The idea for This AS Life is born from the misinformation evident in the community. By listening to conversations, and partnering with experts, we can feed back the insights that came from this process.

We’re able to create content that is always relevant, engaging and fills a need the community itself has identified.

With a condition affecting less than 0.1% of the population, our potential audience is small. We're bringing them together to learn, share, inspire and discuss.

To start finding the needles in the haystack, we started at EULAR, June 2015 - the most significant date in an AS expert's calendar. A congress in Rome that brings experts together to discuss the best way to help these people.

It was here we chose to 'soft launch' the site and social channels, using ties with PAGs to draw in interest and patients. Experts watched on as the social channels gained clout quickly.

From June to December, we built up a bank of expertly informed and shared content that helps patients live better with their condition. Fast forward to January 2016, and the concept has been proven. With a thorough growth plan and paid promotion strategy in place, followers and site visits rocketed.

We've heard people opening up and sharing like never before. A community that now has a place to belong - where even the shortest of Facebook post sees hundreds of comments from the community.

Through social channels alone, we have reached millions of people - up to 1,000,000 a month - more people than ever are now aware of the disease. But we're not stopping until we have the entire patient community engaged with our content.

In the two months since launch, our Facebook page grows by 2000 followers a month. Engagement on Twitter has boomed by 159%, and Instagram by a further 10%.

KPIs in 2016 have been smashed - more experts than hoped, more patient groups than anticipated - we're growing at an unprecedented rate for Novartis. The performance is 400% higher than related benchmarks.