Feature
Predicting Trends 2024
December 2023
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The DHC Group
Overview
Future of Digital Innovation in Healthcare
As we wrap up 2023, we went to our membership to get thought leader insights on what’s ahead for 2024.
We are grateful to all the experts who responded to our request and provided a deep well of knowledge
on key innovation and challenge areas facing our industry in the new year.
For this year’s wrap-up, we asked:
- In your opinion, what was the most significant (innovative) advancement(s) in pharma sales and marketing in 2023?
- According to our recent survey of pharma marketers, "Customer Experience" is the top trend for 2024. What will it look like for pharma to make a meaningful impact on customer experience next year?
- AI is arguably the biggest buzzword headed into 2024. How do you anticipate AI changing the landscape of pharma marketing most in the next 2 to 3 years?
- Based on your perspective in the industry, what advice would you give to a pharma marketer headed into 2024?
Most significant advancements in 2023
according to industry experts:
Artificial Intelligence:
The year witnessed a widespread adoption of Generative AI tools, experimentation with AI technology, and its integration into mainstream practices for disseminating knowledge and fostering engagement.
Data:
Pharma advancements in 2023 highlight the integration of data to enhance health outcomes, prioritize healthcare providers, and personalize marketing strategies.
Technologies:
Transformative growth through strategic acquisitions, the consumerization of healthcare, and the use of technologies like ChatGPT and Bard underpin the industry’s commitment to innovation and personalized healthcare.
Omnichannel:
A major focus in 2023 has been on omnichannel strategies fueled by customer data, emphasizing seamless experiences across platforms, services, and in-person interactions.
Q
In your opinion, what was the most significant (innovative) advancement(s) in pharma sales and marketing in 2023?
The most significant innovative advancement in pharma sales and marketing in 2023 has to be the integration of generative AI. If 2022 was the year of initial AI excitement, 2023 has to be the year of AI experimentation in sales and marketing. Pharma marketers are experimenting with the right ways to emphasize the power and potential of generative AI to tackle some of our biggest challenges. This year of experimentation has armed strong marketers with the intelligence they need to start scaling their successful programs to new opportunities.
I would have to say the mass invasion of Generative AI tools touching down on our desktops and smartphones. Not only is Gen AI significant and innovative in itself, but it is also sparking significant innovation across so many functions within pharma sales and marketing, particularly in helping us advance predictive analytics to create anticipatory customer experiences.
I’m most excited about innovations designed to integrate more types of data to help improve health outcomes. For example, biopharma brands recently began using analytics technology to connect their DTC marketing data back to the field force to deliver timely messages to HCPs. Using Veeva Crossix HCP Trigger data, brands can identify HCPs treating patients who have visited their branded site after being exposed to media. The brand receives a data file of these HCPs, at the NPI level, based on their patients’ activity. This leads to a suggestion directly in Veeva CRM for the field team to act on. The field force can prioritize their activities based on HCPs who are discussing the brand with their patients, and speed up the time to patient treatment.
In 2023, we’ve seen a much larger focus on Omnichannel strategies fueled by customer data which has proven successful in creating a more seamless experience across the customer journey. By integrating platforms, services, and in-person interactions using technology and data, we can create stronger, more valuable relationships with our customers. We’re now serving what customers need next – even if they don’t know they need it!
From the global perspective, the most significant advancements we’ve seen in 2023 is the use of data. At CMI Media Group we have been encouraging our international clients towards increased use of data and more granular targeting in their media campaigns towards HCPs. Outside of the US, especially in Europe and Canada, both privacy and pharmaceutical marketing regulations are very different. GDPR is the first consideration voiced anytime we start asking questions about what data they are using or have for their customers. But once satisfied that we’re discussing GDPR-compliant methods, brand managers across Europe have been quick to understand the benefits of increased use of data. This switch is going to have a major impact on how HCP media campaigns will be activated outside of the US.
