Medicom expands into branding
pharmafile | May 19, 2006 | News story | Business Services |
PR and medical education group Medicom has launched a new consultancy that offers product and corporate branding services.
The new division, named Medibrand, is headed by managing director Stephen Page and creative director Zuleika Burnett, who join the Medicom group from brand communications agency Core-Create.
Page said Medibrand will offer an imaginative approach for communicating with a client's target audiences.
"Just telling audiences about product features is not enough. You've got to really understand the audience and what is going on in their day-to-day working life and work out how to puncture their daily auto-pilot," he explained.
Just six-weeks old, the consultancy has already been invited to three pitches, and from these has won its first new account with a large medical device company.
Page also negotiated with Core-Create to bring with him a handful of clients, including medical equipment firm Eschmann Equipment.
Medibrand will be targeting all areas of healthcare, including private hospitals and medical device, pharma and biotech companies.
"What we are offering is a design and branding capability," Page said. "So we can help people pour corporate glue down the cracks to make their corporate brand more cohesive."
The corporate branding services on offer encompass external and internal communications, the latter including incentive and company value programmes.
"We also support product brands by supplying clients with marketing and communication programmes and sales support material," he continued.
Page says the addition of Medibrand to the existing offerings of Medicom will enable it to function as an integrated agency with a 'media-neutral' selection of channels when needed.
The group already provides med ed, medical publishing, interactive media and healthcare PR services, and Medibrand will work with all areas of the group, including its newly appointed medical manager.
Dr Dianne Cottle was recently appointed to the agency as part of a move to create an in-house approval system to mirror the structure of pharma companies.
A former paediatrician at Hammersmith Hospital, Dr Cottle will operate as a medical resource for Medibrand to use on an ad-hoc basis across a range of accounts.
Medibrand will also augment Medicom's existing creative studio with a design capability, which the consultancy is in the process of expanding through a recruitment drive.
New designer Dimitri Challouma has already been taken on and Medibrand is seeking further creative designers and creative artworkers.
Before joining Medicom, Page was one of the founding partners of Core-Create and its managing director, and Zuleika Burrnett its creative director. Prior to this, Burnett was design manager for Eurostar and art director at the Conran Group.
"What is unique about Medibrand is that clients get to work directly with myself and Zuleika. It's not often that clients get such direct access to this level of creative expertise," Page said.
During their time at Core-Create, Zuleika and Stephen contributed to the winning of the Patient-Focused Marketing Effectiveness Award at the 2004 Pharmaceutical Marketing Effectiveness Awards, and were short-listed for the PMEA Franchise Identity award in 2005.
