Pharmaceutical product managers and their agencies are developing
better ways to orchestrate and integrate multiple communication channels
to reach today's physician, who must manage a busier schedule than
ever before.
A typical group practice physician named Dr. Robin must keep up
with a relentless stream of patients while juggling E-mails, phone
calls, and tasks. Between consultations, Dr. Robin stops by a computer
to view a patient's x-ray sent over from the hospital, and then
uses the personal digital assistant in her lab coat pocket to access
prescribing information on a new drug. Her cell phone vibrates,
signaling yet another new text message. Darting past the drug company
reps in her waiting room, she makes a mental note to participate in a
web-based program on antibiotic resistance for continuing education
credit at home.
Reaching the Overstretched Physician
In the past decade, new channels, opportunities, and ways of
bringing physicians together have grown. Pharmaceutical agencies are
leading the way in balancing the high tech and the high touch. They
manage the gestalt better than any single-channel partner typically can.
It is no longer a question of being the first to latch on to new
technology. The agency's job is to help firms align where they tell
their story with how it is told, using data regarding new media and
physician preferences to create more meaningful brand communication.
They must complement the power of "pulling" (attracting and
rewarding physician inquiry) with the traditional power of
"pushing" relevant, believable, and behavior-changing brand
communications.
Reaching physicians calls for many simultaneous modes of
communication. Much like conducting a symphony, the effort to reach
physicians involves more than simply assembling individual musicians and
instruments. Today's multichannel media platforms work harder for a
brand when provided with clear structure and leadership. The symphony
itself--the brand's multichannel platform--benefits from being
composed by an agency with a sense of each channel's unique
capabilities and knowledge of how separate channels interact with one
another. Together, they form a multichannel master plan.
Moving to Full Integration
The integration of channels represents a profound shift in
thinking. To coordinate a brand message, product managers often dealt
with several partners and few well-established processes or metrics. It
was sometimes difficult to know where true expertise resided, and brand
teams were often required to borrow resources from other departments in
their organizations (e.g., information technology).
Today, channel-specific technology skills have become widespread,
and most of the technical problems have been solved. What matters most
is creating content that works in multiple channels to amplify brand
messages and imagery.
Integration is the key. Today's agency of record must be
responsible for overall brand communications strategy, not just a single
channel. It is increasingly vital that the agency team have an
up-to-date and expanding view of the full range of potential media and
capabilities, as well as hands-on experience.
An agency's task is to ensure that wherever the busy physician
looks, he or she should see, hear, and recognize the brand, and remember
that the experience should be of uniformly high quality.
Moving to Media Neutrality
Research has been done on what physicians like and dislike about
using new communication channels. Ease of use and interconnection with
other brand-related activities are high on their wish list. Physicians
indicated that they have no time or patience to navigate pharmaceutical
product websites where they are forced to go through at least three
screens to find the health care provider menus. Also, if Amazon.com can
remember what someone likes to read, why should physicians need to log
in like strangers each time they visit a drug company webpage? These
physicians also want the multiple sales representatives, who are selling
them the same product, to be aware of what has already been detailed and
how they have responded to on-line experiences, meetings and events, and
other brand-related media.
Accustomed to top-notch experiences with new media in their
personal lives, physicians want comparable quality in their professional
lives. The user's experience must come first. This means agencies
must start with a media-neutral, unbiased, and customer-centric
communications vision.
Championing the Brand
Consider these questions: Where is the best place for physicians to
encounter the brand? What are the key working assumptions you can make,
and where are the most important touch points? What is the role of the
patient in the physician's decision-making, and how will that
communication intersect with professional channels?
Companies should know as much as possible about the preferred
information-gathering styles of their target audience. Are they
primarily visual, auditory, or kinesthetic learners? Does
audience-research help agencies creatively develop materials and media
that appeal to a variety of these styles, making it easy for each
physician to find the channel that fits him or her best?
When developing conceptual approaches, think about the full range
of media and the specific objectives of each channel before committing
to any one mode. Ensure that the team explores how imagery and messaging
in one medium resonates with what is seen and felt through another, and
pilot test explorations that require audience feedback.
The product manager should ensure that the client-agency team
establishes durable, meaningful branding hallmarks that will distinguish
the brand. Test, refine, and strengthen the verbal and visual language
of persuasion as it appears in the different media.
Invest in building a data management structure so interactive
responses obtained through one channel can help direct outgoing messages
to physicians through other channels. Integrated data management is also
great for tracking promotional return-on-investment. Many emerging
communication modalities are individually more measurable than
traditional promotion because of trackable physician behavior, such as
click-throughs, responses, and inquiries.
Easing the Product Manager's Burden
From the product manager's perspective, this multichannel
management approach can be extremely helpful. Many of them are burdened
by more complex markets and products, and cope with reduced manpower and
budget resources. Dealing with one visionary, problem-solving agency
that can manage the multiple channels of communication is clearly
preferable to dealing individually with single-channel specialists. An
agency of record becomes a strong, well-prepared partner who can lessen
the burden faced by product managers. Procurement colleagues, too, may
find that working with a single agency offers more efficiency than
dealing with multiple vendors.
Not Tomorrow, but Today
Multichannel programming with a visionary, integrating partner
helps ensure one's brand message is everywhere the physician is,
ready to communicate whenever physicians are ready to talk. Even though
Dr. Robin will never return to the slower pace of times gone by, it is
possible to keep one's brand by her side, providing support and
information as her busy practice evolves.
THE MULTICHANNEL MINDSET: THINGS TO CONSIDER
As one considers how to better manage a brand's multichannel
communication, keep these factors in mind:
Is the Brand Truly Living in the Physician's World? Find out
what sites the targets are visiting, what devices they carry, and how
much time they still spend with journals. Take a snapshot of their day
so it will be possible to keep them company.
Think More Pull Than Push. Drawing in physicians and patients is
key. Will the content hold up in a "pull model?" When learning
and meeting their priorities, the agency will be welcomed back again and
again.
Match Multichannel to Lifecycle. What is the best multichannel mix
for the brand at each stage of maturity? Can it help overcome the
reduction of rep support, for example? How should the multichannel mix
evolve prelaunch, during launch, and postlaunch?
Who Is at the Helm? Think carefully about who should guide the
overall multichannel campaign. Look for powerful content developers who
can be media-neutral and media-savvy. The product manager sets the
ground rules for all service partners to minimize conflicts.
Can the Agency of Record Handle This? Explore the capabilities of
the agency of record in both traditional and new channels. What is their
vision of multichannel, and how advanced are their thinking and
capabilities?
Lois Moran
President
JUICE Pharma Advertising
322 8th Avenue, 10th Floor
New York, New York 10001
Phone: (212) 647-1595
E-mail: lmoran@juicepharma.com
www.juicepharma.com
COPYRIGHT 2006 Medicom International,
Inc. Reproduced with permission of the copyright holder. Further reproduction or distribution is prohibited without permission.
Copyright 2006, Gale Group. All rights
reserved. Gale Group is a Thomson Corporation Company.
NOTE: All illustrations and photos have been removed from this article.