The leading innovation in 2023 was the integration of conversational AI, like ChatGPT and Google’s Bard, into the mainstream. These AI-driven platforms have become instrumental in disseminating disease and treatment knowledge, empowering patients and caregivers with instant access to information. Concurrently, social media’s role has evolved beyond broadcasting content to fostering genuine connections and engagement. For audiences seeking community, support, and education within conditions lacking wide reach, like rare diseases, social media has enabled nurturing communities where dialogue with like-minded patients and caregivers has flourished. The development of online private communities has been groundbreaking, offering targeted ecosystems where sensitive conversations occur in a controlled, compliant environment. These advancements shift from broad-stroke communications to precision engagement, where each interaction is informed and personal and adds value to the healthcare conversation.
Generative AI and chatbots started to fundamentally change search behaviors in 2023. Health consumers were driven to take control of their health, and we saw people turn to these tools out of curiosity. However, generative AI currently poses the risk of misinformation, which is why consumers ultimately remained loyal to trusted health information sources, including social platforms and brand-affiliated websites. This year, we saw data drive much more consumer-centric innovation within these trusted contexts. The strategic use of content, research, and consumer data helps create more personalized and effective health solutions, tools, communities, and more, all catering to the specific needs and preferences of the consumer groups that pharma wants to reach.
Artificial intelligence (AI) drove a myriad of significant advancements in many industries this year, including an explosion of practical applications across pharma sales and marketing, which will only continue to grow. AI has already transformed drug development, medical diagnoses, data management, and the 360-degree patient experience. In sales and marketing in particular, AI’s ability to analyze data and put forth new pathways to target and communicate with patients, understand their behaviors, and improve their lives through personalized, relevant treatments and experiences has just scratched the surface. Broadly speaking, AI’s influence on digital health still holds many more opportunities and we are thrilled at the possibilities that lie ahead.
In 2023, we saw the continued consumerization of healthcare. From social proofing to big players announcing copay caps and price transparency, we are seeing momentum around empowering consumers with the ability to assert more influence over their health and wellness. GoodRx Research showed that 1 in 3 patients who took prescription medications for a chronic condition reported skipping at least one prescription fill due to cost. The increasing cost burden for patients is driving demand for increased access to affordability solutions and price transparency. Moreover, new entrants are bringing tech-forward, scalable solutions that ease pain points across the consumer health journey. Pharma marketers are increasingly partnering with these innovative platforms to keep consumers at the center of their marketing strategies and meet their brand goals.
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According to our recent survey of pharma marketers, "Customer Experience" is the top trend for 2024.
We asked the experts what it would look like for pharma
to make a meaningful impact on customer experience next year, and they cited three key areas:
ORGANIZATIONAL IMPROVEMENTS
In order to elevate the customer experience, pharma is prioritizing timely coordination between field force and advertising, fostering organizational alignment to ensure impactful customer interactions, and emphasizing the importance of maintaining consistent brand stories across various touchpoints to enhance customer mindshare.
DEEPEN CUSTOMER UNDERSTANDING
To enhance customer experience, pharmaceutical companies are focusing on understanding the patient journey and individual experiences, seeking to revolutionize the customer experience by grasping genuine motivations and needs, and prioritizing the integration of data, technology, and clinical knowledge to create an informed and patient-centric pharmaceutical landscape.
INTEGRATE TECH AND PATIENT INSIGHTS
Pharmaceutical companies will need to leverage Generative AI as a novel approach to comprehend customer sentiment and needs, conducting efficient social media listening for valuable customer insights. They should also commit to offering tailored content and support resources at various stages of the care journey and to diverse patient populations, employing technology to deliver a seamless end-to-end healthcare experience and personalized patient support programs.
Q
According to our recent survey of pharma marketers, "Customer Experience" is the top trend for 2024. What will it look like for pharma to make a meaningful impact on customer experience next year?
In 2024, pharma brands must embrace that customer experience is not a “one and done” endeavor, but an interconnected matrix that requires balancing the big picture and the details. Customers, whether consumers or HCPs, interact with pharma at a lot of different touchpoints, and that journey has only grown more complex as technology and digital channels evolve. In addition, pharma consumers are complex individuals, with their own matrix of demographic factors, needs, and behaviors. It is critical that pharma understands and sees this whole person picture, so that they can address challenges like accessibility and affordability head-on as they build customer experiences. While thinking of customer experience as a thousand-piece puzzle you’re trying to put together can be challenging, it means more opportunities for pharma to make an impact. Brands can turn every interaction into a more relevant and meaningful touchpoint, helping customers take small steps and make intentional decisions. By understanding who people are, what they need, and how they engage, brands can resonate, support, and connect more often.
