Life Technologies Social Media Word Cloud made using the RSS Feed and Tagxedo (click to enlarge)

Word or tag clouds are visualizations which help us to understand the meaning of an aggregate of text by correlating the size of the words with their prevalence in it. As the title suggests, the picture shown here describes the concept best. While the depictions are often correlated with blogs, twitter streams, and other social media, their utility extends beyond this area. In this post, we list several ways that life science companies can use word clouds to understand customers’ needs and adapt marketing and communication strategies to meet them.

1. Analyzing Social Media Sentiment. For the life science marketer, comments made by life scientists on social media applications represent an ‘amorphous’ form of market research. Instead of direct questions being asked and answered, researchers give candid opinions about research areas, products, events, or anything else they want to talk about. As an example, check out the word cloud made from the Society for Neuroscience 2010 meeting tweets. From this cloud, you can see that important topics at the meeting were Glenn Close‘s talk, an article about spooky coloured auras (from a non-American author), and that the exhibit hall booths were well represented. The raw data must be aggregated and analyzed, these associations may not be clear just from the word cloud. However, it concisely shows the ‘buzz’ at the meeting without having to read a single tweet. As such, word clouds can be used effectively understand and communicate the sentiment from conferences, tweet streams, forums, blogs, etc.
2. Market Research. Although traditional surveys produce data that is more structured than social media sentiment, we’ve found that word clouds can be used to effectively capture important take home messages in market research. As an example, for our client 89 North we surveyed fluorescence researchers to determine the requirements for the fluorXchange, a web 2.0 resource for scientists. We got excellent answers to our open ended questions, and made a word cloud from all of the text. From the visualization, we confirmed that a major ‘pain’ for these researchers was related to improving the signal to noise in their experiments. As a result, we chose to include a wiki along with a forum which would allow them to upload experimental images and fully discuss signal to noise issues. For another example, see the word cloud from our poll of San Diego Biotechnology Network members we used to plan the 2010 meetings.
3. Social Media Messaging and Voice. Just as external social media sentiment is amorphous, a company’s collection of posted content, from different individuals and departments, can be nebulous. The image for this post is from all of Life Technologies‘ (LIFE) social media over the past ten weeks. It is comprised of 16 Twitter accounts, two Facebook pages, and their YouTube channel, you can see the RSS feed here and even subscribe to email updates. The archive contained about 1,000 items posted from LIFE representatives. Note that ‘cell’ is the most prevalent word, and terms relating to DNA sequencing are also prominent. Does the makeup of this cloud represent the topics that their customers are interested in? Also, notice that there a few ‘feeling’ words, such as thanks, friends, and love, but that most of the words are about science or events. Is this the proper level of engagement that LIFE should be using? Interestingly, the word ‘market’ is prominent, due to the fact that they have tweeted about the ‘market size’ of an area in several instances–are life scientists interested in this topic? Also, from many accounts LIFE is trying to make strides into human health, is that reflected in their social media? From the outside it is difficult to determine whether the content and voice matches their objectives. If your company don’t yet have enough social media data to analyze, consider using other communications such as tech service logs. Note: Our purpose is not to be critical of LIFE, they are doing a fantastic job as one of the most active life science companies in social media. We’d like to start a dialog in this area and we are grateful that they are ‘blazing a trail.’
4. Internal Motivation. Word clouds based on customer needs can help life science marketing, sales, and technical service groups convey a common message in everyday conversations, marketing materials, and can even help with product development. Help your team to understand by being creative: post or distribute ‘customer clouds’ in sales guides, give easy-to-update framed clouds for desks, or post them in hallways. Do ‘company clouds’ match your intended message? If not, make your own to emphasize words which more closely match your desired voice and post or distribute them. With cool tools like Tagxedo, you can make them artistic and in any shape, as we did with the LIFE logo above.

Other tools to create tag clouds are Wordle (many artistic options) and TagCrowd (fewer artistic options, but word removal available). In addition, several Twitter and Blog tools will generate word clouds. We did this analysis for free, but it did require that we archive the information for 10 weeks, as the free tools rarely allow for this. At our Social Media for Life Science and Biotechnology Workshop 4 we discuss the paid and free tools, and ways to aggregate raw data from life science social media and analyze it.

If you think that this technology seems too simple, consider that the more complex sentiment analysis software designed for larger brands requires much more data. Try word clouds with the data you have in house, you may be surprised with the insights you will gain and the ability to communicate your message internally and externally.

