Enhancing Life Sciences Messaging with Data-Driven Insights

The ever-growing mountain of healthcare data is underutilised by life sciences marketers when creating campaigns and messages on the latest treatment breakthroughs. This article highlights the critical need for data-driven decision-making, the significance of selecting the right platforms, and fostering a data first mindset to enhance marketing efficiency and patient outcomes.

From entertainment to manufacturing and financial services, every time someone interacts with a digital device, a data point is created. However, no industry creates more data than healthcare. Approximately 30 percent of all the data in the world is generated within the healthcare industry. Digital health records contain a lot of this patient data, and life science marketers can leverage the information within these platforms to connect with healthcare providers. Taking a programmatic approach to campaign building brings in even more digital data for marketing teams to assess and optimise against.

Hence, life sciences marketers showcasing breakthrough treatment innovations must adopt a data-driven approach to messaging and brand strategies to be successful. This article will cover the important role of data in pharmaceutical marketing and advertising, how to evaluate new partners before implementation, and the best practices for managing a team with a data-first mindset.

Know your data

Data-driven marketing is crucial for reaching the right audience and maximising the impact of marketing efforts. There is an array of marketing-specific data points that the team should track and use to guide campaign decisions. Here are eight types of data every marketing and communications team should track and evaluate during decision-making.

1. HCP Behaviour data

To truly understand their prescriber audience, life sciences marketers need to research HCP behaviours and preferences. Knowing how physicians and patients interact with a brand’s product can guide advertising targeting, inform the team about gaps in campaign coverage, and provide an idea of where the treatment is finding success in the real world. Third-party companies can provide survey data on prescribing patterns and what types of information physicians look for when consuming pharmaceutical messaging. Emerging solution providers in this space are also enabling HCP behaviour mapping using innovative tools. This information can be used to craft campaign assets and optimise budget spending to improve ROI and increase script lifts.

2. Prescription Data

Increasingly, hospitals and health systems in Asia are moving to electronic health records and other point of care platforms. These digital spaces can provide real-time targeting based on clinical data in privacy-safe environments. Targeting messaging to patient data such as diagnosis, medical tests, and other health history metrics can improve the efficacy of campaigns by only delivering messages relevant to the individual patient-prescriber interaction.

3. Health benefits

Once a prescriber has decided on a treatment plan, insurance coverage and medication costs can determine the likelihood that a patient can afford to adhere to the prescription. Data on health coverage, available packages, and deals from nearby hospitals and pharmacies, can be used to craft campaign messages that improve adherence. Life sciences marketers can deliver messaging about these programs to physicians during the moment of prescription. This will empower the HCP to arm their patient with cost-savings information before the prescription is filled.
Blurb: Data-driven strategies improve decision making and eliminate intuition, bias, and assumptions, and all teams inside a pharmaceutical manufacturer should value the power of data— including marketing and communications teams.

4. Campaign metrics

Utilising data analytics tools, life sciences marketers can monitor the performance of campaigns in real-time. This empowers them to make necessary adjustments to optimise outcomes. Data on reach, impressions, frequency, and conversion from each level of a media buy should be scrutinised based on the funnel level of the platform. For example, broad communication channels at the awareness level should have a low cost-per-thousand impressions (CPM). More specific channels lower in the funnel such as messages within an EHR may have a higher CPM but provide a bigger overall impact by driving conversion and increasing prescription rates in a way that can be tracked down to the individual HCP. For many brands the number one key performance indicator (KPI) is script lift. Without an idea of the number of prescriptions being written and filled, life science marketers are flying blind.

5. Customer Feedback

By analysing sales data, customer demographics, and purchasing behaviour, companies can identify distinct market segments and develop customised marketing strategies for each group. Understanding what the audience is looking for in an ad, satisfaction with deals provided, and preferred media channels can lead to improved messaging. Collecting regular feedback through surveys and focus groups can lead to better-performing campaigns.