You know the saying, “you can't help others if you don't help yourself first?” That is also true when it comes to serving our customers. To make a meaningful impact, marketers have to ensure every team, every person who directly or indirectly can impact customer experience is consistently aligning and coordinating together. We heard this lack of organization cohesion was the #1 challenge in advancing customer experience. The intent is there. The data is there. The technology is there. But where are we as an organization in truly harnessing it all for the best customer experience?
Customer can mean different things based on factors like condition, drug type, pharma solution and so on. So it begins with understanding who the customer is for the specific solution - a patient, clinician, caregiver etc. To make a meaningful impact on customer experience, pharma will not only need to reach them at the right moment, e.g., when they are in an action mindset like actively researching drug prices or health information, but also reach them where they are. That means having an omnichannel approach and working with channels and platforms with high intent customers, not driving them somewhere else. The other key component is to offer the customer a personalized solution for where they are in their journey. Leveraging real time patient data and insights to build personalized patient support programs has been shown to improve engagement and outcomes. Many pharma brands are partnering with GoodRx - a high intent and high trust platform that already has consumers and providers at scale to deliver meaningful campaigns that drive to a prescription fill and obtain rich insights on the customer journey and behaviors.
To truly revolutionize customer experience (CX) in 2024, Pharma must intimately grasp patients' and caregivers' genuine motivations and needs. This understanding will be the cornerstone for developing CX programs that benefit them. Digital journey mapping will be key, with social listening tools providing deep insights into the patient community's concerns, challenges, and vernacular. Such strategic mapping ensures highly personalized content strategies that, when delivered at patients' and caregivers' moments of need, will provide real educational benefits to audiences along their treatment journeys. Additionally, CX initiatives will be crafted with precision to meet the industry's stringent regulatory and compliance standards, ensuring that enhanced engagement never compromises patient safety or privacy. With online dialogue set to remain a top trend, Pharma must facilitate digital conversation spaces through dedicated online communities or social media channels. Still, online communities and social media channels must be moderated around the clock to address any brand risk, including adverse events promptly. By doing so, Pharma will provide its audiences an avenue to engage with its brands on patients' and caregivers' own terms.
Pharma can make a meaningful impact on patients by supporting a more seamless end-to-end healthcare experience. By using technology to weave together data, expert advice, and storytelling into health education solutions, companies can help patients live life to the fullest while managing any condition by empowering them to unpack the complexities of their diagnosis and varieties of treatment options, as well as how to navigate the healthcare system. Consumers want to feel understood and listened to by their providers – and to be treated fairly – making it important to provide resources specific to their unique health needs and personal identity. Keeping in mind the importance of tailoring messages and the mechanics of outreach to support all demographics advances health equity while improving the individual customer experience by reaching people at the right time with contextually relevant, actionable information they want and can trust.
To make a meaningful impact on customer experience next year, pharma will need to fully embrace understanding the patient journey and individual experiences. Digital health advancements and an industry-wide focus on preventive care have increased the number of critical moments to engage with patients, such as during health screenings and risk factor education. With this shift in behavior focused on prevention and not just diagnosis and treatment, the industry needs to adapt messaging and creative strategies to follow patients along their unique path. Providing tailored content and support resources that match patients’ individual needs at different stages throughout their care journey can help drive engagement and improve health outcomes.
Another key trend for 2024 is customers feeling that companies are prioritizing cost savings instead of the customer due to economic pressures. Making a meaningful impact on customer experience in 2024 is going to be about finding ways to ensure patients and HCPs feel valued and heard, even in challenging economic times. At Klick, we have seen brands experiment with AI-enabled solutions that drive more personalized experiences. We’re likely to see more pharma brands work to incorporate internal and external AI-enabled CX solutions to manage the full omnichannel experience.
