Helping brands see round corners

pharmafile | August 20, 2007 | Feature | Sales and Marketing |  market research, marketing, sales, survey 

Helping brand teams cope with climate change

This year marked the 50th Anniversary of the Market Research Society. At the MRS Golden Jubilee Conference, the broader market research industry discussed key themes around diversification of key media channels and the growing trend towards internet environments, web 2.0 and second life as key theatres for the future of market research.  Back in pharma-land, the old adage goes that we tend to lag behind consumer trends in market research by about 10 years.

But at the recent BHBIA annual conference for pharmaceutical business intelligence professionals, the British Healthcare Business Intelligence Association (BHBIA) hosted a stimulating two days of formal papers, workshops and debates examining current trends in business intelligence and market research.

It seems, from the content and variety of papers presented, that perhaps pharmaceutical market researchers are no longer a decade out of step with their consumer counterparts.

Market research has moved from being a stand-alone function within the pharmaceutical company responsible for reporting monthly key performance indicators (KPI) and commissioning the occasional focus group, to being strategic insights partners. Most brand teams today will be formed by marketers, medical and, critically, a market research or business intelligence professional.

The ability of market researchers to bring up-to-date analysis of the market trends, competitor insights and to tap into sophisticated forecasting and modelling tools make them an indispensable member of the brand team.

As the pharmaceutical market research industry has grown (there are now more than 60 bespoke healthcare research agencies in the UK alone), so the services available to client side researchers have enabled them to provide considerably more analysis and interpretation to the marketing and sales teams.

The significant increase in online panels and online research techniques, whereby research can be conducted quickly and cost-effectively with large samples of GPs or specialists, enables the research analyst to respond quickly to the needs of the brand team.

Business intelligence professionals are now spending far less time on producing KPI reports (these are largely automated now if not out-sourced completely) that process large quantities of IMS data to provide latest sales and volume analysis; and far more time on strategic market research that can guide critical decision-making within the brand team.

The way in which salesforce performance is measured has also evolved.  The detail follow-up study  for many years the holy grail of how well the salesforce implemented the marketing campaign  is now available in a myriad of formats, from instant online panel evaluation to highly targeted and diagnostic analysis of particular target doctors in specific regions.

Perhaps the clearest example of a traditional consumer technique being placed firmly into mainstream pharmaceutical market research is the adoption of ethnography by the healthcare industry. Ethnographic research engages people in the real world. It is a tool for examining peoples cultures, everyday lives, and the things they do at work, home and play. The research approach allows one to observe automatic behavioural patterns which may be so habitual, they are difficult to consciously recognise and/or verbalise.  While this is primarily associated with the video recording of people within their daily lives, this is just one research approach, but there are many others.

At the BHBIA annual conference delegates saw first-hand original ethnographic research of patients suffering from COPD. It was stated by a pharmaceutical company CEO, who later participated in a panel discussion, that this type of research would be excellent if only it were shared with clinical research departments in early stage product development.

The future for market researchers within the pharmaceutical industry is exciting, There are new innovative compounds coming to market, business models are changing, evaluation and tracking tools are becoming more targeted and there is a real buzz about the research industry. Perhaps were not so far behind our consumer colleagues after all.

Thomas Lee is BHBIA Chairman and Head of Market Research, Novartis Pharmaceuticals UK Ltd

Calculating field force size and composition

With only 20-30% of GPs now independently prescribing, the need for the traditional salesforce to keep its current size is changing dramatically. To survive, pharma companies need to adapt their field force strategy to get the right sales reps in front of the right people at the right time.

Increased prescribing directives from Primary Care Organisations (PCOs)  not just in major therapy areas  and their increased power, means pharma needs to align resources with them. Establishing support for the product before committing sales reps will save valuable resource calling on practices where the PCO is against the product and there are no prescriptions.

Additionally, differential messaging becomes increasingly key, with the ability to align the message with the situation becoming ever more important. Lobbying PCOs to convert their directives to support the use of products becomes the new sales driver.

As a one-size-fits-all sales model becomes less effective and relevant and influence networks across the NHS change, pharma needs to develop different sales strategies to address every network tier. Sales personnel at each level will need different expertise. Their approach must not only be more sophisticated but also recognise the different types of interactions that will occur.

The profile of this sales team is far removed from the typical rep, going door-to-door with the GP. And it is also very different from the new account management role required to liaise with the PCO.

