health care

Cute Mites, Amazon Drones, Virtual Menopause Help: 2024's Most-Read Pharma/Health Stories

There’s no doubt pharma advertising is growing -- but where is it most effective?

That question was a major topic in several of Marketing Daily’s top 10 health/pharma news stories.

The most-read story of the year reported on an Axtria analysis of the rapid growth of pharma digital spend over the preceding five years, along with a study showing pharma ads in healthcare providers’ offices beating all other media channels in consumer trust. An eMarketer prediction of ramped up in-store advertising of vaccines and medications, meanwhile, scored as the seventh most-read story.

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Advertising outside of pharmacies can be another marketing tool, as evidenced by story no. 8 -- about an opioid hotline’s “855-HOW-TO-QUIT” billboard campaign.

Staying out of doors for another landmark activation,  Liquid I.V. Amazon drone deliveries helped propel a story about that CPG hydration brand’s Prime Day activities into the no. 9 position.

Of course, product launches were another hot topic in the top 10.  Kenvue landed two stories there: Tylenol’s “Easy to Swallow” brand extension at no. 5, and Versalie, which provides virtual menopause help,  at no. 10, featuring marketing testimonials from actress Niecy Nash-Betts.

Which segues us into celebrity campaigns. Comedians Phoebe Robinson and Matteo Lane, starred in Viiv Healthcare’s “Backseat Hotseat” YouTube series, which supports HIV prevention. Marketing Daily’s story, which also covered the GSK pharma company’s sponsorship of “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” resonated with readers, becoming the second most-read pharma/ health story of 2024.

Then, there were Lady GaGa and Sabrina Williams, whose endorsements of Pfizer’s Nurtec and Abbvie’s Ubrelvy respectively have helped those brands drive revenue growth in the migraine drugs category, the subject of the fourth most-read story. It landed right behind an article highlighting sales surges for weight-loss drugs, specifically Eli Lilly’s Mounjaro and Zepbound.

Celebrities of another sort -- “Bridgerton”’s fictional Penelope Featherington and Colin Bridgerton -- just missed the list of most-read pharma/health stories, coming it at no. 11 in a story about Haleon’s Flonase allergy brand teaming up with the Netflix series for spots “having fun with Penelope and Colin having become ‘Polin’ in Internet talk … while pollen season is starting in Flonaseland.”

Finally, another product campaign -- with a fun twist -- took the no. 6 spot.  A story titled “Who Knew Mites Could Be This Cute?” showed a cartoon image of the anthropomorphized critters who reside on the eyelids of people with Demodex blepharitis. The campaign promoted  Tarsus Pharmaceuticals’ Xdemvy, the first FDA-approved treatment for the condition.

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