Pharmaceutical & medical devices Industry is fast adapting to these changes at various levels of the value chain. Billions of dollars are being spent on digital transformation projects ranging from usage of AI & ML in product development, production and predictive maintenance, Blockchain in supply chain and data management & analytics in strategic decision making.
This article focuses on Omnichannel marketing, one of the key digital transformations that the industry is learning and implementing at a rapid pace.
Omnichannel Marketing: Promise and Possibilities
An industry that historically focused all their brand building and market shaping efforts through F2F meetings & medical education programs has started making giant strides in multi-channel strategy now.
A digital journey that started with an e-detailing platform has progressed fast by adding brand websites, Approved E-Mails, social media, webinars and other media effectively creating a multi-channel strategy. The only hindside to this is, all these channels work independently, expecting HCPs to find and sort out information themselves.
In the lockdown, while I was on regular OPD and ICU rounds at a COVID hospital, I started noticing some mild symptoms of the Coronavirus infection. Being in the medical field and considering the severity of the pandemic situation then, I was very careful and cautious, and observed the symptoms closely. The symptoms persisted and I had to self-quarantine until the medical test reports came. It was important for me to isolate myself from the rest of the medical team and prevent the spread of the virus. Finally, the report came: I was COVID positive!
Stunned and slightly devastated; I broke the news to my family who could not believe it either. As a doctor, I could only treat, comfort and empathize with the COVID patients undergoing treatment; completely isolated from their loved ones. But now, I could actually feel the uncertainty of the situation. I was hospitalized and continued to experience body-ache during the admission. It was a stressful situation where I felt anxious and stressed about everything.
My CT scan reports showed mild lung infection on the day of admission but as the cytokines storm developed, my lungs were 76 % damaged in 3-5 days and I was short of breath and my oxygen level deteriorated to less than 80. I was shifted to an ICU with high-flow oxygen and was on a BiPap machine which I had purchased a few weeks ago for the hospital and never imagined that I would be using myself one day.
DigiStorm 2018 was held on 11 September at the Lalit Ashok in Bangalore. The event was headlined by Prabir Jha – President & Global Chief People Officer, Cipla. Deep Bhandari – Editorial Board Member, MedicinMan, gives us the highlights of the post-lunch session.
We will need to find a way to bring together the capabilities of the Medical Rep, the changed scenario of the visit and the ways we can reach doctors into one single strategy rather than looking at the physical and the digital parts separately. Our medical reps will continue to be the core of our promotion, and our digital strategy will need to empower them to not only do a better call but also support their efforts by building processes that will help them beyond the few minutes that they spend in the Clinic. Marketing budgets will have to move away from conventional investments and also think beyond hardware to increase digital engagement.
Arun Subramanian is a Co-founder & Head of Sales Enablement at Enparadigm. Arun and his team are building sharpsell.ai - a Sales Enablement and Learning platform that equips distributed field sales teams with ready-to-use product pitches, dynamic personalized content, and AI-powered coaching to help reps make compelling sales pitches and drive productivity.
Challenging times lay ahead for the sales departments in the pharma industry. The COVID-19 pandemic will surely not be the first disruption, as recent geopolitical tensions, and economic turmoil show. Agile and adaptive sales enablement is thus a must-have in the coming months and years.