The COVID-19 pandemic is impeding the pharmaceutical industry’s capabilities to get in front of doctors. Traditional tactics, particularly anything live, including peer-to-peer, are just not yielding the results needed like they were in pre-COVID times. The best pharmaceutical marketing agencies in the world have stepped up with innovative products and services, but most of them will tell you that it has not been an easy past five months. In our own communications firm, we had been hearing the concerns of our clients since early February 2020. ALWAYS START BY LISTENING Hearing anxiety from yo ..read more

The Collins Online Dictionary explains the word ADAPT as follows: If you adapt to a new situation or adapt yourself to it, you change your ideas or behavior in order to deal with it successfully. The world will be different and we have to be prepared to adapt to the change. There is no doubt the COVID-19 outbreak of 2020 will cause us to change the way we do things, the way we live in the short and long terms, and in our professional and personal lives. The key takeaway for me in the definition is the use of “successfully” so I am going to focus on some of the po ..read more

I may be old school, but self-service or forcing a customer engagement via automated means (website or telephone) can be very annoying. Sometimes you just want to speak to someone live. Whether that be at your local supermarket or calling your local cable company, it can cause frustration when dealing with that company. I personally dislike hearing “Ok, please respond to the following prompts and if you can answer a few questions, we may be able to help you”, rather than having you wait for a customer service agent. The world certainly used to be more personal…people spoke on the phone direct ..read more

When I started Proactive 25 years ago, it was out of the basement of a beautiful ‘60s northern New Jersey ranch-style house we had just moved into. We had three young kids at the time, a mortgage and college educations ahead. What was I thinking, laying it all on the line to be in business on my own? I knew my new venture’s ultimate success would start with very simple objectives: secure a blue-chip client, do great work, make my client look good and make it easy for them. That first client was John Howard of Parke-Davis…and the formula worked. Prior to Parke-Davis’s launch of the blockbuster ..read more