Who says pharma doesn’t do social?

The Set Your Sights disease awareness campaign for Novartis is a bold experiment that redefines how pharma engages people around their health. It’s the first time any company in the sector has used social technologies to truly bring people inside a disease.

It was based on the insight that our vision is our window to the world, our loved ones, our memories, and the beauty around us. Close your eyes. Imagine what it would be like to lose your sight. What would you miss the most? How would you relate to the world around you?

Up to 80% of blindness worldwide is preventable, but early prevention, diagnosis, referral, and treatment of eye health are often neglected.

In a true first for pharma, the agency developed a Facebook application, The Sight Experience, which creates a fully-personalised video showing, through the lens of users’ own photos and memories, what their life could be like with retinal disease.

To date, the Sight Experience app has far exceeded expectations. It has engaged close to 20,000 people in a journey through retinal disease, amassed more than 10,600 likes and 5,400 Facebook fans, and garnered over 1,000 social media mentions.

The Sight Experience app integrates people’s Facebook photos into an emotional, customised video to show what life is like with retinal disease. On a journey through a home, the photos on walls, mantles, computer screens and the refrigerator are revealed to be the user’s personal photos, which begin to degrade. Blurs, spotting and distortions demonstrate the impact vision loss can have on the things and people we love. Users are reminded that retinal disease can be prevented and treated, and asked to share the video.

The Set Your Sights website is tailored to the needs and visual acuity of individuals living with or caring for someone with chronic eye conditions, using best-in-class accessibility features and magazine-style content.

For this first phase of the campaign, the team launched the app and the website to influencers within ophthalmology and digital health, including patient and professional groups and high-profile pharma bloggers.

Pharma has been hampered by a strict, often unclear, regulatory environment that has led to a lack of digital and social innovation. This was a bold experiment for Novartis, showing the true potential of social media to help people better understand their health in a way that no other company has done.

The early results are impressive, surpassing all expectations:

Output/Awareness: Over 30 million impressions online. Media coverage was not a component of the campaign but it was picked up by key online titles.

Action/Impact: To date, the Sight Experience app has amassed over 10,600 likes, 5,400+ Facebook fans, and more than 1,000 social media mentions. Most importantly, close to 20,000 people have taken a journey through retinal disease and have a better understanding of how their lives could be affected. The campaign has been re-tweeted numerous times by key influencers in the ophthalmology and digital community.