Demand creation with ethics

Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day in and day out: Robert Collier

The pharma marketer is always focused on providing best healthcare products at the right time, through pharmacy channel, with the help of opinion builder doctors.  However, pharma marketers are also responsible for quota achievement just as any other sales person.  Some in the non-pharma profession wonder how quotas are relevant to pharmaceuticals or healthcare products?!  After all, nobody wants sickness market to increase and be profit driven!

Hence, there is great emphasis on the ethics aspect in pharma marketing.  If there is unethical pursuit of sales and profits, great evil will certainly fall on society.  In essence, pharma marketing ought not to be a true sales profession,  pharma marketing is a medical representative based profession that offers information and persuasion of marketed products in an ethical format.

Ethics counts in every part of pharma marketing.  Ethics is about the presence of evidence, including proper clinical evidence to back a marketing claim.  Ethics is also about presenting the promotional points in a compelling way - yet being accurate and having patient well-being at the heart.  Pharma ethics is also making the products affordable - ensuring each patient gets the benefit.  Pharma marketing is not profiteering from sickness, the bye-word of pharma marketing ought to be ethics - and must and should be ethics always.

Furore over UCPMP: The Uniform Code of Pharmaceutical Marketing Practices for pharma marketers is a right step in the direction to enforce ethics.  If such frameworks for pharma marketers is absent the chances of wanton pharma marketing practices will only increase.  The net loser will be the pharma industry as a whole.  Also the society will not trust pharma marketers and consequently medical practitioners.  Already, the common man distrusts and suspects an unholy pharma marketer and medical profession nexus.

Unethical pharma marketing practices means the patient well-being is not at heart of the pharma marketing process.  Unethical pharma marketers will only make serving the doctor or prescriber's requirement as the sole goal of the marketing process.  Pharma marketers will entice doctors to prescribe and over-prescribe promoted brands leading to ever increasing sales and benefits to doctors - patients are many-a-times fodder for this cannon.  Hence, disciplining the pharma marketers with a code or law is important.

Ethical pharma marketing will put back the mojo:  The charm of pharma marketing is scientific persuasion.  It is about titrating product benefits to the patient profile and doctor's diagnosis - and ensuring patient benefits.  So there is positive joy in the doctor for being a life saving healer.  This form of ethical pharma marketing will drive companies to focus on knowledge, science, evidence, clinical trials and research, patient case studies and other honest endeavours.  Short cut practices such as sponsoring doctor needs and giving retail bonus offers tarnishes the process of pharma marketing.  This is an approach where science takes a back seat, and non-ethical practices destroy credibility of pharma marketing profession and medical profession too.

The graphic above gives a very scientific process of how pharma marketing process can work effectively and efficiently.

A) It all starts with rack stock analysis at stockist - level.  This also includes tertiary analysis to analyse purchase behaviour.  For instance, I recall tertiary analysis of sales from stockist or wholesaler point during my bygone days as a Medical Representative revealed very high sales of our brand of liver protective HEPATOGARD in the posh Residency Road area of Bangalore.  Further, territory analysis disclosed that dermatologists in that area prescribed my product to the maximum extent.  When I talked to them, the rationale was - liver dysfunction causes pruritus (itching) and many long term derma medicines like antifungals cause liver stress.  Hence, the  support to liver protective HEPATOGARD.  Armed with this feedback, I succeeded with many other doctors and this strategem was taken up at national level too!  This is an example of scientific ethical pharma marketing and the starting point is rack stock analysis.  With today's web based systems, rack stock analysis can be done on a daily basis, since stockists give log in and password to each MR and an online check of rack stocks and product movement can be done daily!

B) This is the age of personalization!  It has become inevitable that MRs plan doctor-wise product promotional approaches to each doctor or group of doctors.  One cap fits all is not recommended.  The appeal promotional points and the way of building rapport is different with each entity.  These days providing a pitch to group of doctors by way of sponsoring high tea is very effective, particularly in hospitals and medical colleges.  Thus, the process of preparation is more intense, to ensure maximum returns from a call.

C) Backing the above two activities are the force multiplier contributions coming from extempore detailing, situational detailing, dialogue detailing with yes momentum, training processes, various print and non-print inputs, and online engagement activities with doctors and pharmacies.

Overall, the present day conundrum where pharma marketers are achieving sales results by hook or crook methods, require a strong dose of ethics medicine.  This will put the pharma marketing process back into the scientific persuasion mode and the mojo will come back!

UCPMP all in all will contribute to demand creation the ethical way, hope UCPMP a voluntary code now, becomes a law.  USA is a place again where pharma marketers are known to splurge on doctors through various modes such as speaker fees, consultancy advisory fees and so on.  Hence, they have a Sunshine Act to control unholy dealings.   At least this is done in USA, however in India as of now, it is full blast for demand creation with out any "lagaams".