Katie Swicegood Fulp is a bit of a late arrival to the world of pharma marketing.
Her health-focused career started three years ago, with a role as a multichannel marketing manager at GSK. But that new beginning followed more than a decade spent in consumer marketing, working on brands like Nationwide Insurance, Sherwin-Williams and CarMax.
After Swicegood Fulp became a mother, her attitude toward work changed: “I needed to have a purpose for what’s next if I’m going to be away from my kids at work,” she told Fierce Pharma Marketing in a recent interview. “I want to really love what I do.”
She soon came to realize that “pharma was a beautiful place to be.”
In a Q&A for Fierce Pharma Marketing’s “Rising Stars” series, Swicegood Fulp reflected on the route that led to her current role as media and digital direct-to-consumer marketing lead at UCB and discussed her approach to healthcare marketing, with its emphasis on empowerment and empathy.
Responses have been lightly edited.
Fierce Pharma Marketing: What inspired you to pursue a career in pharma marketing, and what keeps you motivated?
Katie Swicegood Fulp: As I grew in my career, I realized that pharma marketing was less about telling somebody which medication to take and, instead, more about empowering patients to make the right decisions for themselves and helping them to have the right conversations with their healthcare providers. At the same time, it’s [about] educating healthcare providers so that they can have conversations with their patients ensuring they’re on the same page and allowing the patient to get the best medication for them, regardless of their disease state.
It was less about talking at patients or talking at healthcare providers and instead the education and empowerment aspects of healthcare marketing that I wanted to be a part of.
FPMK: What has been the most rewarding or challenging project you’ve worked on so far?
KSF: One of the coolest opportunities that I’ve had was when I came over to UCB and I worked on a product that has multiple indications, but the newest indication was for hidradenitis suppurativa—HS for short. I got to see how invested UCB and its people were in this community, learning about this disease state and really wanting to understand the struggles that these patients are going through. Getting to be a part of the HS campaign opened my eyes to how to lean in to help these patients seek better outcomes and ask for more. It is about being on the same team with these patients and helping them feel heard and feel seen.
FPMK: If you could give one piece of advice to industry veterans who’ve been in healthcare marketing for decades, what would it be?
KSF: Keep an open mind. There are always different ways of doing things. There are always going to be shifts in the media landscape and in terms of how we show up creatively. Some people want to grow, be better and do better, while others simply say, “This is the way things have always been done.”
Hearing from those outside of the industry and learning about what they’re doing and seeing how it can be adopted in a compliant way on our side is something I’d strongly recommend. We can get comfortable, but stretching ourselves and understanding what’s going on outside of our industry will drive impact across the board.
FPMK: What do you like to do outside of work?
KSF: I’m a mom on the weekends, so I’m chasing after our kids, exploring all of the great things that North Carolina has to offer and hanging out with friends. We love the state that we live in. We get to go to the mountains and to the beach, and it’s all just a quick drive.
Know a standout early-career pharma marketing pro? Send your nominations for future "Rising Stars" honorees to apark@questex.com.