Buzz Marketing

[7vNH]

As you can see from the column to the left of this text, I'm pretty new here. So I had a thought. A question, really.

How many pharmacy marketing people have logon ID's on this board? I thought that zero would the wrong number.

My thinking goes like this...
* Marketing budgets for big pharma companies are huge
* Many companies are visibly answering questions and doing damage control on many social media channels
* It would be trivial to define a fictional personna (or several) and stick to that story in all posts
* This would serve to mildly bolster a drug in the eyes of the forum members
* This would allow the company to monitor what people are saying about a specific drug treatment, to correct misconceptions, to do 'damage control'

This forum has awesome value! I'm not saying that having a little fictional influence like this is all that horrible (we're pretty smart, so they need to be pretty subtle).

But, not to be too paranoid, but how many active ID's on this board do you think have a pharmaceutical marketing person behind them?

PS: If you answer zero, we've got you pegged :ycool:

 

[Cat-a-Tonic]

Hi, welcome to the forum. I guess I'm not really sure what the point of your post is? As a moderator on the site, I try very hard to remove spammers, advertisements, etc from the forum. I'm not particularly thrilled by you implying that we've got all sorts of secret spammers lurking about - it's possible, but that implication is also rather offensive to the staff who all work very hard to keep this forum wonderful and as un-biased as possible. Posting legitimate information about medications or treatments is fine, anything fishy should be reported.

I can direct you to the forum rules - the link is here:
http://www.crohnsforum.com/faq.php?faq=new_faq_item#faq_new_faq_item3

Specifically these rules:

*While many of us personally deal with Inflammatory Bowel Disease any information or personal testimonials provided on this site should not be considered personal advice and should be checked out with your personal doctor or medical practitioner. Inflammatory Bowel Disease affects us all differently and it is important that you arrange any changes in your battle against it with medical professionals.

*This community is not a substitution for medical advice or treatment and all questions or emergencies regarding your condition should be brought to the attention of a medical practitioner immediately.

*If you're looking to interview, engage in any commercial activity, survey members, or post research recruiting information you must first be cleared by an administrator by emailing [email protected]

*Here on the forum we share facts with credible sources, personal experiences and offer support. Posts that deter a member from getting treatment suggested by their medical practitioner that they may need is not allowed. Such posts may be subject to editing and you will receive a warning.

If you notice another member breaking any of these rules (or any of the rules in the link above), please report the post and the staff will deal with it. Otherwise, please don't imply things without having some evidence to back you up. This is a support forum first and foremost - we're all here to support one another and provide good information. If you notice otherwise then please report it. Thank you.

 

[nogutsnoglory]

It wouldn't surprise me if they monitor places like crohnsforum to assess their public standing but it's hard to believe big Pharma is making up usernames to defend their drugs. They are defending them on a much larger scale. We see the self promotion with small supplements and bogus "cures"
I don't think anyone can answer how many on here have an agenda but certainly some do. What is prompting this concern for you?

 

[Farmwife]

Yes I guess I question your motives, which I hope are honest.
Most on this forum take great care into consideration when choosing a medicine for this disease.
To my knowledge this forum has never "pushed" a specific drug or try to glorify it as a perfect drug with no side effects.

We all do the best we can with the choices given us or in my case the choices given to my 5 year old.

 

[vonfunk]

There have been charlatans and people pushing supplements on the board. It usually becomes apparent pretty quick once people start questioning claims and asking for science to back up the claims
As far as drug manufacturers go, it would be pointless. There enough people on this board to cover the spectrum between "This was awesome" and "This put me in the hospital for a week". One more added voice to that chorus wouldn't tip the scales much in either direction.

 

[Jennifer]

When I was the Administrator I received emails from some drug companies asking if I or they could post positive reviews and give links to their customer support line as they saw a lot of bad reviews about their product on the site and even got these emails from insurance companies as well. I refused every one because we don't want biased information on the site. Any sort of spam is deleted promptly. We only allow legit users on the site. If someone is found out to be otherwise then they're banned from the forum.

 

[Orchid]

You mess with the crab you get the pincers.

