Diabetes? Hypertension? There’s an App for That!

The iPhone represents an important — “potentially huge” — new marketing opportunity for pharma marketers, as outside developers begin to morph the phone into a diagnostic device for both consumers and healthcare professionals.

According to reporter Rich Thomaselli of Advertising Age, when Apple unveiled its 3.0 software-development kit this spring, the company demonstrated how pharmaceutical manufacturers could exploit the iPhone's external-accessories application to hook up a blood-pressure cuff to the iPhone.

“For Big Pharma, the opportunity is clear, writes Thomaselli. “A consumer who tests positive for high blood pressure or diabetes via the iPhone will clearly be a marketing target for prescription medications or ancillary medical services.”

Recently, LifeScan, a Johnson & Johnson company that makes diabetes products, introduced a prototype for an application that would allow diabetics to interface their glucometers with the iPhone, thereby enabling them to better adjust their medications and diet.

There are already more than 500 medical apps among the iPhone’s more than 35,000 existing apps. An issue that’s certain to arise in the not-so-distant future: the question of when an iPhone becomes a medical device — and thus subject to FDA scrutiny.

A Question to Bankers: What’s Up with Your PR?

I recently read an interesting article in Advertising Age about the marketing challenges facing financial services industry in the post-TARP world and how banks are responding.

Some customers are asking whether Citibank is a safe place for their savings,” writes reporter Beth Snyder Bulik. “So what is Citibank doing? Running ads in the Wall Street Journal about its microfinance capabilities in Texas and India.”

It’s just one example of the tone-deaf marketing messages coming from some banks that don’t answer worried customers’ real concerns … Is my money safe? Can I trust you? Will you be here tomorrow?

According to Ad Age, the top 10 banks and credit-card companies cut their ad budgets by a more than 25% in the fourth quarter of 2008 and nearly 40% December compared with those same periods in 2007. This represents a tremendous opportunity for banks and other financial services institutions to step into the void and claim it for their brand.

As our CEO, Ken Makovsky, wrote recently, public relations “is significantly less expensive than advertising and much more credible. We’re talking about a modest investment in time and money that delivers a major return on investment.”

Making the Most of Search Engine Marketing

New York-based Advertising Age recently released the 2008 edition of its Search Engine Marketing Fact Pack, an overview of the top search engines, keyword use and “everything else marketers need to know to connect with consumers.”

It’s filled with interesting data. For example, a recent survey of advertisers revealed that they were robbing Peter to pay Paul. When asking which budgets they were diverting to fund search marketing programs, “magazine advertising” was the number one answer, accounting for 32 percent of replies, followed by “website development” (22%) and “direct mail” (17%).

Also worth checking out in the Fact Pack are the industry-specific rankings of the top websites and search terms. Among the sectors addressed: business information, banking, stocks and shares, telecommunications and healthcare. … all valuable business intelligence for branding and marketing firms and public relations consultants.