Is Your Corporate Site Like a Kitchen Junk Drawer?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cote/ / CC BY 2.0

Not too many years ago the web and digital technologies were just another spoke in the wheel of communications and commerce.

Today these technologies are the hub.

Having the privilege, of working with many pharmaceutical clients and looking at their corporate websites Ive come to the conclusion that by and large most of the corporate websites in existence are more akin to the kitchen junk drawer than part of a broad and robust technology hub that exists to drive efficiency and organizational best practice.

This is not surprising as new technologies and more pointedly perhaps, new approaches to managing a business are often very slow to be adopted by firms with long standing traditions and an operational legacy built on earlier forms of commerce and communications.

As Pharma companies struggle to remain profitable, with sparse pipelines, approval letters slow to come and the shadow of healthcare reform looming large, it is time to look inside and re-engineer operations around a strong technology hub.

As a marketing partner this is very frustrating as the rolling up of marketing budget in an effort to save money limits our ability to help drive sales and generate more profit for our client.

Pharmacos, (this is a gross generalization) seem to worry more about and use their IT resource as a method to control risk as opposed to an asset that centralizes and maximizes operational efficiency.

Its time for Pharma cos to stop squeezing their contractors and their brands to save money and time to re-engineer their approach to operations and free up much needed capital to feed the engines of product development and marketing.

If I were the CEO of a Pharma company Id be working very hard finding the smartest digital strategists and top technology experts and partners to be my left and right hand in driving organizational change.

I dont believe any one ever cut their way to long-term profitability and growth. We must work together with our clients and lead them to operationalize new approaches, to clean out the kitchen junk drawer, get it reorganized, accessible and powering the business for the new age of commerce.

Short of this we run the risk of turning into archeologists mining the remains of lost tribes, trying to understand what went wrong and maybe if were lucky turning up a bit of gold now and then.

What say you?