Communicating in Biotech During COVID

The life sciences has been and continues to be squarely in the spotlight during the COVID-19 pandemic, with startups like Moderna and technologies like mRNA becoming household names. The pandemic catalyzed life sciences research, and the media continues to cover and inform about the science that powers vaccines and therapies, and about research into the molecular mechanisms underlying disease. Many reporters who previously enjoyed writing items about life sciences and healthcare innovations are now being tasked with solely reporting on COVID-19. It’s a challenging landscape for both the media and life sciences communicators.?

For the last decade I’ve been working with early-stage startups in the life sciences and digital health who are often in stealth mode, and by the time our journey together has reached the close of their Series B Financing, I help them onboard a full-service integrated communications agency and then I may stay on in an advisory role to help direct the team and fuel continuous momentum. One of the issues I am hearing from a lot of my clients recently is that they cannot find a life sciences communications agency that is accepting new clients. The upside of this issue is that biotech startups see the value in working specifically with professionals who specialize in life sciences communications, because now more than ever it’s important to break through all the noise in the biotech to communicate your value and differentiators.?

Over these past two years since the pandemic hit in the U.S., I’ve been observing the work of several life science communicators who have been successfully getting their clients media coverage with a mix of earned and paid media and social media. The first one that came to my attention is Rachel Ford Hutman, CEO of Ford Hutman Media. Her work on Rebus Biosystems was exemplary and you can view her portfolio at https://fordhutmanmedia.com/ . The second one that popped upon my radar is a well-known communicator, Dan Budwick, Founder of 1AB Media. You can check out their work at https://1abmedia.com/ . Two other go-to life sciences communications agencies are Bioscribe https://bioscribe.com/ and CG Life https://cglife.com/ . And here in Boston there is LaVoieHealthScience https://lavoiehealthscience.com/ and Macdougall https://macdougall.bio/services/ ?

If you don’t have the time to reach out and zoom with all these life science communications agencies yet really want to find the right fit for your organization, I highly recommend reaching out to Rachel Huff, an alum of Weber Shandwick who founded Victoire & Company to do agency searches. Rachel will interview you about your needs and then assess her vast network of contenders to identify and onboard the perfect agency partner to fulfill your communications goals. She does this via an RFP Process and you get to e-meet the participants: https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/rachelmhuff/

If you are reading this item and are a life sciences communications firm, please add yourself in the comments and sorry I missed you! If you are interested in supporting my work for my clients, please feel free to reach out.