A look at the characteristics of the best performing pharmaceutical ads for both print and digital.

Is pharmaceutical ad design a science or an art? Well, being brutally honest it’s both. Every ad, regardless of it being pharmaceutical-based or not, will need to be visually appealing and also persuasive to draw attention and stand any chance of success. In pharma, you also want to make it clear what sets your product apart from the competition and/or what is already on the market.

To achieve this we need to strike a balance.

In this article, we’ll explore some of the key characteristics of pharmaceutical print and digital ads and we’ll highlight some of the key takeaways for your next ad.

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WHAT THE BEST PERFORMING PHARMACEUTICAL ADS LOOK LIKE

For print ads, there are no hard and fast rules which we can impart to say what design the best ads follow. This is mostly because it’s difficult to actually gauge how successful print ads are due to their very nature. But always look to keep your ads relevant based on where the ad will relative to the audience of the specific pharmaceutical publication. Context is key and the audience is the primary concern.

One way of tracking performance on print ads, however, is to point campaign-specific URLs or QR codes if there is a definitive call to action and measurement in place. If you can, always try to measure a print ad; even if it is just be keeping an eye on just the one metric. But for a generic branding print ad, it’s tricky to gauge. Another way of measuring your pharmaceutical print ad is to choose a publisher that offers an ad survey report (for instance Readex) for advertisers. It’s free for you, so you have nothing to lose.

Run an ad study of your previous pharmaceutical ad campaigns. In a typical ad study, selected ads in a particular issue of the publication are studied. Both quantitative and qualitative feedback is obtained from readers. (Survey invitations are timed to reach sample members at mid-interval between issues of the publication.)

Results are nearly always based on 100 responses. The response is tabulated, and a full report with you benchmarked against competitors. Readers evaluated each ad by rating 3 ad effectiveness measures on a scale of 1 to 5; where 1 is low and 5 is high:

• Attention-getting ability

• Believability

• Information value.

They rank each of the ads against similar advertisers in the pharmaceutical supply chain, so the metrics are comparing ‘apples with apples.’

When designing a print advert, it’s a good idea to cast your eye over the design and ask yourself (and team members) how does it look against these three benchmarks. If it passes, you won’t go far wrong. But whilst your team members are reviewing the ad, always keep in mind the audience you are trying to reach by emulating your customer’s language on the copy.

The end of the report comes with verbatim qualitative comments from the respondents - always gauge feedback on ads that have previously run. Here are some from a Readex report we commissioned for one of Orientation Marketing’s own pharmaceutical-based ads which we ran in a major pharmaceutical magazine.

"Fabulous", "Good clear ad with a good level of detail regarding the product they are offering" and "Modern dynamic company with a good approach to marketing services."

These kinds of comments are good to hear and together with the ad survey data, will give you great feedback (good or bad) on your creative. All of these ads focussed around a powerful headline - this is where you should start every ad.

Let’s turn our heads to digital…

Digital ads are different. Easier to measure, clearly, but what do the best-performing ones look like? Well again, it would be an oversimplification to generalise about how a particular design performs better than another.

In the crowded marketplace, the message and look and feel of the ad needs to be easy to remember. Digital display ads tend not to deliver too many clicks. Gone are the days when you would run a banner ad and expect it to deliver hundreds of clicks, think of your own browsing behaviour. Do you actually click on banner ads when you see them? Possibly not. If it clicks you want, dedicated e-blasts are a better route to market, or at least used to supplement the banner.

This said some banners will generate traffic if they are built effectively and are persuasive in nature. You can find a variety of banner templates online. At its core, advertising is a form of communication that aims to publicize a product or service and encourage sales. Animated banners are more eye-catching than static banners. However, if you do animate, only have two slides, with a quick easy message. Four slides rotating in under a second with lots of words on each slide will not work at all.

Some rules of thumb to observe:

• Have a clear call to action

• Have a simple message

• Have an attractive offer

• If it’s an e-blast, a general rule is one button, one call to action

• Have your logo as part of the ad (relate to the brand).

Digital banners, I’m afraid to say, are highly saturated - so many websites (especially that of publishers and media companies) will run ads. If the ad isn’t creative and original, it is likely not even going to register with the website visitor. This said, in pharma, the ad also needs to be ethical. Catching attention is one thing, making a positive impression is something else.

Be aware that digital ads also run on various devices, so ads need to be optimised for both mobile and desktop use. If you can run print and digital ads synonymously, increasing the number of touchpoints, you will increase the chances of your message sticking. So, strive to create multiple ads in a campaign or ad group.

SUMMARY

Your pharmaceutical ad needs to be part of an overall marketing strategy and plan. If it isn’t it is likely that the ad won’t work, regardless if you’ve used the tips in this post or not. Consistency in your ad's message and live campaigns is required and keep everything short and sweet - this is the case for both print and digital pharmaceutical ads. If you are interested in a free review of your ad assets or would be interesting in getting a free ad study, reach out to us at gareth@orientation.agency and we can work with you to get one completed so that your pharmaceutical ads are always going to perform to the best of their ability.

For more on email marketing in the healthcare and pharmaceutical sectors, and how we can help, see our section on email and marketing automation.