2 concerts and a plate of bones.

Whether it was poor timing or some inner party animal instinct, I managed to lock myself into two consecutive nights of concerts.

Both bands would feature loud guitars, a healthy dose of ‘80s-style synthesizers, pulsing bass lines, and did I mention loud guitars? Yet, they’re different.

One band is relatively new - the mean age of their members was about 26. The other, a band that’s been around for about 30 years, whose members are geezers and could technically be the fathers of the kids in the first band. These bands are quite unalike, yet each has qualified as ‘kickass’ in my opinion.

Without prejudice.

We had spare tickets to these shows and offered them to friends. No takers.

“I don’t know these bands, but I don’t think I’m gonna like ‘em,” was the typical response. This, was without hearing a single note from either band.

Much prejudice, it seems.

When I asked a colleague if he wanted to see one of these bands, he promptly googled them and told me, “I see that they’re classified in Wikipedia as a shoegaze band. What on Earth is shoegaze?!” Then he didn’t think he was going to like them. His reasoning made my head explode. “I think they’re before my time, before I was born.” I’m pretty sure people shouldn’t be benchmarking new music on the basis of their birth date.

You see, I have a voracious appetite for new experiences – not just music – and I believe that every one should be constantly on the look out for new and different things.

For example, lately I’ve taken to the idea of nose-to-tail eating, which means I’ve been going out of my way to try every type of offal I can find. Heck, before last night’s concert, I pigged out on roasted bone marrow with ramps.

I knew I liked bone marrow, but I had no idea what a ramp was, so I ordered it. (It’s a wild spring onion and you can see the little bulbs embedded right into the marrow).

(My mouth is watering just looking at that picture)

We all need to go out and try everything weird. If not weird, something that makes you a tad uneasy, and takes you out of your comfort zone.

So what’s the point of all this, then?

Run towards ideas that are unfamiliar or different from what you currently believe or understand. Have a voracious hunger for new ideas.

Despite its original context in the film Wall Street, Gordon Gekko’s seminal speech has a universal truth to it:

“Greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right. Greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures, the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms; greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge, has marked the upward surge of mankind.”

Greed is very good for marketing, in the sense of the pursuit of ideas and creativity. Eat up everything around you – in pop culture, in automotive design, in furniture aesthetics, in product packaging, in films, I gastronomy–all of it.

I believe that so many solutions for pharma marketing lie outside pharma marketing. And the only way we’re ever going to find them is when we start paying attention to things about which we have no idea.

-Des

Please Welcome Our Latest extrovert to the NY Office.

As part of extrovertic’s recent rebranding brainstorming, each of us was asked to “bring in something that you feel represents extrovertic.”

I brought in a bulb.

But not just any bulb—an amaryllis bulb.

You’re probably wondering, “What does an amaryllis bulb have to do with extrovertic?"

A bunch of reasons come to mind:

        ·      It blooms big, with multiple flowers

        ·      It’s determined. An amaryllis is one of the easiest flowers to grow. The bulb of this one couldn’t even wait to get to work. It’d already started to sprout before we put it in soil and watered it

        ·      It’s unstoppable. An amaryllis can keep on growing and blooming for years with minimal care. This is the second time this one’s bloomed. I just trimmed off the wilting stalk and it grew another stalk that then flowered

        ·      It’s popular. Because it’s so easygoing and cooperative, there’s a worldwide demand for them

        ·      It’s diverse. They flower in different colors (red, white, pink, salmon, and orange) as well as with different stripes

The way I see it, we at extrovertic operate the same way. It’s who we are. What we do. And how we work. Is it genetic? The environment? I don’t know. I’ll leave that to the Watson and Cricks of the world to unearth.

But I leave you, kind reader, with a perennial question: Why not grow your brand with extrovertic?

-PVB

This Skittles Commercial Is the Spinal Tap of DTC

The 2008 documentary It Might Get Loud showcased 3 highly influential guitar players of the modern-rock era: Jimmy Page, Jack White, and The Edge. It’s a brilliant film. You really should watch it if you haven’t yet.

