With busy life and hectic work schedules, consumers today prefer everything that saves time. Internet has made this job all the more easier, as today right from paying bills to buying movie tickets and shopping online to booking travel tickets, everything can be done on internet within few seconds. Given that many patients these days look up the internet to understand several health related ailments they (or their family members) are suffering from, social media has become a channel that the pharma/ medical firms cannot afford to miss. Moreover, consumers also use internet information to validate costs associated with the treatment/ procedure, information on medical insurance, etc. India is one of the fastest growing digital markets in the world. With an increasing number of Internet users in the country, there has been an increase in health related searches as well. Similarly, the growing trend is that the doctors in the country are interacting with their patients through Internet and are increasingly using social media to better understand the landscape within the healthcare industry. When it comes to pharma companies, they cannot promote or sell prescription products online because of the guidelines set by the Medical Council of India and code of conduct set by The International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers & Associations (IFPMA) for the ethical promotion of pharma products. However, even if the social media cannot be a sales channel for prescription products, it serves another important purpose. Social media has emerged as a key influencer and medium to understand stakeholder sentiments, and drive appropriate programmes to proactively engage with patients and healthcare practitioners. One of the key drivers for using social media by pharma companies is to generate an opinion or standpoint on a topic related to their business and influence change. The pharma industry also used social media to create awareness about a disease; a good example would be Merck’s work on cervical cancer awareness. Also, this medium is used to connect with patients suffering from similar ailments. For example, Sanofi has taken to Facebook and Twitter in a big way where over the past two years they have created a community of 4000 patients suffering from diabetes on both these platforms. An active social media presence thus can be a crucial branding strategy in an increasingly competitive and over-crowded market.
