Communicating With Healthcare Providers Based on Prescribing Behavior
Introduction
As pharmaceutical representative access to prescribers continues to diminish, email is increasingly recognized as one of the best ways to inform healthcare providers (HCPs) about new products and brand updates. In fact, according to the Healthlink Dimensions Annual Healthcare Professional Communication Report for 2018, when receiving industry news, product updates and announcements, or research and educational opportunities from life sciences businesses or insurance payers, “73 percent of respondents said they prefer email.”1 The Healthlink report notes that “consistent findings over the past few years show that email has become firmly established as the most convenient and effective method for directly providing physicians with information.”
Pharmaceutical marketers ask themselves many questions as they begin to plan a prescriber-targeted email campaign. Chief among them are, “Which prescribers will I target?” and “How will I measure the success of the campaign?” Answering these questions with forethought and precision can make the difference between success and failure.
Which prescribers will I target?
Digital campaigns to HCPs are often targeted to a distinct subsegment of the prescriber universe based on geolocation, demographics, specialty or other available criteria. But is there a more exacting and effective method to identify high-value prescribers? As described below, ConnectiveRx recently tested the impact of an email campaign in which prescribers were identified and targeted based on their observed prescribing history over the previous 6-month period. The results are described in the Key Findings below.
How will I measure the success of the campaign?
The success of email campaigns has historically been measured largely on open and click through rates. After all, such metrics are trackable as a proxy for reach and engagement, they provide a mechanism for evaluating the success of one campaign versus another, and they represent an attempt to tell a value story connecting opens and clicks to changes in prescriber opinion and behavior. But do these metrics fully capture the impact of a campaign on your brand’s goals? Recent ConnectiveRx research showed that traditional methods, like open rate, often underestimate the success and value of email campaigns.2