 

[7vNH]

Let me first say I'm sorry if I came across as something other than curious. This site, those who take the time and effort to moderate and members of the community seem like something very special and valuable. I didn't and don't mean to diminish that.

More about where the idea came from...my sister worked at a Fortune 500 company and she told me that there were people that maintained multiple personnas on forum sites as part of their job responsibilities.

As far as drug manufacturers go, it would be pointless. There enough people on this board to cover the spectrum between "This was awesome" and "This put me in the hospital for a week". One more added voice to that chorus wouldn't tip the scales much in either direction.

I agree. That's why I was surprised by what my sister told me. Why would they even bother? I guess they have more money than they know what to do with

When I was the Administrator I received emails from some drug companies asking if I or they could post positive reviews and give links to their customer support line as they saw a lot of bad reviews about their product on the site and even got these emails from insurance companies as well. I refused every one because we don't want biased information on the site. Any sort of spam is deleted promptly. We only allow legit users on the site. If someone is found out to be otherwise then they're banned from the forum.

That's good! Like I said in the OP, if they are here, they need to be very subtle to keep under the radar.

 

[Lisa]

7mcg, have you posted in the your story sub forum? I don't see a specific diagnosis in your profile, can you tell us a little about yourself over there, are you going through testing, etc?

 

[nogutsnoglory]

It becomes very clear quickly if promotion of any kind is occurring. If every post references a particular treatment or idea, we quickly catch on. If big pharma wants a go at it. Come at us. Oh and please introduce new IBD drugs. Thanks.

 

[7vNH]

It becomes very clear quickly if promotion of any kind is occurring. If every post references a particular treatment or idea, we quickly catch on. If big pharma wants a go at it. Come at us. Oh and please introduce new IBD drugs. Thanks.

The more I think about this, the more I think it might not be worth the risk for a big pharma company to make the creation of fictional personnas "official". It's like in Vegas, if there was ever 'hard evidence' that a casino was cheating, the fallout would be huge. So they probably don't use anything that would let them get caught 'red handed', like a magnet in the roulette wheel. Fictional personnas are against the rules, yes, but I don't think that would be breaking any laws. But even though it would not be illegal, it might make a pretty big negative splash, and big pharma has enough reputation problems already

As to the advantage creation of fictional personnas would bring, I do think it would be minimal, but not a zero advantage. For instance, say I was on the fence about side effects of some drug and I come on here and spot someone who's been taking it for 20 years, or spot some kid that's been on it for 1/2 her life. That might tip the scales. I have no clue what the volume of lurkers is here, and how often posts here show up in google search results, but that would be part of the risk/reward calculus.

With respect to how they could get caught, if they posted while they were at the company facility or while connected to the company VPN, that would be pretty close to a smoking gun (check IP address of posts to see if that IP block was assigned to a big pharma company). Of course there are going to be a few people that work for a pharmacutical company that also happen to have CD, and those would be legit. Another red flag is if the IP address of posts is a TOR exit node (trying to hide identity could also be legit, though).

Again, this thread was just spawned by a bit of curiosity on my part...not saying anything 'bad' about this board! And about me...I'm here because after having been on and off 5-ASA's for a very long time, they recently haven't been as effective. So I'm here to get a feel for what's going on in the current state of care.

 

[DustyKat]

I can see where curiosity would raise such a question. This is a very large forum, very active and primarily frequented by members residing in the US. An attractive draw point for pharmaceutical companies, doctors and anyone else with a vested interest in IBD, including us.

As the health system in the US is different to that of other western countries pharmaceutical companies have a far greater reach into the lives of private citizens there. In Australia, for example, direct to the consumer advertising of prescribed medication is not allowed. Of course in other countries with universal healthcare it is allowable but the system of obtaining these medications is different.

As Jennifer has said, pharmaceutical companies do try to get a foothold into the forum by legitimate means and are rejected. For those companies or individuals that try to peddle their wares, no matter what the product or cause, by circumventing the approval process then the rigorous attentions of the staff here see them quickly banned. This forum is not for profit and is a support forum first and foremost, as such the focus is one of personal experiences and the passing on of knowledge learnt along the way.

Dusty.