PharModelling for Customer Centricity
-Amlesh Ranjan
Buddha said, “In compassion lies, the world’s true strength”. And through compassion, we develop genuine empathy which helps us bring someone or, something at the center of our thoughts or, endeavors.
Healthcare, Life-sciences, Pharma, Medtech… are the domains where compassion is a given and hence, thinking Customer centricity should be natural and being Customer-centric should come easy.
We as an industry should be proud to have contributed towards improved well-being and higher life expectancy in the world. We are as committed as ever to find solutions for the pressing healthcare problems of our global community.
Yes, the challenges continue to be multi-fold but so are the opportunities. Thanks to rapid digitalization, we are not only operating in a hyper-connected, ever-on world we are also serving an increasingly more informed/aware consumers and stakeholders. This necessitates our truly and completely becoming Customer-centric.
And, what it means to be truly Customer-centric, the same has been very well defined by Prof. Fader of Wharton Business School. He wrote, “Customer centricity is the strategy to fundamentally align a company’s products and services with the wants and needs of its most valuable customers”. It sounds like classic marketing but, let’s see, how it pans out in our industry.
Where do we start the journey of Customer centricity in Pharma- I have always believed, Doctor’s chamber is the center of Pharma business universe. Brands and Businesses are built or, destroyed here only. We also know, while Sales Force drives the business, it’s the Brands which own the business.
Great Peter Drucker, famously said, “Marketing is not a function, it is the whole business seen from the customer’s point of view”. While the whole organization needs to culturally be Customer-centric, the onus, to strategize and execute the same, lies with Marketing.
But the classic 4 Ps of Marketing gets redefined in Pharma with 6 more Ps- Physician, Patients, Pharmacy, Provider, Payer and Partner. Being Customer-centric means, that we keep, each of the above, at the very core of our being as a business.
Transition to Customer centricity needs a shift of focus – from Sales promotion toValue Creation; from Passive-Reactive to Interactive-Proactive; from Milestone-driven to Behavior-driven; from Silo toIntegrated; from Messaging-Creativity toEngagement-Experience and finally from Ps to Ws – Who, Where, Why, When. (Adapted from Bearing Point Customer Centricity White paper 2008.)
PharModelling for Customer Centricity- the 3 Key Imperatives
HEALTHCARE RESPONSIBILITY
We live in a World, where more than a billion people lack access to quality healthcare and almost 50 million die each year due to non-communicable and communicable diseases. Global Child mortality numbers are still around 5 million.
While HIV and Cancer continue to be the biggest health challenges, Antibiotic/Antimicrobial Resistance is seemingly moving towards becoming the biggest threat to global health.
The kind of stressful lifestyle that we have brought upon ourselves in the pursuit of success and progress, affects our mental health and wellbeing. In healthcare, the need is enormous and the gap is huge and hence, there is immense opportunity for all who operate in healthcare or, life sciences.
But we all must remember, “Healthcare is first a Responsibility and then only, an Opportunity”. The onus is on us to take people from ‘dis-ease’ stage to ‘@ease‘. We need to look at our domain first from the lenses of responsibility because what is good for society can be good for the business if, the intent and efforts are in that direction.
‘Patient Centricity, the most talked, least understood and poorly implemented strategy in our domain, if holistically approached and sincerely implemented, can truly transform and lead us towards a culture of ‘Healthcare Responsibility’.
If every person in the life sciences organization at every level, is motivated, trained and equipped to understand, what is of real value in healthcare and then strives towards co-creating or contributing with a sense of responsibility, we can travel a huge distance.
(Quoting from my blog -“Healthcare is first a Responsibility…”https://link.medium.com/NpKvBJ5t3W)
VALUE ORIENTATION
Great Scientist, Albert Einstein said, “Strive not to be of success, rather to be of Value”.What value do we offer- Products, Education, Information but what is considered the desired value in healthcare- Outcome, Outreach, Knowledge. We should strive to go beyond the pill and create a comprehensive offering which helps improve outcomes.
This means, Products are not enough, we must bring Services into the picture. Renowned Economist and Marketing Guru, Theodore Levitt wrote, “There is no such thing as service industries. There are only industries whose service components are greater or less than those of other industries. Everybody is in service.”
When we bundle Services with Products, we create Solutions which helps in delivering the Desired Value to the customers.
If the disease and health outcomes are the most important value, can we look at the factors, which, has huge impact on the same. One such factor is ‘Adherence’.WHO published- ‘Adherence to Long Term Therapies: Evidence for Action in 2003, quoting from the same – “30-50% of medicines prescribed for long term illnesses are not taken as directed”.
Fierce Healthcare’s August’12 article on Drug Adherence mentions, “… better drug adherence could avert 699,000 emergency visits and 341,000 hospitalizations each year”. We can sure contribute towards improving adherence in which ever therapy areas we are and that can be a good value-add from us.
Outreach and Knowledge, both are important for Healthcare Providers and, we are in a position to partner with them for both.
Our larger geographical operation coupled with in-house medical expertise can be of great value for them through joint activities and programs. Even the ongoing training and excellence of their paramedical and pharmacy staff can be contributed to and then the traditionally commercial relationship will be elevated into value-based partnership.
INTEGRATED APPROACH
Lifesciences has a fairly complex ecosystem and the networked inter-connectivity requires that our approach is completely integrated.
The integration is first needed internally where all stakeholders within the organization pitch in with their expertise to help create the augmented offering to the key customers.
They need to partner the Sales and Marketing team in delivering the desired value and also servicing the same.
As we know, Customer centricity is the journey to move from Product focus to Customer focus and here the integrated approach will mean that the business relationship and information sharing moves to higher levels of trust and transparency with more touch points and increased customization.
Going Digital is a necessity and an opportunity for planning and implementing an integrated approach as, our key customers are increasingly relying on the virtual ecosystem and also the technology really makes it possible to integrate, network and be more responsive.
But, this will need Information Age Strategy where open and agile technology is deployed for speed and flexibility. We can start being social and adopt Multi Channel. Digital facilitates Closed Loop Marketing which can help deliver the desired value to the key customers in the most integrated way. The biggest advantage of an integrated approach is that it becomes a two-way information highway and a tool for co-creation of value.
Customer Centricity is so very rewarding. It’s a strategic approach to transform Marketing. It positively impacts Commercial Excellence by facilitating Strategy-Tactics and People-Processes Alignment. It turns the whole operation into a value creation enterprise.
But the biggest gains are in terms of ensuring Empowerment and giving Experience to the Customers which impacts outcomes and makes them @ease.
The appropriate PharModelling for Customer Centricity needs a Culture of Healthcare Responsibility, a Value Oriented Strategy and a Drive for an Integrated Approach.
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