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2010: The Year Social Became Gravity
| 2010: The Year Social Became Gravity |
by Amir Kishon, Ph.D., Chairman & CEO
 "Social Defined Gravity in 2009" was the title for my blog summarizing 2009. I highlighted the success of social technology companies and their ability to survive the economic crunch of 2009, Wellness Layers included. Looking back at 2010, I think social may have become gravity, i.e., a central force in business and in healthcare! It is just fitting that 2010 ended with the creator of Facebook smiling on the cover of Time Magazine as "Person of the Year".
Within health and wellness, we saw a mind shift towards understanding the power of social and particularly of branded community networks to support product and service offerings. This trend was beneficial for Wellness Layers, and we would like to thank all our clients, new and old, staff and friends for another record breaking year.
As a leader in vertical health and wellness private social networks and customer portals, we were able to extend our client portfolio adding mainstream healthcare companies to our existing roster. In particular, I would like to mention two key initiatives. First, we've commenced work with hospitals, focusing on conceiving what we see as the next generation of online healthcare; taking hospital websites from mainly glorified brochures towards real high value and personalized destinations - think "online hospital (or health)" like "online banking". We also were glad to engage with Hannford's Guiding Stars to consider the future of retail, food ratings and healthy family nutrition. In 2011 we will be releasing several online and mobile solutions as a result of this partnership. In 2010 we also have grown significantly in our core original markets: Nutrition, fitness and employee wellness.
2011 should be a pivotal year for Wellness Layers. We enter this year with revenue momentum that is twice what we achieved in 2010 and we will be unveiling some exciting new products. In particular, we've recently filed a patent for a secure social network for pharmaceutical companies. This solution effectively provides the pharma (and healthcare) market with a strong social solution which eliminates the headaches of adverse event reporting as well as regulatory and privacy oversight. We can actually offer pharma the ability to "have the social cake, and eat it too."
This year we aim to make further inroads in all healthcare, wellness and pharma markets and explore even more opportunities in such markets and industries. All in all, we hope the wind will continue to push vertical health social media forward to a successful 2011.
Finally, please join and contribute to our LinkedIn Group: Wellness 2.0 as well as visit our website at www.wellness-layers.com.
| Why Nutrisystem is a Branded Social Networking Giant |
by Lucy Reynales, Director of Sales and Marketing
 This was the title of a recent blog post on Mashable.com. As the creators of Nutrisystem's branded customer community portal, the answer is simple: if you build it right they will come.
Prior to launching its branded customer community portal by Wellness Layers, Nutrisystem already had a modest customer community for a few years, with member enrollment of the community reaching over 100,000. Not bad, you might say.
Then Nutrisystem's CMO believed they could do better and partnered with Wellness Layers to create a new experience for their clients, migrating their online general tools and community to a cohesive true Nutrisystem destination. A destination with a custom-made Nutrisystem meal planner coupled with a highly branded social network and resources that are 100% tuned with the Nutrisystem experience and brand.
Within three months of launching the new portal, enrollment jumped by 500% to over 430,000 members and activity within the portal jumped by 800%. With no change in marketing efforts and a soft launch, Nutrisystem's CMO's vision was instantly realized then, and now proves to be a sustainable success with the portal running strong at over 3 million members today. The members came and kept coming.
Online customers do not come without thoughtful structure and integration. We commonly see disparate architecture lending to a disjointed user experience with the community, ecommerce, mobile apps, tools and information, all offered as separate generic modules. This approach will pale in comparison to creating high-value destinations with online personal plans, highly branded social networks and information. Moreover, such disjoined solutions are much inferior in terms of engagement and also fail to reach the acquisition, retention, and increase in orders numbers and CLV that our clients experience.
Realizing the difference, companies have been creating highly branded portals, this approach will help them capture their target customer network and boost numbers while anything less will leave them looking to re-build and play catch-up down the line.
| Wow, Really?! The Next Generation of Fitness Clubs Online is Here |
by Lucy Reynales, Director of Sales and Marketing
 WOW, aka Work-Out-Word, a 9 club New Jersey based fitness club, has plans to roll out the next generation of online and mobile member fitness with Wellness Layers this spring.
The new architecture will allow members to track their personal fitness, interact with other members and their personal trainers, and get all club information, not just schedules, all in one place. Some of the new social functionality includes game dynamics with badges and teams based on special interests, goals, and challenges.
A study conducted by Wellness Layers determined that the three most desired features members of fitness clubs want online are: club, PT and class information, personal fitness management, and connecting with other members and trainers. Wellnes Layers Platfrom Fitness Edition will deliver.
HIMSS11 Annual Conference & Exhibition
Set a meeting with us at the conference in Orlando, FL
February 22
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