Enhancing Patient Outcomes: Aligning HCP and DTC Strategies
In today’s digitally-driven pharma marketing landscape, brands face audience information fatigue – due to competition from both other brands and newer sources of information, like social media. At the recent Digital Pharma Innovation Week, I explored a path forward for brands as they refine omnichannel marketing and next-best-action strategies to cut through the market noise – increasing the alignment of Health Care Providers (HCP) and Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) marketing.
Traditionally, HCP and DTC campaigns are treated separately, each with distinct audiences, tactics, and messaging. However, as digital and offline competition grows, optimizing brand impact requires a unified approach.
In a recent independent physician survey, conducted by OptimizeRx, the responses indicated significant gaps between current HCP and DTC marketing that could be harming marketing efficacy and impact:
- Only 27% of HCPs find patient-requested medications generally appropriate.
- A mere 17% believe DTC marketing significantly benefits patients.
- 61% of HCPs spend substantial visit time correcting misinformation.
In fact, 70% of physicians agreed that when the information HCPs and patients receive from brands align, it streamlines patient care. Yet only 13% of HCPs currently see strong alignment between these marketing efforts.
If we can close this gap, there are substantial benefits for patients, HCPs, and brands. Patients get more access to clinically appropriate health information so they can feel empowered during office visits, in turn, HCPs are less frustrated with inappropriate requests based on misinformation, and more likely to consider new therapies. More informed conversations lead to faster treatment selection and initiation, better adherence, and improved outcomes – all of which drive sustained impact for brands.
“We need to promote cross functional collaboration and technological advances that lead to the synchronization of these messages that drive conversations that convert.” - Theresa Greco
Starting with the Patient to Maximize Marketing Relevance
Achieving HCP and DTC marketing alignment should start with the patient. By grounding both efforts in a shared, centralized patient audience, brands can precisely profile, segment, and target communications based on patient care windows. This ensures brands are delivering relevant information simultaneously to qualified patients and their HCPs. By timing these communications around upcoming office visits, brand marketers are maximizing the actionability of their messaging. Next, effective, compliant, and aligned marketing must consider a more holistic view of both patient and physician audiences:
- Patients are more than their disease; know their media preferences, geography, demographics, clinical profile, socioeconomics, and support networks, with adhering to HIPAA and emerging state privacy regulations to protect patient confidentiality and trust is a must.
- Providers are both clinicians and consumers. An effective strategy should account for prescribing behavior, specialty areas, patient demographics, media consumption, personal interests, and geographical factors.
Understanding and integrating these factors into your aligned marketing strategy yields more personalized and impactful communications timed to the patients’ specific stage in the care journey.
Patient Centricity: Bridging the Synchronization Gap for Success
By embracing a patient-centric approach, brands can minimize confusion, enhance understanding, and provide the most relevant and timely resources, ultimately improving the overall healthcare experience. Time and money spent on marketing efforts are wasted if the information presented is not relevant to either the patient or the HCP and both may miss crucial details about your brand’s benefits. Aligning HCP and DTC marketing, brands build a greater, shared understanding between patients and HCPs – fostering stronger relationships, driving more efficient care, and leading to a notable increase in script lift.
Curious how you can adopt a patient-centric, synchronized approach to HCP and DTC marketing for your brand? Check out my full presentation for more insight on building a centralized patient audience.
