Go Beyond HCPs: Set Up Patient Support and Value with Pharma Content

Take a moment to think of how your health behavior has changed over 2020. Can it be measured exclusively by the number of thoughts about hygiene and clean hands? Or was there something more to it?

The positive impact of coronavirus (strange though it might sound) is in the change of mindset concerning our health. Some of us have started thinking more about our chronic diseases; some have been just evaluating the possible outcomes in case of infection. The truth is – we all did that. 

It means only that awareness has grown, that the management of our own health is above all in our hands whatever they are clean or not.

Let’s discuss the role of the modern post-covid patients in the pharmaceutical industry and figure out why it’s a good time to spread value with pharma content far beyond HCPs.

Set value with pharma content – cover all the touchpoints

Something important in pharma has changed for good. It’s not simply customers’ expectations – the patient’s mindset has changed.

The reasons for this were both the growing role of digital technologies in healthcare and the pandemic that has become a powerful impetus for change.

As per most surveys, close to 25 percent of the consumers today are driven by health and hygiene choices. – Gaurav Sharma, Investcorp India

Modern patients no longer want to surrender their health to the doctor’s hands, they want to be actively involved in the process of treatment. This new type of patient requires something more than just product information, they strive for assistance in aspiration to manage their own health.

Thus, modern patients need personalized, interconnected, engaging, and even entertaining interaction with a healthcare provider.

Meanwhile, 81% of pharma manufacturers still rely on healthcare providers to educate patients on their services. That’s why, in a big way, they target content primarily on HCPs, investing very little in patient and pharmacists’ awareness.

What can pharma do now?

We caught probably the most appropriate time to finally change our mindset as well and realize that our engagement shouldn’t be limited to HCP, it shouldn’t have boundaries.

How to expand the dialog with healthcare professionals

Pharmaceutical content for patients, in the traditional sense, is 100% valuable. At the same time, it’s not engaging, it’s not personalized, and it’s not even entertaining.

You might say that it’s not supposed to be ‘entertaining’  the purpose is different, BUT your target audience might have a different opinion.

• 80% of customers say the experience a company provides is as important as its products and services
• 57% of customers have stopped buying from a company because a competitor provided a better experience

If even these percentages are not convincing enough, then just think of billions of dollars spent on promotional materials when desired outcomes were never achieved.

Patients lose loyalty when they don’t feel that the brand cares enough about their treatment outcomes. Moreover, this leads to patients’ nonadherence which is every year responsible for the loss of between 100-300 billion dollars in the US alone.

Sometimes people do not follow a treatment or are unable to cope with side effects because they have little knowledge about their condition and treatment.

It’s about time to invest more effort and creativity in content for patients and pharmacists.

More pharma content for pharmacists and patients: Benefits

Pharmaceutical content enjoying success among patients

The goal of any doctor is to create a clearer picture of the disease and engage patients in active treatment. That’s why, above all, from a med rep, HCPs need corresponding materials that would help them complete their mission. Such content should be valuable, well structured, interactive, and contain the right message about your pharma brand. Concerted efforts, when pharmaceutical companies would provide HCP with corresponding materials, and further HCP deliver it to the patients could be referred to as «cascade sharing». These efforts have a strong potential to elevate patients’/HCPs’ engagement and fit well into the picture of modern healthcare. Health applications, websites, landing pages, portals, videos, and many other materials can perform this mission and explain all aspects of the disease to patients. Let’s dive deep into the characteristics and capabilities of such materials.

mHealth Apps

In the era when being healthy isn’t simply vital but greatly trendy, it’s important to stay focused on patients. With 67% of the world’s population being mobile phone users, the most feasible way to stay patient-centered is mobile applications – offering truly engaging, gamified experiences, communication and information –and above all, psychologically calculated ways to support the patient in their journey.