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You may know that through our work at Comprendia or the San Diego Biotechnology Network that we often need to get in touch with people we don’t know well or at all, whether it’s finding a speaker for the SDBN, or doing business development for a client. We like to think we get pretty good results by following a few simple rules, which are listed below:

• Do your homework. We all get irritating emails every day, from all-out spam to people who clearly don’t understand our business or needs. These people didn’t do their homework, and whether they’re guessing that I need to spice up my love life or to optimize my website, it doesn’t matter, we ignore and are sometimes even offended by these messages. When it comes to ‘cold’ emailing, less is more: better to spend an hour researching a prospect and emailing them a thoughtful and personalized message than to blindly email 10 at a time, something we’ve warned about earlier.
• What’s in it for them? This is where many fail, and it’s funny because it’s so obvious when you’re on the other side. You need to give the person a benefit to the action you are asking them to take. Otherwise, why act? Everyone is busy. Tell them in simple terms how working with you will make their life easier. Not their company, them personally, as our instincts kick in when benefits are expressed in this way. You may need to be creative if what you’re asking has no immediate benefit to them (e.g., obtaining information). Perhaps if they help you now, you can promise to help them later. I sometimes leverage the SDBN or my large network in these situations. I’ve also found that the offer of a free lunch is often irresistible to Ph.D.’s at any age (grad school turns on those genes).
• Don’t be a stranger. Sure, this post is about contacting people you don’t know well…or do you? Any way you can put yourself in context for the person will help, whether it be common LinkedIn connections, interests, or even geography. Of course, the chance of having connections in common is made greater with a larger network, so be sure to grow it as well, both virtually and ‘in real life’ by attending networking events. If you’re lucky enough to get someone to introduce you, that’s even better, just remember the whole karma thing and return the favor (or pay it forward).
• Flattery will get you everywhere. This year I struggled to get a speaker for an SDBN event from a certain company. I sent no less than five emails to people trying to get someone from the senior management to speak. What worked in the end? I contacted a VP myself and indicated how much we wanted them as a speaker. Presumably, the person was flattered that I asked, and even though they were at a high level, they acted on my email when people who were lower on the totem pole were ‘too busy’ for my request.
• Put the ball in YOUR court. One common mistake is to setting yourself up for failure by asking the email recipient to ‘respond if they are interested.’ This works sometimes, but a more foolproof way is to indicate that you will follow up with a phone call. Don’t have their number? Here’s a secret: you can call most companies’ main line and use their directory get to the person you’re interested in. This way, you’re not at a dead end if the person doesn’t reply. Of course, always keep the phone call polite and short if they didn’t reply, as you still may be ‘off the mark’ as to their needs or interests.

We hope these guidelines will help you next time you need to contact someone you don’t know well with a request. As with much of our advice here, rely on feedback to what you’re doing, and if you’re still not getting good results, consider that your product needs improvement (even if that product is you!).

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Social media applications which track users’ locations are big news recently since Facebook Places launched, competing with Foursquare which has three million users. Many businesses are learning to leverage these applications, allowing users to learn about discounts and gain benefits for ‘checking in’ to their establishments online while they are visiting them. Even though life science companies do most of their business via the internet and mail, there are ways they could leverage these location-based applications. Below are our ideas for life science companies to use tools like Foursquare, and we hope it sparks some ideas for building their brands and obtaining leads and sales in new ways.

Account Managers. Getting the sales team using location-based applications is perhaps the most straightforward way to take advantage of them. Account managers could check in while visiting large institutions or hot spots, offering prizes for customers who see their check ins online and find them. More generally, account managers could give prizes to those who check into institutions in their territory–the implications for lead generation are fantastic! What’s great about Foursquare is that from the login perspective, it’s an isolated application. In other words, employees don’t have to worry about mixing their personal and business personas as they must do on Facebook. They can create a Foursquare persona for work and upload their email contacts (and check in only when working).

Events. Perhaps vying for first spot with the sales team, events are a terrific opportunity for life science companies to use location-based applications. At conferences, companies could offer benefits for ‘checking in’ to their exhibit (anyone can create a venue on Foursquare). Attendance at seminars and workshops could also be tracked, rewarding the first to check in. While it’s true that currently these applications can be ‘fooled’ and users can check in without actually visiting, really it’s more about engaging with them and building your brand through their sharing. As with most social media applications, Foursquare ‘plays well’ with the other tools such as Facebook, allowing each check in to be shared with hundreds of people on other applications. A nice side benefit is that customers may make connections with each other while participating, helping everyone.

