How UCB built engagement on Facebook

Last month, Stephen Whiteside of WARC attended the ePharma Summit in New York City. Over the next few weeks, you'll see some of the insights he captured from the event. How UCB built engagement on FacebookPeople with epilepsy often welcome the support of their fellow sufferers and actively embrace the chance to learn about their condition. The challenge for UCB – the maker of Vimpat and Keppra XR, two drugs assisting in the treatment of partial-onset seizures – was finding a way to help them do so while staying inside the pharma sector's strict regulations.An online listening exercise conducted by UCB just over 18 months ago, when Trish Nettleship joined as its director/social media and influence, emphasised just how crucial it was to meet these needs. "We realised, within the epilepsy space, there's this significant feeling of isolation. And there's still quite a bit of stigma for epilepsy patients," she said at the ePharma Summit, a conference organised by the Institute for International Research, and held in February 2014. "There was this overwhelming sense of isolation; lack of information; these feelings of, 'I'm alone.'"The proposed solution involved establishing a digital arena where members of this audience could easily and naturally come together. "We needed to create a forum for these folks to connect with each other, not feel alone and share resources – and provide resources to them," said Nettleship. (Read more about how UCB engaged with sufferers of Rheum...
Source: ePharma Summit - Category: Medical Marketing and PR Tags: ePharma ePharma Summit Online user interaction UCB Source Type: blogs