There is, therefore, not just a need to establish the potential at PCO, practice-based commissioning group and practice level, but also to identify independent prescribers outside target practices. Once armed with this knowledge, establishing optimum call frequency and the preferred channel to deliver specific messages using the correct skills becomes paramount to establishing salesforce size and increasing sales.

As the multiple tiers of influence across the NHS continue to change and evolve, its clear that the traditional pharma company salesforce has to change. And it will be those companies that understand the new environment and develop a highly targeted, highly focused multi-tier sales strategy delivering tailored messages to each audience, that will be best placed to succeed in the new NHS.

Gareth Thomas is managing director at Cegedim UK

Understanding NHS changes

The NHS is changing. How many times have we heard this over the years? But this time, things really are different.

This wave of reform is based on the experience of the patient, not the doctor. New hospitals and services are being designed around moving clinicians around  not patients. SHAs and PCTs are growing to counteract the market power of the hospitals. Their job is to reflect this by representing the demand side and managing the supply side  not the other way around. This has obvious implications for sales and marketing and hence for market research.

New campaigns will benefit from adding more NHS personnel to your campaign development research. Pharmaceutical advisers have been included in research samples for a long time, but this has often been sporadic or tokenistic. In future, smart companies will include them more regularly and widen the net to include bigger hitters.

Concordance, or compliance  ensuring patients take medication appropriately  is another area where market research can help. With the money spent on reconfiguration, savings have to be made elsewhere, and concordance is an obvious target.

Consequently, companies who understand barriers to compliance, can offer solutions, and communicating this effectively will reap benefits. But be smart: barriers vary by disease area, so you cant transfer learnings from hypertension to COPD. Indeed, not all hypertensive patients are the same, and your programme for one disease area may need different modules. Youll only find this out through carefully planned, high-level, qualitative research with patients.

The biggest change in market research over the last five years has been reduced project timeframes. This will have to change to accommodate research with NHS staff and patients. It simply takes longer to recruit and interview these people. Rule of thumb: add three weeks to your typical project time for research with patients and/or NHS staff. Research plans have to become more strategic and less reactive.

These aren't the only issues facing pharma marketing and market research, but they are crucial. Research along these lines can give you an advantage that lasts for years, and not just through the current sales campaign. On the other hand, keep on doing what you've always done, and you won't even get what you've always got. Now, there's a barometer of change!

Mark Spedding is a director of Insight Research Group

Anticipating the next market access challenge

We are at a watershed. The NHS has enjoyed unprecedented funding over the past five years, and as we enter the final year before this summers comprehensive spending review, what new controls and negotiating ploys should we expect next from UK market access players?

We have become used to the Delaying card: Deferred decision making, Deflecting funding as in POM to P switches, Denying access through NICE judgements, and Demand management as practised by PCTs.

We now have on the horizon the Discount strategy card. How has this come about, and what does this mean for an industry that constantly has to justify the value of its medicines?

Spending on the NHS is now around £90 billion per annum, so approximately 9% of GDP goes on healthcare, but what do we have to show for it? Government is ramping up its demands and the focus of attention will now turn to trying to squeeze more value and productivity out of the increased funding that has gone into the NHS.

The DH is moving in the direction of efficiency, and after an internal analysis linked to the comprehensive spending review, it came to the conclusion that there is some scope for achieving £7 billion worth of efficiency savings out of that £90 billion annual budget.

The three areas of efficiency improvement are:

* The use of the workforce in healthcare  this is not surprising given that most of the money actually goes on employing doctors, nurses, managers and other staff.

* Tackling productivity and variation in NHS activity; for example, prescribing, referrals and the use of hospital resources.

* Improving procurement practices for drugs, IT or other services.

The DH has already started to work on the first two areas with its recommendations around specialist practitioners, and the introduction of Better Care Better Value Indicators, but what about procurement practice? Novation DHL, a group purchasing organisation with a strong US heritage, has won a 10-year procurement contract which currently does not cover drugs, but how much longer will this remain the case?

Knowing what is around the corner will be pivotal for pharma. Access to innovative medicines is a mantra pharma is used to shouting loud and clear. Future access will come, but probably only after considerable pain and reorganisation. How pharma prepares for these negotiations, and what the most effective commercial strategies in the face of these challenges are, is where the insight is most needed.

Mike Mallinson is director  payer and market access practice at GfK HealthCare Europe

Understanding the patient

The focus of marketing research is becoming much more patient-centred, with patients' views and attitudes helping to drive product development, compliance and educational requirements and influence healthcare professionals attitudes and actions.