Making a meaningful impact on customer experience will require a more informed and patient-centric pharmaceutical landscape in patient care through data, technology, and clinical knowledge.
Don’t just consider the who, consider the where: move towards creating content and experiences built specifically for your target customers based on WHERE they are. For example, an email blast should be a very different experience/content than a social media campaign.
Outside of the US we have strict restrictions on how and where we can promote prescription medicines, which results in some channels automatically being excluded from media campaigns. However, the HCPs are still using those channels, often on a daily basis. Internationally, we must consider how we can use these channels, even if it’s not for branded campaigns, to ensure we’re reaching our target audiences when they’re online and actively looking for information. Reaching them at this point will result in meaningful changes in the customer experience.
While field force activities and advertising can be powerful on their own, timely coordination of the two creates a better customer experience. This “synchronization” helps biopharma brands maximize marketing and field efforts across their organizations to improve engagement with HCPs. By creating this enhanced customer experience for HCPs, some brands see a 23% increase in marketing effectiveness. (Source: Veeva Crossix, 2023 Trends in HCP Omnichannel Engagement). Synchronization will change the way field and marketing teams approach HCP marketing. It requires shared goals, an enterprise approach to analytics, and the integration of CRM and marketing data.
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Four key themes emerged as thought leaders considered how AI will most impact pharma marketing in the next 2 to 3 years:
Evolution of AI
in Pharma:
The responses highlight a collective anticipation of AI’s transformative role in the pharmaceutical industry, moving beyond initial hype to practical results and the establishment of best practices. The consensus underscores that AI is not just a passing trend but a permanent and integral component shaping the future of pharmaceutical marketing and operations.
AI Applications
and Challenges:
The diverse applications of AI in streamlining processes, enhancing content creation, and optimizing marketing strategies emerge as key themes. The responses also delve into the challenges, exploring AI’s potential to address issues such as regulatory reviews, fragmented customer landscapes, and the need for combating misinformation in the industry.
Cross-Channel Integration and
Global Impact:
The responses emphasize the pivotal role of AI in facilitating cross-channel integration and ensuring global alignment of messaging in pharmaceutical campaigns. The underappreciated impacts of AI on international campaigns, particularly in smoothing communication across diverse markets, emerge as a significant theme in the context of global pharmaceutical marketing.
Marketer Adoption
and Integration:
Encouragement for marketers to embrace AI tools, both major announcements and seamlessly integrated innovations, is a prevalent theme. The responses stress the importance of consistent experimentation and utilization of AI tools, even in unconventional ways, to add value and enhance workflow. The dynamic and evolving nature of the AI landscape is highlighted, emphasizing the need for marketers to stay nimble and experiment with various tools.
Q
AI is arguably the biggest buzzword headed into 2024. How do you anticipate AI changing the landscape of pharma marketing most in the next 2 to 3 years?
Even though AI in the form of machine learning (ML) has been used for years for things such as media optimization, generative AI (GenAI) and ChatGPT have brought AI to the forefront in 2023. It’s important to understand the distinction between the two and how the combination of ML and GenAI can address even more compelling use cases. Three areas Klick expects GenAI to have a significant impact in 2024 include: -Streamlined Personalized Content Creation: GenAI can help automate the creation of marketing materials, allowing personalized outreach on a larger scale while maintaining brand consistency. -Amplified Market Insight: GenAI can assist with uncovering market dynamics, patterns, and trends. By garnering insights from unstructured information and text, we can understand the market shifts, unique attributes, and customer sentiment. -Personalized Engagement at Scale: The world of personalized engagements is rapidly evolving. Real-time, one-on-one tailored experiences empowered by GenAI can potentially improve customer engagement and experiences. Over the next two years, more options will be available to marketers. From Gemini from Google to ChatGPT from OpenAI, marketers will need to be nimble in experimentation and agile in swapping tool sets to take full advantage of what will be a very dynamic and evolving AI landscape.
The torrent of claims will eventually subside and hype will give way to real results and ultimately best practices.
