Impactiviti Blog Joins the Club and Gets Sense of Humor!

I love Steve Woodruff, author of Impactiviti Blog. I really do!

So I hope he doesn't get angry when I point out that, until recently, his blog did not give a hint of his sense of humor.

As recently as January, 2007, Impactiviti Blog stuck to its knitting, which frankly was to showcase Steve's expertise in the area of pharmaceutical training. That's how Steve really makes his money, you know:

"Impactiviti provides traditional fee-based consulting, as well as something unique - free consulting with training clients on their needs, followed up by targeted recommendations" (see About Impactiviti). [Plug for Steve. So, Steve, what will it take to get my Pharma Marketing Blog on your blogroll?]

Several of us bloggers also started out that way. For example, I started my other blog, Pharma Marketing Blog, to help promote my newsletter and other services for pharmaceutical marketing experts.

While Steve was sticking to his knitting, the Pharma Blogosphere experienced its BIG BANG and many new, edgy pharma blogs were born. That's when I started this blog to keep track of it all and to give me an outlet to talk off topic and engage in some gossip about these new bloggers.

Many serious bloggers, like Steve, found themselves being left behind as the bang reverberated throughout our sphere. To keep up, some bloggers had to get edgier and talk off topic about issues that had little if anything to do with their knitting.

One other blogger that comes to mind is Cary Byrd over at eDrugSearch, a blog/website whose mission is to help consumers find cheap drugs from reliable Canadian sources (listen to my Pharma Marketing Talk podcast interview with Cary: "Can You Find Reputable Canadian Drugs Online?" Listen to the audio archive here.).

Many bloggers in this space have gotten onto the "MacRost" bandwagon and boosted their visibility by creating clever photoshop collages, keeping track of book sales and blog ratings, and generally devoting at least a portion of their blogging bandwidth to the Mack v Rost saga.

Some other bloggers -- notably Jack Friday over at PharmaGossip -- have remained aloof from the brouhaha.

Finally, someone -- Steve Woodruff -- has gotten what this is all about: total world domination by the Mack-Rost machine! Steve even came up with the idea of a "Blockbuster Pharma Blogger Mega-merger" between Mack and Rost. That was his "Biggest Pharma Blogger News Ever to be Unveiled," which I helped him promote here on this blog yesterday (see "Biggest, Most Gigantic, Absolutely Monumental Blogger Announcement Ever!").

Frankly, I misjudged Steve. Here I thought he was a serious guy, sticking to his knitting. Lately, however, he's gotten more interesting and his Impactiviti blog quietly moved into the circle of the Inner Planets of the Pharma Blogosphere. [Another plug for Steve. I ask again, what will it take to get my Pharma Marketing Blog on your blogroll?]

When Steve made his "Biggest Ever" announcement, both I and Rost, thought he was being serious. I thought he might be announcing a merger of his company with a big name outfit or maybe The Neilsen Company, which owns BrandWeek and other properties of dubious merit. I even wished him success and hoped we'd all get some good news from him.

But what do we get? A bogus, but very humorous, Pharma Giles style post about a "mega merger" between Rost and Mack that Steve dubs "J.P. MacRost."

"Now blogging under the name J.P. MacRost," jokes Woodruff, "the two have become 1 expansive psyche of blogging bluster, threatening to overwhelm the entire pharma blogosphere with their combined fulminations, self-promotions, and appeals to readership numbers.

"In fact, they are about to announce their new combined site, The Pharma Egosphere, where the new MacRost will continue to seek world domination through blogging bloviation."

This is not your father's Impactiviti!

Steve even did some Photoshopping of his own and came up with a screen image of what the Pharma Egosphere might look like:


Close, my friend, but no cigar!

Rost, now that Steve has outed us, we have to come clean and tell everyone what our plan has been all along.

While I work out the details of the announcement with Rost, stay tuned for

The REALLY Biggest, Most Gigantic, Absolutely MOST Monumental Blogger Announcement of ALL Time!