Transforming your pharma brand strategy: Congress

28.01.2025 | Health Strategy

Transforming your pharma brand strategy: Congress

Learning about the needs, views and behaviours of online HCPs can shape the way you take part in congress meetings and transform the effectiveness of your congress tactics.

By following the online conversations of HCPs prior to, during and after congress you can discover who or what is really influencing their views. It’s a great opportunity to learn how HCPs are responding to new data or content and discover the impact congress has on wider HCP discussion within your therapy area. These insights can help shape your HCP engagement plan post congress and for future events.

Learn from the online conversations of healthcare professionals

As an example, when we tracked the online conversations of HCPs over ESMO 2024 we saw the peaks in conversation were driven by HCPs reacting to the latest trial results and oral presentations within bladder cancer.

HCP ESMO 2024 online conversations peaked on September 14th

Further analysis of this conversation can help you understand exactly what HCPs are discussing, their thoughts, needs and concerns, in order to help shape your HCP marketing strategy.

Another useful insight to discover is where your HCPs go online for information during the congress. We identified the sites most often shared over ESMO 2024. Partnering with these journals and associations could help amplify content you are planning to release over congress. A deeper examination of this can also be useful to understand what type of content your HCPs engage with in order to shape your content messaging. 

Key voices over congress

There are always HCPs who are more vocal over congress, leading the online discussions and shaping the views of their peers. By identifying these key voices you can look for engagement opportunities on topics you align on. As an example, our analysts examined the online conversations of HCPs over ADA 2024 to find the five most impactful HCPs. 

Although these impactful HCPs were generally positive about scientific data and advancement in diabetes, @KenBerryMD, a family physician with a focus on nutrition, took a markedly different approach, stating there was no need for the drugs and that a ketogenic diet would reverse both Type 2 Diabetes and Obesity.

 

This underlines the importance of understanding who the influential voices are as well as knowing which ones you may be best placed to support or collaborate with. It is also useful to be aware of those who may not necessarily be aligned with your goals and strategies but may impact the way your brand is perceived at congress.

KPI reporting

Congress can be a huge investment for pharmaceutical companies. Pharmaceutical companies can measure their impact and check whether KPIs are being met by tracking HCP conversations during the congress, especially after launching a campaign or releasing new trial data. For example, your KPIs might be to increase the positive share of voice around your company or products, raise awareness about a specific topic, or increase the dissemination of your clinical trial results.

Congress meetings are a great time to engage with your HCP customers online and add value to the conversation. Isolating the voice of the HCP on social media is crucial in order to get to the level of insights needed to help shape your HCP congress engagement strategy. 

For more information, watch our webinar on unlocking hidden HCP influence at congress or contact us to discuss your ideas.

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Meet the Author

Katie Kennedy

Katie has a background working within health organisations and continues to champion the work we do at CREATION.co amongst our current and future clients.

When not at work Katie enjoys being a mother to her two little girls, a dog, a cat, and a tortoise.