Supply Centers. Many institutions allow companies to stock popular products on site, making it more convenient for customers. These supply centers are usually fairly low profile–usually a freezer in the hall or shelves in a small room. They are the perfect opportunity to use Foursquare. Companies could allow users to check in and perhaps give discounts or prizes for the mayor (the person who checks in the most frequently). The perhaps little-known supply center will also be seen by all Foursquare users in the vicinity, as cell phones’ GPS is used in the application, allowing them to pick from nearby venues to check in to. Our local Scripps Research Institute has 156 checkins from 23 people, and this number will likely grow.

Activities and Virtual Events. An interesting take on the location-based applications is Miso, which allows users to check in while they are watching TV shows. In San Diego, we’ve even ‘checked in’ after earthquakes, treating them as an activity. Now, this could make many life science brands salivate, as you could imagine researchers checking into such activities as ‘doing PCR with Company X Polymerase.’ While I don’t envision these activity-based check ins going this far, I do think researchers would check in for webinars, product launches, promotions, or even scientific discoveries. Wouldn’t it have been cool to ‘check in’ when the structure of DNA was discovered, or the human genome sequenced?

As we cover in our Life Science and Biotech Social Media Training and Workshops, many companies in our industry are just getting their feet wet with these new ways to connect with their customers. So, these ideas may not be adopted soon, but we think that it’s never too early to start thinking of ways to leverage the massive networks that researchers have already created. The changes that Facebook have made recently will likely herald a new era of the web, where these networks, and standardization of its content, will rule. The ‘virtual world’ of online places can be seen as the ‘wild wild west’ (www, get it?) in which life science companies should stake their claims now.

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Almost every life science company we talk to about web 2.0 and social media has the same question: what’s the return on investment (ROI)? We’ve discussed that the ROI equation for social media strategies and tactics is the same, but that the ‘expense’ and ‘payback’ calculations will likely be different. In this post, we’ll discuss two reports which show that web 2.0 sites have increased traffic and engagement, and that customers who are engaged buy more. Together, they present a strong argument that adding web 2.0 features can directly and positively impact a company’s sales.

Web 2.0 sites are dynamic and interactive, and include sites which the user can add content to such as blogs, forums, and wikis. The first report we’ll discuss is titled ‘Traffic metrics and Web 2.0-ness‘ and it was published in Online Information Review from a group in Taiwan. They surveyed the online habits of about 1000 people and correlated metrics such as sites visited, page views per site, and duration per page on site with the degree of ‘Web 2.0-ness’ a website had.

The researchers found a positive correlation between the Web 2.0-ness of a site and users’ understanding of its content and the number of visitors to the site. In other words, adding web 2.0 elements and more content leads to stronger user engagement with the site and a related increased traffic to the site. One interesting corollary they discuss is the ‘double jeopardy’ small companies face: fewer products=fewer pages=less engagement. We definitely see this with smaller life science and biotech companies we talk to, and we have many ideas to help them overcome this issue.

You may be asking yourself, does increased engagement mean more sales? The second report is from Gallup and is titled ‘Customer Engagement–What’s Your Engagement Ratio?’ (Note: the report is a bit of an ‘infomercial’ but has good information). Gallup first looked at what they call ‘World Class’ companies, which rank in their 90th percentile, to determine whether they engage their customers more than the others. The result was shocking–the ratio of ‘Fully Engaged’ to ‘Actively Disengaged’ customers was ten-fold more for the World Class companies compared to the others. So, top performing companies have a higher ‘engagement ratio’–is this directly related to improved sales? Gallup has found through many examples and industries that emotionally engaged customers spend more and are retained more easily. Moreover, they’ve seen that companies can improve their business performance by increasing their engagement ratio. See the report for more details, as some of the details behind the statistics are not given and thus hard to summarize, but Gallup is a highly respected company and I’m sure more can be learned from them if you need more information.

Taken together, these two reports show that adding more web 2.0 features to your life science company website will lead directly to increased sales. What may be more exciting is that life science and biotechnology offers many interesting ways to add content to your site, and we’ve discussed that you may be closer than you think to making these changes.

Want to learn how to get there even faster? Attend our Social Media for Life Science and Biotechnology Workshop 2: The 4 B’s of First Party Applications interactive webinar. We’ll talk about web 2.0, blogs, forums, and wikis, and how to generate engaging content for life scientists. Also, check out our Social Media for Life Science and Biotechnology Training page, we offer training and workshops on almost every topic, contact us if you don’t see what you need!

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