Liveworld

Pharma Has Embraced Influencer Marketing

Historically, the pharmaceutical industry has hesitated to adopt influencer marketing on social media due to stringent regulations and risk management concerns. However, as patients increasingly turn away from inauthentic ads and seek genuine voices on social platforms, pharma companies are beginning to recognize the potential of influencer marketing to engage with patients and healthcare providers effectively.

3 Ways Pharma Uses the Power of Influencer Marketing to Connect with Audiences:

1. Increased Reach: Influencers have large followings on social media, which means they can help pharma companies reach a wider audience than they would be able to on their own. By partnering with influencers who have a relevant audience, pharma companies can connect with patients and healthcare providers who may not have been aware of their product or service otherwise.
2. Trust & Credibility: Influencer marketing is seen as more trustworthy and authentic than traditional forms of advertising. When a healthcare creator recommends a product or service, their followers are more likely to trust their recommendation than a company’s marketing message.
3. Education & Awareness: Many patients turn to social media for health information and peer support. By partnering with healthcare creators, pharma companies can help educate patients about their conditions and treatment options. This can help increase awareness of a particular disease or condition and ultimately lead to better patient outcomes.

Learn more about how influencer campaigns work, especially for rare disease conditions.

Steps to Create a Proper Influencer Program

To establish a successful influencer program for a pharma brand, it is essential to follow a structured process. Brand leaders must focus on every aspect from discovering and vetting influencers to measuring and reporting the program’s success, ensuring each step is meticulously managed to drive impactful results.

1. Discovery & Influencer Vetting: Identify and evaluate potential influencers whose audience and content align with the pharma brand’s goals. Assess their credibility, engagement rates, and adherence to regulatory guidelines to ensure they are a good fit for the campaign. Vetting pharma creators is crucial to maintain the integrity and effectiveness of marketing efforts.
2. Contracting: Negotiate and finalize agreements with selected influencers, clearly outlining the scope of work, deliverables, timelines, and compensation. Ensure that all legal and compliance requirements are addressed in the contract.
3. Content Development: Collaborate with influencers to create engaging, accurate, and compliant content that resonates with their audience. Provide necessary guidelines and resources to ensure the content aligns with the pharma brand’s messaging and regulatory standards.
4. Content Flighting: Plan and schedule the distribution of influencer content across various social media platforms to maximize reach and impact. Coordinate the timing and frequency of posts to align with campaign objectives and audience engagement patterns.
5. Moderation: Monitor influencer content and audience interactions to ensure compliance with AE reporting and other regulatory requirements and brand guidelines. Address any issues or negative feedback promptly to maintain the integrity of the campaign. Moderating influencer programs is vital for sustaining the campaign’s success and compliance.
6. Measurement & Reporting: Track the performance of the influencer campaign using key metrics such as reach, engagement, and conversion rates. Analyze the data to assess the effectiveness of the campaign and generate insights for future initiatives.

Evaluating Content Creators for Pharma Brands

The success of any influencer campaign hinges on the careful selection and vetting of influencers. Ensuring that creators align with brand values, possess genuine credibility, and adhere to regulatory standards is crucial for maintaining the integrity and effectiveness of marketing efforts. Here are critical considerations involved in vetting influencers within the pharma industry, setting the stage for authentic, impactful, and compliant collaborations.

Influencer Categories and Vetting Criteria

Compare celebrity and micro-Influencers for pharma marketing brands (view influencer comparison chart).

Additional Vetting Criteria

• Authenticity & Credibility: Choose genuine influencers with a trustworthy reputation.
• Relevance to Brand & Campaign: Ensure the influencer aligns with your brand values and campaign goals.
• Content Quality: Assess the quality and consistency of the influencer’s content.
• Follower Demographics: Match the influencer’s follower demographics with your target audience.
• Engagement Rate: Evaluate the influencer’s ability to engage their audience (likes, comments, shares).

Moderating Influencer Programs to Ensure Pharma Compliance

The true value of healthcare influencers lies in the organic communities that form around them on social media. These communities are crucial for disease state education, awareness, and support as they provide a trusted space for sharing information and personal experiences. Influencers foster engagement and empathy, creating a sense of connection and solidarity among patients, caregivers, and healthcare professionals. This dynamic environment enhances understanding, reduces stigma, and encourages proactive health management.

Many pharmaceutical marketers fail to fully leverage social media’s potential, often because of compliance worries. Opting to disable comments might seem like a safer choice, but this strategy falls short in harnessing the true benefits of influencer marketing. While it provides a sense of security, it significantly diminishes the impact and engagement that influencer campaigns can achieve.

How to Build and Manage a Pharma Influencer Moderation Program

1. Compliance: Align with your business needs and objectives as well as your brand’s specific regulatory guardrails. A vigilant moderation program is crucial for promptly identifying and addressing adverse events, safeguarding the brand’s reputation, and ensuring regulatory compliance.
2. Engagement: A moderation partner needs to fully appreciate the subtle-to-substantial differences among social platforms to help a brand deliver the experiences that each unique community expects across the different social channels.
3. Support: Patients and HCPs expect to connect with your brand on any channel they choose whenever they choose. Strategically designed content moderation services provide highly responsive omnichannel support that helps improve brand sentiment and turns customers and caregivers into advocates of your brand.
4. Insights: Strategic moderation of pharma brand and condition channels equips your marketing team with a constant stream of valuable data and insights that you simply cannot get from digital media advertising. Mining user-generated content (UGC) as well as peer-to-peer or brand engagement creates a valuable data set that captures the authentic voice of your customer. You and your moderation partner then can use those insights to fine-tune strategies and tactics to grow brand trust and influence behavior.

Did You Know?

• Instagram and TikTok are leaders in influencer marketing: 79% of marketing specialists use Instagram for their influencer marketing campaigns.
• Nano-influencers have stronger connections with their audience, showing the highest engagement rate.
• Over 66% of TikTok creators are nano influencers with 1K-10K followers.
• TikTok nano- and micro-influencers have the highest engagement rate.

By carefully vetting pharma influencers and effectively moderating influencer programs, pharmaceutical companies can harness the full potential of influencer marketing while maintaining compliance and fostering genuine connections with their audiences.

Learn more about the benefits of embracing a pharma-centric influencer marketing campaign.

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Reach out the author, Rishi Kadiwar, VP Strategy, LiveWorld at rkadiwar@liveworld.com