improving health. They feel more information is better and are proud of communicating their point of view through DTC. It would help if critics softened the populist rhetoric and dealt with how to make DTC better. I know the people doing the DTC are willing to listen and improve it.

So, I am proud to be part of getting 500 plus DTC marketers together every spring.  I hope to keep doing it as long as people are willing to attend. Thanks to all who attended and all those unable to be there but who will learn from the attendees.