It is therefore important to use research and the existing data to understand fully what is driving patients needs and actions, particularly in areas such as compliance.

Of all the different elements which contribute to product development, the patient is potentially the most crucial, and so should be placed at the heart of an integrated approach, combining patient needs, product development and product positioning, along with the needs of the individual businesses. The internal needs of companies (new product development, sales and marketing, business intelligence, medical education and communications) should be allied with those of external customers (patients, healthcare professionals, payers, patient advocacy groups etc.) and they are all rooted in the question: What makes a difference to patients health?

Understanding patients better can lead to more streamlined product development, increased compliance and higher levels of brand loyalty. By putting the patient in the middle of the mix, pharma companies can challenge or ratify their hypotheses about product usage. Discussions with patients and patient advocacy groups can highlight other factors, feeding into debate with healthcare professionals, both advocates and non-advocates, so the whole approach is eventually shared with key users, prescribers, educators and marketeers.

Compliance is a problem that the pharma industry is only just beginning to understand and plan for. To what extent, however, do healthcare professionals understand compliance and know what drives their patients to comply? Just putting a percentage on the people who comply with treatment is difficult for healthcare professionals, so understanding what drives attitudes to compliance is an issue they cannot effectively address in their limited time spent with patients.

Pharma can help by understanding the end users in more detail, and by talking to healtcare professionals to understand their perceptions of their role in healthcare management and their attitudes towards their relationships with patients. Pharma can become a facilitator, enabling patients to communicate more freely with their healthcare practitioner and giving healthcare professionals the tools they need to improve their communications with patients effectively and relatively easily.

For example, by understanding what is behind patients' attitudes to compliance in a given therapy area, a few simple questions can be developed from an algorithm to give to healthcare professionals. Asking these questions in a consultation can help healthcare professionals identify what type of complier a patient is likely to be and therefore what type of support they might need in the management of their condition. This type of information can also be used by marketing and medical education teams to tailor communications to patients, thereby addressing the issue from several different angles.

Putting patients at the centre of a brand's lifecycle development can enhance communications approaches and help us work towards our ultimate aim of providing the best type of healthcare for those who need it.

Jeanette Harwood is research director at Healthcare Research Worldwide (HRW)

Revealing the significance of patent information

The fundamental principle in conducting a market research facility is to discover facts that would enable correct and risk-reduced marketing and corporate decision-making. Most, when considering market research, picture the person on the street with the clipboard, or an after-hours telephone call trying to extract some data on personal activities. But the market research function goes much further than that, particularly in the business context, where it incorporates, in my opinion, significant business intelligence that does not include sophisticated primary research techniques.

For the past 30 years or so, I have been involved in the identification, acquisition and interpretation of key data much of which is in the public domain. One of these areas for which our organisation has become best known, is for its work in pharmaceutical patents and intellectual property.

There is no question that patent protection on major products is a key issue in pharmaceutical circles. Some might say that it is the kingpin of the whole industry. Without the protection of patents, which is merely a legal monopoly granted by the state, the pharmaceutical industry would not have flourished and developed into the success it enjoys today. The purpose of the patent is to grant the patentee exclusivity for a fixed period to enable return on investment and a reasonable level of profits. The period granted by most national patents is 20 years.

In reality, because of the required interim procedures like clinical trials, licence submissions, etc., little over half of that time is actually available. Nevertheless, it has been sufficient to create a cash-rich industry. Because these initial and necessary procedures erode the patent duration afforded by most other inventions, legal mechanisms have been created to compensate for this shortfall. These are referred to as Pharmaceutical Patent Term Extensions which in Europe are manifested as Supplementary Protection Certificates (SPC) and in the USA under Waxman-Hatch legislation. Many countries throughout the world have adopted one or other of these systems. The net result is to provide up to an extra five years of patent duration.

Knowledge of these patents and their extensions is a vital piece of intelligence for those involved in the industry. The generic sector, which is one of the fastest growing areas in the industry, must treat this intelligence as essential. How many times have we seen in the press comments like Pharma industry to lose $X billions in Y years through patent expiry? It is an emotive but inevitable truism that can be said at any time over the past several decades. The growth of the UK generic industry can be traced back to a provision in the UK Patent Act 1977 called Licence of Right which allowed access to patents prior to expiration.

With availability of such data becoming more extensive via the internet, it is imperative that those needing such data not only have quick and accurate access, but are attuned to the significance of such data. That is where the professional investigator comes into the picture to provide such a service.

Martin Paltnoi is managing director at MPA Business Services