AI is going to be transformational in guiding where brands spend their media budget, and on what messaging. The industry is already collecting reams of customer engagement data. But the data is decentralized, and even if it weren’t, simple business intelligence isn’t sufficient to analyze all the different combinations of person, stage in the journey, message, creative, format, channel and outcome. So the industry is currently making most decisions manually, based on an incomplete view into what’s actually going on. With machine learning, we have been able to make sense of our vast amounts of data and figure out which profile of person reacts to which type of creative and messaging, in which channel and in what sequence to drive which outcome. Taking it a step further, AI is enabling us to develop decision-support that tells us what to do with these insights: how to tailor the message we’re delivering to each person in each channel at a certain moment in time to drive the desired outcome. This is a combination of what the industry calls “personalized marketing”, “sequential marketing” and “omnichannel marketing.” Over the next two years, it is going to become much more accessible to marketers for implementation across channels.
I anticipate (and hope) AI will speed up so many workstreams that slow us down, especially regulatory reviews, content generation, and informed decision-making. I also foresee experimenting with AI to help us connect the dots across our increasingly fragmented customer landscape: medical practice consolidation, and the expansion of shared decision-making at hospitals and IDNs—not just in numbers, but in complexity--is making it more challenging to find and build HCP and account relationships, and the rapid expansion of retail and telemedicine clinics is making it more challenging to understand the connected patient journey.
AI is here, and it is not going away. In 2023, AI application and usage by the masses became very real. Now, and throughout the next few years, industry stakeholders will have to determine what AI means for their organizations—how comfortable they are using it, where it adds value and when to use it. We will see more exploration around thoughtful applications of AI in content creation and personalization. But we may also see an increase in misinformation and the need for better content curation and verification. Every pharma organization will need to think through all these considerations about AI quickly and carefully.
Over the next few years, AI will enable more personalized, efficient pharma marketing. It will streamline Medical Legal Review (MLR) processes, allowing for faster creation of compliant content and enhancing campaign agility. As the digital landscape moves away from cookies, AI-powered content tagging and taxonomies will be critical for precision targeting. In combination, these capabilities mean AI will be able to create an order of magnitude more content variants, targeted toward precise levels of taxonomies and audiences. This will be the key to hyper-personalized campaigns that transform what it means to deliver the right message to the right person at the right time.
Many of us are feeling overwhelmed by the endless barrage of news and predictions about AI. It’s no exaggeration that every day there is a new announcement, pronouncement, or opinion about this powerful technology. Even at Klick, we have weekly communications informing us of internal AI tools, research projects, experiments, and innovations that we can integrate into our workflow. As marketers looking to 2024 and beyond, we cannot allow ourselves to back away from AI because it’s uncomfortable. The most important thing each of us can do is “just try.” It doesn’t have to be perfect. It doesn’t have to be mind-blowing (though it certainly may be). It doesn’t even have to be relevant. It just has to be consistent. Even if your company has a policy against using it with “work” data, you can still use the technology for brainstorming, patient insights, learning, or any number of things. If it’s something you do to add value at work, AI can help.
One of the most talked about areas that AI can deliver impact in pharma marketing is personalization to reach the right person at the right time with the right message. Machine learning and predictive analytics can segment customers efficiently, build dynamic customer journeys and drive ‘next best action’ for customers and marketers. Additionally, AI can help scale personalization of marketing campaigns and creative assets with faster cycle times, and optimization to deliver the highest engagement and performance. For example, AI can help with rapid localization of campaigns including translating assets and making them more culturally relevant. The other area that AI can impact is around social listening and competitor analysis to help marketers understand what is working in their campaign, what are the emerging trends, who are the influencers, what do consumers really want, and what are competitors doing. AI can also impact compliance by improving efficiency of the medical-legal-regulatory (MLR) review and approval process. For example, MLR guidelines can be fed into an AI tool to enable speed and clarity with this process.
AI is already driving a surge in automated creative and content generation, shifting what we see in pharma marketing materials. At the same time, with advanced AI capabilities, pharma marketers will experience a notable increase in precision for analyzing and optimizing ad buying and performance. Lastly, the search landscape could change, as AI-generated search results could notably influence top-of-the-funnel queries.
