By Katie Kennedy 
At Creation Healthcare we work with our clients to explore healthcare professional (HCP) conversations on public social media during time periods that best suit their goals. Using Creation Pinpoint we have the ability to look at both historical data as well as monitor ongoing conversations. While each approach offers advantages in different situations, sometimes a combination of both may be the best option. Looking back at the past year or two provides a benchmark on how HCPs are talking about your brand or the therapy area. Following this, receiving frequent timely and insightful reports allows you to keep up to date with topics that are important to HCPs, see what impact current campaigns are having on online conversation, and be alerted to any information being shared about your brand.
Product launches, trends, and alerts
The strategies you choose will depend on your goals, but ongoing monitoring provides a great opportunity to be informed of the latest HCP thoughts on news or data in the industry, observe trends on specific topics, and further understand the daily activities of digitally active stakeholders.
Figure 1. Monthly tracking on three non-insulin diabetes treatment volumes over a year.
One of our clients decided to monitor a period of time where approvals in Europe for new indications for both their own pharmaceutical product as well as competitors were expected. From this they were not only able to learn how HCPs share data and news stories about their approval in real time, but also compare data to previous approvals for similar drugs in the past year. They saw how a negative editorial piece which was published about a competing product prompted comments from HCPs online, and how the company themselves interacted with these HCPs as the situation unfolded.
Another client was interested in understanding HCPs’ conversation about their product, from the launch of a campaign and into the following year. Given that the campaign focused on seasonal use of the product, this provided a unique case. Using Creation Pinpoint we identified any common questions leading up to this period, to inform the development of educational material, as well as monitor for specific areas of concern mentioned in forums dedicated to a specific profession.
Our ability to set up alerts that send automated emails whenever a topic is mentioned means our analysts (or you, or your agencies if you wish) receive up-to-the-minute information on your product – a crucial feature for those who want their finger on the pulse of online HCP discussions.
Professional conferences
One of the most useful aspects of ongoing monitoring is being able to keep up to date with events as they happen. This is especially useful for conferences and other scientific meetings where a large number of HCPs will gather and post about their day on social media, most notably on Twitter. With conference hashtags being a common way to join conversation, it is simple to track real-time HCP discussions about new data being presented, pictures being shared, and opinions on any pharmaceutical presence. We can prepare a live feed that can be customized to suit your needs, from following certain key opinion leaders to tracking key topics over the course of the day.
Figure 2. Year-on-year comparison of HCP participation volumes in social media in 3 different congresses
Our previous studies on congresses have been a great success for clients, giving them insights into not only what HCPs are saying, but also how and what they are likely to share, especially in reference to tweets from another company. Our clients are keen on seeing how the social media conversation flows and are becoming more and more educated on the best approach to effectively communicate in upcoming congresses.
The importance of ongoing studies
Overall, gaining insight to HCP conversations that are occurring right now offers several distinct advantages:
- Identify the current top opinion leaders or professions on social media that are talking about topics of interest, and gain insight into their behavior.
- Be aware of any areas that need to be addressed, such as further education on administering a product
- Receive instant insights from product mentions by HCPs which can alert you to the spread of information (or even misinformation)
- Monitor the success of current digital or offline strategies
- Observe topic trends as they happen, and compare with previous years
- Learn from the type of content being shared and produced in upcoming scientific conferences by HCPs
Keeping up with HCP discussions in real-time could provide you with a crucial competitive advantage. Creation Pinpoint is able to empower you with the knowledge necessary in order to achieve your goals for 2015 and beyond.
If you would like a case study presentation on how clients are using Creation Pinpoint for monitoring HCP social media conversation, please contact Katie Barden.
