No doubt, you have heard the phrase “Do more with less” applied to pharmaceutical marketing research countless times. While the expression describes an admirable goal, most of us have focused on the “less” part of this pronouncement. Many marketing researchers now recognize it is not only the fat that has been cut out of the research process, but much of the bone too, as demands for lower prices, rebates, etc., now squeeze agencies to work in ways that produce less than optimal results. For example, using lower-level personnel, offshoring to inappropriate vendors and similar cost-cutting maneuvers can significantly reduce the quality of work performed and thus call into question the decisions made based on this work.
This month’s published document for The Orange Pages challenges readers to concentrate on “doing more.” The article outlines 10 key steps that, if followed correctly, will transform pharmaceutical marketing research from being one of the first areas hit by budget cuts to an endeavor that actually helps pharmaceutical companies reinvent themselves out of the current, and worsening, perfect storm in which the industry finds itself. In brief, these suggestions include:
- Stop doing meaningless research. As the British would say, unless the marketing research is purpose built, i.e., designed to accomplish a specific and actionable objective, it should not be conducted.
- Spend a significant amount of time thinking through what the data resulting from the study will look like. While entering into the marketing research process with an open mind might sound good in theory, we cannot afford to approach marketing research in this naïve way as we are increasingly called upon to accomplish more with less.
- Decide in advance best guesses as to what meaningful segments exist, and make sure that each is included in the pilot work conducted. It is important to know what role each shareholder plays in the decision-making process and how these roles interrelate, what common themes are heard from different stakeholders and where there are differences in perspective across the stakeholders.
- Choose the most cost-effective methodology for the marketing research task at hand. Focus on using simpler methodologies that are not only less expensive to employ but are also better understood by respondents and customers.
- Employ only meaningful questions. Since data collection and analysis costs money, avoid any diversions into lines of questioning that are not directly related to the business and/or research objectives of the current project.
- Study issues, not products. By studying issues, results can be generalized to other products in the company’s portfolio and accumulated in such a way as to make them fully accessible to future generations of pharmaceutical marketers and marketing researchers.
- Make full use of technology. While videoconferencing and videostreaming technologies are avoided by many pharmaceutical companies because their internal customers won’t show up to watch the broadcasts, these technologies should be considered to allow teams to benefit fully from exposure to the opinions of the customer that the methodology is designed to provide.
- Make sure the results of your study are appropriately distributed, consumed and discussed. Marketing research could be more efficient if it were presented and discussed at least as thoughtfully as it was conducted.
- Train not only your marketing researchers, but also their internal customers, on how to fully utilize marketing research. Skill-based training for all key stakeholders in the research process, if conducted across the types of research and methodologies most frequently employed in marketing research, will go a long way toward getting maximum value from each research dollar spent and toward minimizing the number of such dollars that need to be spent.
- Recognize the fundamental changes that are occurring in the delivery of health care and in the pharmaceutical industry and adjust marketing research processes to respond to these changes. As pharmaceutical companies increasingly morph into health care companies, we will need to stop thinking of ourselves as “pharmaceutical marketing researchers” and increasingly think of ourselves as “health care marketing researchers.” Such a transition will not be a simple renaming but will require us to change the stakeholders we study and the methodologies we employ.
To download the complete May 2008 discussion on conducting efficient marketing research, please click here.
The monthly issue-based discussions that we publish in this newsletter
can also be distributed to you in hardcopy format via a complimentary
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Orange Pages. The Orange Pages is intended to serve
as a living, breathing resource of “Information, Education and
Issues Exploration for Today’s Pharmaceutical Marketing Researcher”
that we hope will be read with interest and kept within reach for
ongoing reference.
The format is a three-ring binder designed to hold packets of content
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colored) orange envelope and be delivered on a monthly basis. The
materials will be three-hole punched for convenient one-click assembly
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