It seems like every day brings a new way to innovate with AI in pharma marketing. The next few years will be critical for the industry, as companies and marketers learn to embrace the power of AI and apply those learnings to more effectively engage, educate, and activate patients to better understand the conditions impacting their lives and take meaningful actions towards improving their health and well-being. As a patient insights leader, I’m excited to continue to explore the use of AI tools to identify patient needs, behaviors, and outcomes, and, in turn, incorporate those insights into digital product development. The possibilities are endless.
There are endless, exciting potential applications for AI. I’m personally most excited about using AI to speed up traditionally slow processes such as content creation and content review. We cannot truly meet the individual needs of our HCP and patient customers by segment and channel if we are bogged down by our own internal processes. AI can support us in speeding up our entire go-to-market strategy so we can create, deliver and support in as close to real-time as possible.
Internationally, our HCP media campaigns often use a mix of local market publishers and international publishers. Depending on the market, there will often be elements of traditional print-based marketing too. I anticipate that potentially underappreciated impacts of AI will be on cross-channel integration. AI will make it much smoother and faster to ensure that the messaging at the global level is aligned with what is being said at the local level, and that what is being used on one channel complements another.
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Straight from the experts - here's the top advice for pharma marketers headed into 2024:
Embrace Data and Technology
Several experts emphasize the importance of leveraging data and technology for effective pharma marketing in 2024. This includes advice to be open to possibilities realized through data and technology, prioritizing understanding the audience by comprehending their needs and challenges, and making significant investments in future-proof measurement amid changes in privacy regulations.
Focus on AI Adoption:
The need to embrace artificial intelligence (AI) emerges as a recurring theme. Suggestions include getting comfortable with change and starting to use AI now, mastering generative AI for enhanced performance, and exploring the AI landscape to stand out and succeed. Marketers are encouraged to view AI as a tool that can empower and differentiate their efforts.
Prioritize Patient-Centric Approaches:
A strong emphasis is placed on adopting patient-centric strategies. This involves focusing on traditionally underrepresented and historically marginalized communities, delivering personalized content that resonates with diverse patient populations, and understanding the broader aspects of patients’ lives beyond managing their conditions.
Stay Informed and Adaptive:
Marketers are advised to stay informed and adaptable, with specific reference to the evolving pharmaceutical landscape. This includes paying attention to startups offering solutions to healthcare providers (HCPs), being aware of industry changes related to third-party cookie deprecation, and embracing experimentation to stay ahead of the curve.
Strengthen HCP Engagement:
The importance of HCP engagement is highlighted, particularly through avenues like mobilizing Medical Science Liaisons (MSLs) for peer-to-peer interactions, recognizing the demand for MSLs to assist the promotional side of the business, and staying attuned to the preferences of HCPs for webinars, digital forums, and panel discussions.
Q
Based on your perspective in the industry, what advice would you give to a pharma marketer headed into 2024?
Mobilize MSLs. Peer-to-Peer demand is driving reliance on social media to connect HCPs with others serving similar patient populations or confronting similar treatment considerations. Doctors love to talk to each other, especially when they share questions and concerns. Surveys have revealed a preference for webinars, digital forums and panel discussions. The traditional separation of commercial and medical affairs teams is changing as Medical Science Liaisons (MSLs) are increasingly appearing at congresses, interacting with reps, counseling individual physicians, participating in private condition or disease groups or adding to conversations in the Walled Gardens. Expect the demand for MSLs to assist the promotional side of the business to continue and expand.
The industry is experiencing increased privacy and regulatory demands, particularly with the proliferation of digital marketing tactics and the associated patient and provider data. HCP access is getting more sophisticated and moving towards more on-demand services. The next generation of marketing strategies will be focused on targeted HCP marketing with seamless consumer pull through and activation. Further, no two customer journeys are the same, so marketers should relentlessly focus on improving the overall customer experience. A key component of this is the often overlooked area of performance auditing. Marketers should invest the time and resources to analyze historical performance data and understand what works and why in order to inform future decisions. Another component is contextual marketing and full funnel marketing strategies which will enable brands to reach more consumers at more points in the journey and empower them to take action. Partnering with high intent platforms like GoodRx can help pharma brands drive conversion and engage action-oriented customers.