One glaring moment was when The Edge recounted the time he watched This Is Spinal Tap. He said, “Spinal Tap….That's a movie that I watched. I didn't laugh, I wept.”

Those weren’t “I laughed so hard I cried” tears. Those were tears of shame. Not because The Edge had himself been guilty of the same big-haired, cheese-rock, melodramatic antics that Nigel Tufnel, David St. Hubbins, and Derek Smalls got up to. It was because the parody was so spot on that it was hard not to take personally.

And that’s how I felt when I watched this brand‑new Skittles^® commercial from Canada.

DTC TV spots are certainly not new fodder for parody. Saturday Night Live has been taking jabs at the category for ages. But having the likes of SNL poke fun at DTC was a little like an outsider looking in and laughing at us. It’s a whole different ball of wax to have our marketing brethren do so. That’s an inside job, a more personal jab. (And it seems to be a common trend—here’s another pharma spoof for Stoogesta, courtesy of the upcoming Three Stooges movie.)

Just as The Edge was chagrined by the over-the-top parody of rock‘n’roll in Spinal Tap, I was gutted when I saw that Skittles commercial. It cut a bit too close to home. Look at every cut in that spot—you’ve seen them all before. Every smile, promise, motion, on-screen effect—all of it. You’ve been seeing them for close to 20 years now.

So how did we get here? Have we squandered the last 15 years creating a monolithic category of pharmaceutical advertising that can be summarily goofed on in 60 seconds by a candy company? You know the answer to that question: yes.

I have worked in DTC marketing for almost 10 years now. And I want to continue to do so for the foreseeable future (at least as long as the FDA allows us to communicate directly to consumers to keep them better informed). But I also want to stay in DTC because I never want to make a “typical DTC commercial.”

Take another look at that Skittles ad. Soak in the horror of such creative mediocrity. Do our consumers really want to see creative like that? As marketers, are we truly satisfied that that sort of work is what we’re churning out day after day, month after month, year after year? Watch that spot again and let it drive you to create something better, more meaningful, that matters. We CAN do better. We CAN create fascinating imagery and tell stories that smash the norms of DTC advertising. We CAN create meaningful messages that do more than serve as fair balance wallpaper in a commercial pod.

We continually struggle to get standout creative to market. We don’t always succeed but that doesn’t mean we or anyone else should stop trying.

Let’s never give anyone reason to rip on our creative again. Do it first and foremost for the consumer. They deserve better. Then let’s do it for ourselves. Because we’re better than that.

-Des

Be the Patient

Every time I’ve started a patient-centric initiative, I’ve given the direction to my teams: Be the patient. I’ve found this helps provide my creatives with a deeper understanding of what an average patient is going through. Recently, I took my own advice a bit too literally—I broke my left humerus bone and spent a day in an ER, followed by a day spent with a highly regarded orthopedist. Having never broken a major bone before, the experience was both very painful and very instructive.

Upon arrival at the hospital, I sensed an information disconnect—I kept asking questions but only got selective information in return. It seemed the hospital staff wanted me to feel comforted by giving me some answers while flat out ignoring others. They weren’t really listening to what I was asking for. This experience got me thinking about how we listen (or don’t listen) to patients in focus groups.

I’ve spent as much time as anyone in dark focus-group rooms, chain-chomping M&M’s^® and taking notes on patient stories. But my accident made me wonder if my previous objectives had been to hear what I wanted to hear rather than to try to understand what patients were truly saying. Since patients are usually quite expressive in focus groups, if we really listen when they speak about how they are feeling, we can end up with keener, truer insights that might change the type of strategies and concepts we come up with in the future. It could also affect the patient’s long-term health.