Moreover, these apps are great facilitators of patient adherence, providing beyond-the-pill value with its pill reminders, information on products, patient leaflets, calculators, symptom diary module (shareable to chat), information and articles on diseases. They may also contain video tutorials, quizzes, surveys, rewards and live chat 24/7 with the option to schedule calls with the HCP – offering a truly gamified patient experience.

Web portals, websites and landing pages

Today patients’ path to treatment begins online as over 70% have researched a prescription medication or medical device online in the past year. A brand’s websites, web portals, and landing pages have become a critical resource of true for patients. Therefore, they act as a critical entry point to access treatment and help patients improve adherence. 52% of patients rely on brand websites to research prescription information. 88.3% want pharma brand websites to connect them to providers. Thus, you can note that patients feel certain power being able to find the right information to manage their condition better.

To choose the right treatment,  pharmacists also should be updated with the latest health-related information. Therefore, if there were more such sites, there would no doubt be matching demand for them.

A well-structured, user-friendly, and interactive website provides your pharma brand an enhanced online presence, the ability to be available for customers 24/7, and to gain consumer insights due to collected analytics.

Emails

Broadcast emails and approved emails are default facilitators of HCPs engagement. It is impossible to imagine a more personalized way to communicate with HCP, especially with all the interactive features users currently can enjoy.

The truth is that one personalized email can generate more reactions than any other content. HCPs are eager to receive emails and they enjoy great success with an 18.58% open rate throughout 2020.

Would it be equally interesting for patients and pharmacists?

Definitely, yes. It would be beneficial for all sides of treatment as it would stimulate a dialog and inspire tight collaboration between them.

Pharma can send specialized emails with information that the HCP could later forward to those patients who would benefit from it. The email with information from the HCP currently managing their condition will certainly enjoy great confidence and inspire more loyalty. Meanwhile, pharma can create more trust in their brand and be sure that patients receive the information they need at the moment.

This practice is also beneficial for pharmacists, who are likewise required to work in concert with patients and healthcare providers to promote health and deliver patient-oriented support.

Self-detailing

Self-detailing is the practice when the medical rep invites the HCP to get familiar with an eDetailing presentation independently. Self-detailing has gained popularity among doctors because it is not tied to the doctors’ schedule, thereby giving them time and the opportunity to delve into the materials fundamentally. During the quarantine, the number of doctors interested in this practice was constantly growing. Also, the greatest value of Self-Detailing in the pharmaceutical market lies in its versatility and ability to complement any communication channel and any device.

This practice could also be favored by patients who might be able to learn more about their condition and the methods of treatment. The equally nonintrusive manner could inspire more patient loyalty and bring certain benefits for pharma companies as well. During self-detailing, the patients can look through the structure and key messages in the presentation at their own discretion. That way, this channel gives a better understanding of the target audience, and gives honest metrics for the campaign, as it is likely to see a different pattern of slides and time spent on each of them.

Parting thoughts

Now of all times those unique moments when patients are eager to take care of their health and cooperate with the pharma. Let us help them in their quest to be healthier. We hope that now you see that moving beyond the creation of pharma content just for HCP brings recognition and loyalty among modern health-oriented patients.

Finally, take a look at an example of a customer journey that reflects how all of these types of content can fit perfectly, complement each other and create value in pharma’s picture of customer engagement.

Imagine that you want to promote a special mobile application among patients with poor adherence. Here are two interaction models that reflect how these types of content can foster collaboration with the HCP and generate loyalty and success of your app among the patients.

An example of promoting a mobile application using content for a patient

You may have noticed that this model of interaction is rather multichannel, but note how the one piece of content that is valuable to both the HCP and patient complements the efforts of other materials and encourages the patient to download the app.

The next example shows how such content can encourage patients that have downloaded your application to fill the survey about the reasons for their non-adherence.

If you got interested in more details on all aspects of work with such content – contact our experts. We’ll help you to choose those options that will be right for you, develop promotional campaigns, and calculate the most reasonable ways of implementation to create value in the new era of healthcare and life sciences.

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