The Futurist: Innovation in healthcare

The pharmaceutical industry is changing and marketers in the industry need to also change to keep up with the times. Patients, providers and other stakeholders are holding pharmaceutical companies to increasingly higher ethical standards – and rightly so.

Pharmaceutical players must move to take advantage of the rapid advances in digital technology and the opportunities they offer to share information in new and different ways.

Our focus is now is to deliver new ways of working. This means improving the capabilities of people, standardising the way work is done, and building a common platform of technology across the company.

We are now engaged in investing in raising the skills of our medical and marketing staff, and building a consistent digital framework. There are multiple information channels and platforms for health care professionals (HCPs) that are integrated to ensure a seamless and exceptional customer experience. This integration will also allow teams to gather and analyse customer insights to drive improvement in what we provide the HCPs.

In today’s world, marketers need to rethink how to engage HCPs and reach them in a variety of ways across multiple integrated channels, based on a deep understanding of customers.

There is a need to deliver fresh content which is relevant to be used across different channels. At GSK, the HCP portal is the heartbeat of our multi-channel activities, providing a central base for our customers to access GSK product information and services when, where and how they want it.

It provides mobile and desktop access to up-to-date GSK product and therapeutic information, patient and professional resources, as well as multiple channel options to contact GSK for medical information.

In addition, it provides a forum for healthcare professionals to register for emails, sign-up for webinars. Overall, the portal provides a branded design template. It is a technology platform and content hub to enhance the user experience for our customers. Also, it aids time-poor HCPs want to fi nd the right content quickly – whether that’s prescribing information for a product, understanding the company’s work in a specific therapy area or finding patient resources that will assist them in their jobs. The site’s search and fl at navigation structure makes all this accessible within a click or two.

Over the next two years we will transition from providing up-to-date product information to expanded content beyond the pill to advancing the medical science dialogue.

Asuch, the customer experience strategy is largely set around four key objectives: user journey, digital content, personalisation and building trust through engagement. Multi-channel marketing fills a gap by bringing continuous medical education to HCPs. The future of marketing in the pharmaceutical industry is an exciting one. Here are some future take aways for marketers in the field to consider:

• The pharma industry is catching up in the digital era and expanding the way we engage with our healthcare professionals.
• HCPs are time-starved individuals and even the pharmaceuticals players have to move with the changing times to find the right time and right platform to connect with HCPs.
• Information is at our fingertips and doctors want the same convenience and we want to make information available to them anytime, anywhere via digital platforms.
• In future, the new generation of HCPs will want information much more accessibly.

  Adeline Chan

The writer is Adeline Chan, a multi-channel marketing lead of GSK Pharmaceutical. To read more check out the print version of The Futurist.