Blake Schiller
Director, Mobile Strategy
AstraZeneca
Making Mobile Personal
Blake Schiller’s leadership in mobile health wasn’t born out of his rapid ascent through agency and brand leadership, but the moment his wife—a type I diabetic—was labeled a high-risk pregnancy with their first son.
“We walked out of that appointment scared, overwhelmed, and with a yellow Post-it note with the name of a crude diabetes nutrition mobile app,” Blake explains. “Little did we know, that ‘prescribed’ app would have an active role in reducing my wife’s risk levels during her pregnancy.”
That personal mobile health moment is what motivates Blake to transform AstraZeneca into a mobile-first business. It’s what inspires him to engage patients and be useful for them in the moments they need help.
That transformation is well underway, with Blake’s work on AZhelps, a connected health mobile platform, serving as just one example. AZhelps is designed to simplify access to and treatment with AstraZeneca’s medicines. It features pharma’s first mobile wallet savings program, and medication adherence features that automate dose tracking and refill management.
“Healthcare is complex and transactional,” Blake says, “so I’m focused on delivering solutions inspired by phenomenal customer experiences created by companies outside of pharma in order to add value to our medicines beyond their clinical profile.”
Blake is also reimagining and delivering marketing innovation at AstraZeneca. His work includes collaborating with unexpected partners such as Under Armour, winning the prestigious Grand Prix at Cannes Lions Health, and launching a nationwide crowdsourcing tool to harness and incubate ideas from thousands of colleagues.
“Blake is a contemporary marketer and a rarity in pharma,” says Jenny Streets, Sr. Director, Customer Experience + Innovation, AstraZeneca. “He is someone who understands that connecting with patients and physicians in alternative ways that they prefer, such as through mobile and social, and with relevant content—sometimes in small, useful ways and sometimes in bigger, more impactful ways—can really bring value and create an enduring relationship.”
