Wave I of Life Science Social Media Research finds that Social Media Channels are a Significant Untapped Opportunity
PJA Advertising + Marketing and bioinformatics, LLC announced the complete results of their first social media study among life scientists. The survey, fielded by The Science Advisory Board and co-sponsored by BioInformatics, LLC and PJA Advertising + Marketing, found that 77 percent of life scientists participate in some type of social media.
Social media refers to blogs, podcasts, online communities, Wikis, and social networking sites that are increasingly being used by professionals to share experiences, opinions and advice. While scientists still consider their suppliers to be the most trusted source of product information, 45 percent of those surveyed find "access to objective feedback on products and services from multiple sources" to be the most valuable aspect of social media. Other findings indicate that:
- Nearly a third of respondents report that social media of all types help them to make more educated decisions about purchasing new products and technologies, while nearly half report that social media facilitates the sharing of ideas with colleagues and the scientific community
- More than half of respondents agree that social media tools and user-generated content have helped to make more informed decisions, while nearly a third said these tools have made the purchasing process faster and more efficient
- The higher the media engagement of the scientist, the more likely they are to choose traditional marketing channels such as company Web sites, catalogs, trade magazines and content aggregators. However, less-engaged scientists are much more likely to be attracted to new social media channels such as user-generated content or third-party online portals
"Scientists aren't laggards to the IT crowd in social media-they've been there all along. Yet it's only recently that life science suppliers have begun to grasp social media's potential as a way to bond with their customers in a way that really drives loyalty, " says Hugh Kennedy, Executive Vice President and Partner at PJA. Bill Kelly, President of BioInformatics, LLC concurred, "The results of our study demonstrate that life science suppliers have to understand social media and learn how to incorporate it in their overall strategy for informing and influencing their scientific customers."
The survey was fielded late in 2007, and 1,510 responses were collected between October 29 and November 2, 2007. The participating scientists were engaged in a wide range of biological research including genomics, proteomics and drug discovery. Nearly half of respondents were from North America, 36 percent from Europe, 11 percent from Asia, and six percent from rest of world.
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