6. Competition and industry performance

Pharmaceutical brands should track competitors’ market share, media mentions, and key messages. Surveys with patients and physicians can include feedback, limitations, and perceptions of the competition. Beyond specific competing treatment solutions, life sciences marketers should track market dynamics, industry benchmarks, trends, and outlooks. Tracking this data can help pharmaceutical marketers make informed decisions about media placements, find ways to create differentiation in messaging, and stay ahead of developing market trends.

7. Compliance data repository

To stay compliant with regulatory and legal requirements, life sciences marketers should closely track news and data from governments and regulators. This data is essential for keeping the brand messaging aligned to new laws and requirements. With these basic data points, life science marketers can make the best decisions for their pharmaceutical brand campaigns.

Choose the right marketing partner

Selecting the right marketing partners who can supply the needed data and assist the team in sifting through campaign results is a critical decision for pharmaceutical manufacturers, and finding the right platforms for monitoring and optimising campaigns requires thorough evaluation.

Leadership teams should create a list of key criteria to evaluate before signing a new contract. Remember that interoperability is key for data systems and improved data use within marketing and communications teams. When data is siloed, it cannot be utilised as effectively. Seamlessly integrating various data sources, enables comprehensive data analysis and reporting. Because of the vast amounts of data available internally and externally, these platforms must be scalable to perform efficiently as data demands grow. Given the sensitive nature of pharmaceutical data, the platform must ensure data security and comply with regulatory requirements such as GDPR and HIPAA.

A marketing partner with a platform that’s difficult to use will slow down teams or be ignored. When evaluating a new partner, look for an intuitive interface that facilitates easy data access and analysis for users. An unused resource will end up wasting precious time and budget, and it is important to consider the total cost of ownership, including implementation, maintenance, and potential upgrades, to ensure the partnership is a sound investment.

After the team has outlined the specific data needs and objectives, it is time to narrow down suitable partnership options. Conducting thorough research on available marketing and communications platforms is itself a valuable data collection task that reinforces the importance of making decisions based on facts and not intuition. Implementing a pilot program to test the partnership in a controlled environment and gathering feedback from end-users can be a great way to collect data. Partners should be able to provide transparency into how data is collected and provide teams with documentation during the evaluation stage.

Build a team with data-first mindset

A data-driven approach encourages all stakeholders to base every business decision on data and insights. Gathering, monitoring, and analysing data to develop strategies keeps data from languishing on a shelf. Leaders should expect decisions to be made around data-driven evidence, and this mindset should be reinforced through the company culture. Involving key stakeholders and subject matter experts in developing a strategy roadmap creates buy-in and lays the foundation for other team members to follow.

To streamline the integration of new tools, data management should be centralised, and there should be clearly defined data roles within the organisation. Implementing collaborative tools that facilitate data sharing and communication among team members will enhance overall productivity. While establishing feedback mechanisms will allow for continuous improvement of processes and ensure the team adapts to new data challenges and opportunities.

There can be many challenges to fostering a data-driven culture. Some teams use manual techniques. This can lead to lost data and human error. A lack of data literacy can be a large hurdle for onboarding a new platform. Software solutions driven by data best practices won’t fulfil their true value without team members who know how to use them. Investing in training and upskilling for team members is key to overcoming these issues.

Most importantly, pharmaceutical manufacturing teams should not let siloed data and a lack of data literacy skills stand in the way of success. As technology advances and more teams have access to machine learning and analytical artificial intelligence, the power to glean meaningful insights, improve forecasting, and develop data-first teams will only improve.

Improving decision-making with better data strategies

Data-driven strategies improve decision-making and eliminate intuition, bias, and assumptions, and all teams inside a pharmaceutical manufacturer should value the power of data—including marketing and communications teams. By creating objective benchmarks to understand the impact of campaign designs, messaging tactics, and demographic targeting, life sciences marketers can optimise the delivery of important treatment information.

Tracking the right data provides a clear-cut way to identify new opportunities, threats, and trends, and it will create a more agile team. Life science marketers can improve campaign performance through a better understanding of competitors, physicians, and available inventory. Leaders can create a culture that puts data first by educating team members, using data in decision-making, and eliminating manual techniques.
Armed with the right data, life science marketers can not only improve campaign performance, but they can also improve patient outcomes by reaching the right HCP with the right message during critical moments of care.