Health comms agency Hive launched
pharmafile | February 27, 2008 | News story | Medical Communications |Â Â Â
A group of experienced healthcare communications executives have launched Hive which they claim represents a 'next generation' of agency to serve the pharmaceutical industry.
Created by a breakaway team from well-known agency Paling Walters, former Managing Director Ian Busby and Business Unit Directors Tim Scorer and Jas Hummel say they have set up Hive to challenge traditional approaches to healthcare communications.
Partner Ian Busby said: "Although our roots are in healthcare advertising, we have to recognise that the market has, and will continue to change."
Ian says the industry is still overlooking the fact that patients are its customers, but that by focusing on their needs, pharma can transform the power of its brands.
"Hive is all about re-thinking the way disciplines operate within the marketing mix and ensuring a more integrated brand approach," he says.
"Our end user [the patient] is smarter, more investigative, more informed and more powerful than ever before. We have to take this increasingly informed patient as the starting point of the strategic process."
In order to put this philosophy into practice, the Hive team say marketers must take into account the increasingly blurred channels of communication, brought about by new media and the internet and wider access to information.
Ian says that for pharma companies that understand this, the opportunities for "creative and cohesive healthcare marketing" have never been greater.
Based in London's Regent Street, the agency will capitalise on its founders' previous experience across consumer and prescription medicines, and says it will offer a broader integrated capability in terms of implementing campaigns.
Ian, Tim and Jas are best known for their work on the multi-award winning 'Lethal Obsession' advertising campaign for Roche's Xenical while at Paling Walters, but have worked on a wide range of healthcare accounts over the years.
The Hive team say they are great believers in pursuing the best creative ideas for healthcare marketing – whether it is by 'stealing' techniques and ideas from other fields, or by generating them through group discussions and communities. In keeping with this spirit, Hive has launched what they believe to be the world's first healthcare communications blog, and are inviting contributions to its website forum from anyone with a view or experience to share.
The agency is keen to keep its office abuzz with people and energy, and have an 'open house' rule, with pharma execs invited to drop in and use the office as a London base.