For instance, at extrovertic we were recently able to discover a valuable truth about a patient group. This truth completely changed how we viewed the group and our approach, which ultimately resulted in very successful pre-launch and launch campaigns. We came to this truth by listening differently, not just to what the patients were saying about their condition, but to other significant experiences they’d been through in their lives. We established a greater understanding of our target demographic through this process.

To that end, listening beyond what patients are saying to truly get at what they are expressing or feeling can continue to help us find patient truths. With those truths, we can offer patients what they really need and not what we think they need. As a patient, I know I certainly would have appreciated being more closely listened to.

Are you really listening to what people are trying to tell you?

-Tom

A Pinteresting Approach to the FDA Social Media Guidelines

When Twitter first came on the scene, I challenged myself to meet and converse with a complete stranger every day for 3 months and then tweet about it (hence my Twitter handle, @talkswstrangers).

My latest challenge to self, (prompted in part by my role as editor of this blog) has been to keep even more on top of what’s going on in social media. I tasked myself with this for 2 reasons:

      1.    Because I’m constantly working in pursuit of a higher Klout score.

      2.    Because part of my job is to find new social media opportunities for extrovertic’s clients within the confines of the FDA social media guidelines for pharmaceutical marketing.

To accomplish my goals, I decided to spend some time every day looking for new social media sites, becoming a member, and participating in whatever it is they are offering. My latest find, Pinterest, describes itself as a “virtual pinboard” that:

allows you to organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web. You can browse pinboards created by other people to discover new things and get inspiration from people who share your interests.

What’s so cool about this site is that, other than appeasing my need to gaze at extensive visuals of beautiful clothing and delicious-looking pastries, Pinterest also offers interesting opportunities for the healthcare industry at large.

On my latest visit, I spent some time on the Pinterest healthcare board. Working at a healthcare marketing agency like extrovertic, this particular board piqued my interest. Since there are no rules about or limitations on what qualifies as a certain category, there’s an unspoken anything-goes mentality. When I looked, people had pinned images of: 

      ·      X-rays

      ·      Paul Farmer’s book Pathologies of Power

      ·      Florence Nightingale

      ·      Architecturally beautiful hospitals

The point is, peoples’ personal perceptions of what ‘makes’ healthcare is left open to interpretation via a site like Pinterest. To that end, I think that healthcare and pharmaceutical companies (and agencies!) may have an interesting outlet to tap here. Create a pinboard about a medical condition or category and see what people pin to it. People who suffer from various conditions can have the opportunity to visually represent how they feel—it can be the mood board of the future. Marketers can then derive keen insights into what people are saying about certain categories. It’s market research in its basest form. And yet another way for extrovertic to develop a deeper understanding of our target demographics.

I’m not saying that Pinterest can address or solve all the FDA regulatory issues via social media. Or that it won’t present its own slew of problems. But it seems at the very least worth exploring. This was probably one of my most productive self-challenges to date. Making a pinboard can be an enlightening experience!

-Jamie

Why Did I Do That?

About a month ago, I realized I was in need of some refocusing and re-centering. Since it was winter in New York City, the prospect of a trip to California was a fabulous one. So I found a meditation retreat in Cali and off I went!

When I arrived at the meditation center, one of the themes of the weekend was “pay attention to your intention.” My first thought was, “What the heck does that mean?” But once I managed to reign in my thoughts, sit quietly, and meditate (always a difficult task for an extrovert!), I realized the importance of these words. If you are in touch with your intention at any given moment, no matter what the activity, you come to terms with what it is that you’re really after.

For instance, I think that I need to go to the gym more often.  If what I really intend to do is go to the gym, I need to make a plan, right?

      1.     Find a gym.

      2.     Pick a time to go to said gym (and incorporate into already hectic schedule).

      3.     Pack workout clothes and bring to work.

So why is it that even when I define my goals and identify an approach, I don’t always accomplish what I set out to do? It all comes back to intention. When I reflected on this, I realized that I don’t really appreciate the benefits of going to the gym—I’d much rather go for a nice long walk. So I don’t even bother wasting the energy trying to push myself if my intention isn’t really to go.

