EmpathIQ Advisors
What we do

Five service areas, anchored in advocacy.

If something stands between your organization and the outcome you are working toward, advocacy and engagement are very often the key.

Clients

Our clients

  • Biopharma & life sciences
  • Patient advocacy organizations
  • Nonprofits & foundations
  • Coalitions & alliances
  • Medical & professional societies
  • Public health & government
  • Health technology
  • Social issue campaigns
01

Advocacy & alliance building

We design and manage coalitions, advocacy campaigns, and patient, consumer, and population engagement initiatives across disease areas and policy landscapes. A single patient’s story can move a room. A thousand patient stories, coordinated and directed with purpose, can move a legislature, a regulator, or a market.

We create the conditions for that kind of collective power through stakeholder and influencer mapping, partner identification, coalition governance, and the convening strategies that turn individual voices into undeniable collective impact. Because coalitions require continuous tending rather than a one-time build, much of this work is ongoing advocacy counsel and alliance management rather than a single campaign.

02

Communications & campaign strategy

We develop evidence-based, empathy-driven communications strategies for complex health and social challenges: scenario planning and issues management, mis- and disinformation prediction, pre-emption and response, message development and testing, and media engagement. We help clients say the most impactful things, to the right people, at the right moment.

We see communications differently, with partnership at the center rather than the periphery. When credible voices carry one message together, it changes minds and moves behavior further than any single organization speaking alone, from coalition messaging to multi-sponsor campaigns to alliance communications that hold together under real organizational tension. We bring the same rigor to focused, single-organization work.

03

Access, policy & regulatory communications

We help advance drug and product approvals, product lifecycle strategies, access expansion programs, and value demonstration campaigns, with deep experience supporting regulatory submissions through patient and advocacy engagement and navigating the policy landscapes that shape what patients can access and when.

In our experience, regulators respond well to organized, credible, sustained patient engagement and poorly to last-minute advocacy letters. We help build that record from the beginning, working alongside your regulatory affairs and legal teams. We provide advocacy and communications strategy, not regulatory or legal advice.

04

Capacity building & organizational development

We help advocacy organizations, patient groups, and companies build the infrastructure, capabilities, and partnerships they need to scale their impact: organizational creation and development, bandwidth expansion, operational strategy, strategic planning, communications strategy and execution, and leadership in specific competency areas and markets.

05

Stakeholder & landscape research and analytics

We apply primary and secondary research to gather and organize stakeholder, influencer, and situational insight that helps clients build strategy and make key decisions. Decades of creating stakeholder and landscape research processes for major communications firms — and acting on the findings — shape how we approach it.

Where warranted, we use responsible AI and data analytics to surface patient insight, identify advocacy opportunities, monitor emerging issues, and measure campaign outcomes with precision. AI amplifies human expertise; it does not replace it. Critically, it gives smaller companies the intelligence infrastructure of a much larger one. We use only public or client-licensed, de-identified data sources, follow applicable data privacy regulations, and disclose our AI tools and data handling practices on request.

How we work

Five principles, in this order.

01

Listen first

We begin with genuine empathy, understanding the human stakes before designing any strategy: first-hand stakeholder listening, patient and community engagement, an honest assessment of what is and isn’t working, and online listening to gather a broader set of perspectives.

02

Map the ecosystem

Every health and social challenge exists within a web of partners, stakeholders, and influencers. We identify who needs to be at the table, what they care about, and how to connect them around a shared purpose.

03

Build the right team

We draw on our global network of subject matter experts, advocacy leaders, communications specialists, and technology partners to assemble precisely the expertise each engagement requires.

04

Design with evidence

Our strategies are evidence-based and technology-enhanced. We supplement primary data with research and analytics to surface insight, test messages, identify opportunities, and measure what matters.

05

Execute with accountability

We measure outcomes that matter to people and to clients, with clear milestones, transparent communication, and a commitment to reporting.

What changes at each stage, depending on when advocacy starts

01
Pre-clinical & discovery
The community is unknown. Trial design reflects internal assumptions rather than lived experience.Patient and community insight shapes trial design, so the protocol reflects what patients can actually do.
02
Phase 1 / first-in-human
No channel to the patient community. Sites are chosen by default, and relationship-building becomes a late scramble.Relationships with community organizations are already established, and credible channels to patients exist.
03
Phase 2–3 / pivotal trials
Enrollment gaps, distrust of the sponsor, diversity shortfalls, protocol amendments, timeline slippage.Enrollment accelerates through trusted networks, diversity reflects real community engagement, and the protocol holds.
04
Regulatory submission
Patient voice is added late and advocacy letters are assembled reactively, leaving the dossier weak on real-world burden.Patient experience data runs through the submission, and regulators encounter a prepared, coordinated, unified voice.
05
Access & commercialization
Payer resistance, community skepticism, and limited uptake in the communities that need the therapy most.Payer engagement is supported by organized advocacy, and uptake reflects trust that was built over time.

Outcomes depend on program-specific factors. We’re glad to share illustrative examples and to define success metrics together for a specific engagement.

Tell us what’s standing in the way.

A regulatory hurdle, a policy environment that hasn’t moved, a community whose trust hasn’t been earned, a coalition that hasn’t come together. Advocacy is very often the key, and the first conversation costs nothing.

Talk with us