Should #Pharma Spend More Time Engaging Docs via Social Channels?
Recent research indicates most pharma marketing is still shooting towards the old goal posts, in that they’re not actively maximising the digital opportunity. The same research highlighted that doctors today estimate they spend around 84 hours a year dealing with pharma through non-personal channels. This works out to around 64% of their pharma interaction time, with 26,000 of the most popular prescribers on the receiving end of 2,800 pieces of communications every year from the pharma industry.
Time pressured physicians have cut down on the number of face-to-face meetings with pharma sales reps. Research data from sales and marketing firm ZS Associates indicates that far fewer physicians have time to meet with sales reps, resulting in many now seeing less than 30% of those who try to arrange meetings with them.
Clearly, medical communications must develop a fresh approach, with more emphasis placed on multichannel marketing efforts, delivering carefully crafted messages that build and maintain physicians’ trust. Despite the fact that the survey analyses indicate that around 75% of physicians don’t entirely trust pharma marketing information, an (almost) equally large percentage (around 65%) indicate a willingness to interact with pharma through social channels.
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