As I thought about it, I realized that this applies to everything. Intention already has a firm place in my work as a marketer. Every time we put a plan, proposal, or a creative project together, we are thinking about our intention—our objective. And if we’re not fully committed to and aware of our objective from the very beginning, whatever we’re working on generally becomes a mess. We end up changing direction midstream, or have to start over on the creative. 

Intention is the reason extrovertic holds the creative brief in such high regard. I know sometimes it’s a hassle to go through the process of discussing the assignment, waiting for the brief, reviewing it with your team, and then waiting for a revision before finally signing off on it. It’s just a brochure, right?? But if we’re not clear about our intentions, we might end up with a brochure that doesn’t accomplish its goals. So, in the month since I’ve returned, it’s been interesting to reflect on my everyday actions and think about my intentions. Does every extrovertic project maintain the intentions of the brief?

The best part of this experience has been realizing that intention (or lack thereof) is something I maintain complete control over. Whenever I want, I can reorient to infuse everything in my life with a bit more purpose and focus.

Try to take some time to “pay attention to your intention” and apply this to your own life. Experiment a little with thinking about why you approach situations in the way you do. Then try changing your approach and see what happens. I bet you will have some fascinating discoveries. It’s amazing what you can learn on a beautiful February day in California.

-Nichole 

A good reason for self-inflicted pain

One of the great things about working at Extrovertic is that we enjoy socializing with each other. We are also fortunate that our office has no shortage of elite organizers who relish the opportunity to turn any prospective activity into an elaborate endeavor.

Towards the end of 2011, when holiday parties started taking their toll on our waistlines, we decided that January would be dedicated to health and the reclamation of our attractive and fit selves. Of course, merely encouraging each other to lose weight and take up exercise wouldn’t be enough—we needed a competition that would bring out our best efforts and ensure a lasting commitment for the entire month. The natural choice for this type of challenge was a Biggest Loser-style contest. After a mass email was sent out asking for participants, 12 people (around a third of our New York office) signed up and put in $50 each towards the pot. The winner would be the person who lost the highest percentage of their total body weight during the month of January. The terms of this competition were highly disputed—we debated whether a single month would be enough time to achieve noticeable weight loss. But acknowledgement that people wanted to limit the duration of their dieting pain led to a consensus on the one-month time period (that and our chief extrovert said she couldn’t stand us squabbling anymore).

It is with great false modesty that I take credit for coming up with this idea. During a conversation with my desk neighbor, I fatuously claimed that I could lose more weight than he could if I were inclined to do so. He disagreed, and the germ of the idea for the extrovertic Biggest Loser competition was born. Remarkably, several people overheard my boasting and the idea took off from there. And despite the sentient nature of my job as extrovertic’s head of IT, I was sure I could shed the pudge with low-carb dieting and cardio exercise—the $600 pot was as good as mine.

The level of intensity shown by most of the competitors took a lot of people by surprise. Working at extrovertic is so fun because the people who work here genuinely like each other. But that didn’t minimize the fact that no one wanted to lose. Competitors cut way back on carbs and calories and still found the energy for heavy cardio workouts (sometimes twice a day). There was only a modicum of sabotage and paranoia in the contest. A banana generously given to a fellow contestant was later mentioned in someone’s blog as treachery.

The final weigh-in showed extrovertic’s true sense of camaraderie. At the final tally on February 3rd, most of us remembered to wear very light clothes to make weight. One person, however, wore jeans. Another offered a co-competitor his own shorts and as a result lost by a 0.45% margin. A sad ending to a generous offer.

In total, as a collective group we lost over 130 lbs, or about 11 lbs per person. Our winner, Desmond Yuen, lost 26 lbs for a winning percentage of 13.9%. I lost 23 lbs and came in a distant 4th place. But everyone lost weight and we all gained an even greater sense of respect for each other. Afterwards, we took our shrunken stomachs to Hill Country BBQ for the closing ceremonies.

-John Yoo