POV: Outsourced Digital Marketing for Pharmaceutical Companies

Digital Health: Benefits of Technology for Consumers and Professionals

The importance of digital marketing operations

The patient's behavior is quickly changing, and this is not new. Since the advent of the Internet and search engines, patients have been seeking information about their health and conditions, sometimes knowing more specifics about their diseases than their healthcare providers (HCPs). 

In the film “Lorenzo's Oil,” a father extensively studies to find a cure for his son's disease: ALD (adrenoleukodystrophy), a rare, incurable degenerative brain disorder. Frustrated by the limitations of medicine, the parents educate themselves, hoping to halt the disease's progress. This was before the era of the World Wide Web and search engines, so their research, relying on physical libraries, books, white papers, articles, and interviews with doctors and scientists, took years. 

Today, beyond search engines, we have Generative AI at our disposal. We can find the necessary information, summarized from diverse points of view, instantly. I asked a Generative AI tool questions about the side effects and medical interactions of the pills I take every day. The response was impressive, well-written, and summarized, providing information in seconds – including some I had never received before. 

It is not just healthcare consumers who benefit from educating themselves about their health conditions using mobile apps, the internet, and now Generative AI tools. It is also important that HCPs stay up-to-date and leverage advanced AI, marketing, and digital solutions.

Marketing is sometimes undervalued, but it creates awareness, education, and communication to connect what is offered and what is needed. Targeting the right audience with the right message at the right time is challenging. Digital marketing has brought us several tools to facilitate this, such as cookies. Now, as we transition to a cookieless world, digital marketing processes are changing fast.

Understanding the importance of digital marketing operations by HCPs, employees, and patients is crucial. It is vital to remember the purposes of educating, generating awareness, and communicating the benefits and risks of pharmaceutical product use. Digital marketing operations connect the dots in the ecosystem formed by pharma companies, hospitals, clinics, HCPs, and patients

Digital marketing operations and budget

Budgeting is always a challenge, and digital marketing operations must be considered to improve productivity and efficiency so that we can do more with less. This includes managing multiple brands within the same company and optimizing the budget and digital marketing initiatives among them.

Several industries succeed based on their reputation and trust, and this is especially true for pharmaceuticals. There is a chain of trust between pharmaceutical professionals, sales representatives, HCPs, and patients. Digital marketing operations can help maintain, improve, or even recover trust and brand awareness in an overconnected world with its potential for information and misinformation.

This POV explores how digital marketing operations can improve brand awareness, education, HCP, and patient engagement using an outsourced model based on agile principles, nearshore engagement, the latest digital solutions, and Generative AI trends.

Structuring optimal digital marketing operations for Pharma

Usually, pharmaceutical companies operate on a global scale. Considering the goals of efficiency and productivity, global initiatives can bring the optimization levels needed, but local cultures matter. Aligning global initiatives with local flavors should be part of the digital marketing strategy. Enabling local customizations with the minimum impact on global initiatives should be pursued without compromising expected outcomes and planned budget. 

Beyond geography, the diversity of channels also matters. A multichannel strategy should consider the web, apps, social media (Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, WhatsApp, etc.), and related ads and content distribution. With Generative AI and new VR/AR/XR devices, immersive experiences can also be considered a new channel. 

Events, webinars, discount and sample programs, and downloadable content that captures individuals' first-party data with their consent are important initiatives, especially in a cookieless world. Additionally, consider thinking in clusters to produce content, ads, websites, articles, publications, and campaigns tailored to the specific interests of each cohort. 

Explore the communities and forums grouped by themes in specific social media channels like Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, Instagram, and TikTok.

How can digital marketing operations be outsourced?

Unlike tangible products, services must deliver on promises in real-time. Products are like edited movies, while services are like live theater or shows. Performance depends on people, processes, methodologies, and tools. Errors can occur and must be solved as soon as possible. The process must evolve to improve the quality and outcomes. 

It is necessary to choose the right digital marketing operations partner with proven experience in digital marketing, digital solutions integration and development, offshore/nearshore engagements, and, of course, knowledge in the healthcare and life sciences business domain. 

Beyond costs, usually represented by a rate card, other factors must be considered for a successful outsourced digital marketing operation. Considering the strategy of global initiatives and local flavors, a digital marketing partner should be culturally aligned, be close in terms of the main regions' time zones (nearshore + local teams), act cooperatively, be part of the same team, and contribute with creativity and innovative approaches. 

The onboarding process of an outsourced partner should include a clear mission from the client's leadership to its internal team to consider the nearshore partner's team as part of the same company's team. This message should be reinforced often. An initial personal encounter on the clients' site or the partners' site involving leaders and main stakeholders from each will be an important step for a successful engagement. This onboarding process, including steps and responsibilities, should be planned with the agreement of both parties. An open channel for feedback on both sides should stimulate a very transparent and trusting engagement. 

The main points to take care of:

> A clear understanding of what must be achieved (agreed upon by all)
> The right people and the right leadership on the boat
> The convenience of nearshore teams, along with the proximity of onsite resources
> A well-planned and executed partner onboarding process
> A strong sense of cooperation and teamwork between the outsourced team and the internal client teams
> An agile framework in place, checkpoints, cadence, feedback 
> Content generation - e.g., white papers, reports, webinars, and educational videos
> Content & interactions tailored to specific audiences
> Email Marketing - A/B testing
> Search engine optimization
> Messenger/Mobile marketing
> Using a CDP to have a unified view of the HCPs

How to measure the impact of digital marketing operations initiatives

Digital solutions, including digital marketing, allow us to track and correlate data. It is possible to measure or at least estimate the outcomes that result from a given digital marketing initiative. In the pharmaceutical industry, this must include participants in the chain of companies involved up through the patient. We should keep track of the impact a digital marketing initiative brings to the sales representatives, HCPs, number of prescriptions, and patients. Some platforms facilitate this outcome measurement process, keeping track of the touch points in all the channels accessed by the different personas. The digital marketing operations partner should consider the right platform according to the client's internal technology architectures.

To achieve this level of information, we need:

> Data to be organized and structured in all stages, from digital marketing to sales
> Dependable data and analytics 
> CDP (Customer Data Platform)
> A/B testing
> Evaluation and measurements of all customer experience touchpoints.

Monitoring the outcomes by correlating sales and other perceivable results reveals the entire operation. Reporting tools with the appropriate KPIs will help guide budget and investment decisions for a given company and its brands.  

To conclude, the benefits of an outsourced digital marketing operation are mainly:

> Cost-effectiveness when considering nearshore + onsite teams
> Cultural diversity, according to the provider and its nearshore locations
> Flexible talent pool that could increase or decrease according to the demand, avoiding internal bottlenecks or budget constraints, respectively
> External knowledge, creativity, and innovation
> Service analytics, KPI/OKRs for a better outcome-oriented management

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