LillyPad: What happens when a pharma company dives into Social Media

Eli Lilly & Company has recently launched a blog, LillyPad, and a related Twitter account as well written by three employees. John Mack and Mark Senak have already covered this issue, and Andrew Spong also published a very detailed review. A few points from Andrew:

• The name is an eye-roller, not an eye-catcher
• Wrong blog motto
• Buzzword rich blog description
• Contradictory site policy
• Twitter account sometimes looks like a bot

Yes, they made some mistakes, but I still think it’s good to see the social media efforts of such companies and as long as we can help them, we really should.

So the real challenge here is whether LillyPad will listen to the criticism and feedback. If not, then that is just another closed window for a big company. If they will, it means something new is happening again.