With third-party cookie deprecation and changes in privacy regulations, 2024 is going to be a critical year for digital advertising. To remain competitive, health brands should work with trusted marketing analytics partners who are investing in future-proof measurement, including direct media feeds and addressability solutions. Significant investments in product, people, and long lead times are required to develop and mature new capabilities to be ready for prime time. Companies that can’t address these challenges will have difficulty accurately connecting their media investments to health outcomes.
Together, we can increase access to the information needed to make more informed treatment choices, reduce provider burdens, and drive improvements in patients' lives. And by transforming how brands plan, execute and optimize their marketing initiatives, we can help life science manufacturers feel confident their therapy is reaching the patients who need it.
Don’t be afraid to try something new or out of the box! There’s a preconceived notion in the industry that pharma is “behind” other industries in terms of innovation and technology. Let’s make 2024 the year we “catch up” by testing new types of content, new platforms, and new technologies with trusted partners.
Heading into 2024, there is still an enormous opportunity and work to be done in reaching and communicating with traditionally underrepresented and historically marginalized communities. Historically marginalized patient populations face a range of barriers to care, from cultural to economic and geographic. These challenges span all aspects of healthcare, including clinical trial enrollment, addressing access to care and delivering tailored and inclusive information and support resources. In the year ahead, the industry should continue to explore new strategies for reaching and activating patients in historically marginalized groups. Delivering personalized content that resonates with these patient populations and facilitates health education can better support them to play a more active role in managing their health.
Data makes it possible to align with what consumers need and how they engage. Managing a condition is a significant part of a patient's life, but it's not their whole identity. Use a data-driven approach to uncover broader insights about their lifestyle, interests, and barriers they face to treatment adherence. With this broader understanding and rich data, you can better pinpoint and engage consumers across channels, and reach them with the right message at the right time. For instance, you can emphasize cost-saving, efficacy, and side effect conversations early in a treatment journey.
Get comfortable with change and start right now. AI is new and not perfect, but it’s very easy to start using, either in work or personal applications. We are in the midst of one of the most intense periods of innovation and change in history, and that means marketers need to stay flexible and adaptable to seize opportunities and react to challenges. We are all experiencing the friction of new technologies bumping up against policies and frameworks that haven’t yet caught up. We are all trying to balance the opportunities innovations bring to us with the human efforts required to drive success. We are all learning as we go—it’s exciting and intimidating. Those who begin to master generative AI will simply outperform those who don’t.
Pay greater attention to the start-ups that are appearing across Europe and other regions with solutions targeted to HCPs. Great new tools and apps are being developed all over the world which may only start being used by HCPs in a single country, but based on the quality of the solution, can spread very quickly. For example, Tonic App, which is a multi-disciplinary app that launched in Portugal, is now an increasingly important tool for HCPs. Its popularity spread quickly throughout Spain, France and Italy, and they have a launch planned in Germany and the UK. Since it’s important to HCPs, it’s important to pharmaceutical marketers too.
As we approach 2024, the pharma marketing landscape is poised for rapid evolution. Here are three pieces of advice for marketers aiming to stay ahead of the curve: Prioritize understanding your audience: Dive deep into the online ecosystems where patients and caregivers interact. By comprehending their needs and challenges, you can ensure your messaging hits home. Harness AI for agility: Implement AI tools to accelerate the development of marketing materials and strategies. This technology is your ally in staying responsive in a dynamic market. Embrace experimentation: The digital domain is always expanding, with new channels and content formats emerging. Be bold in testing these avenues; learning from these forays is invaluable for innovative engagement. Adopting these approaches will be essential for delivering impactful, patient-centered marketing initiatives in 2024 and beyond.
Be bold and take risks in your role while being thoughtful to “do no harm.” The available tools to support our functions is overwhelming, but they can empower us to stand out and succeed. Pharma marketers who embrace the challenge of exploring the AI landscape, reexamine industry tools for potential upgrades, and present new ideas to support the goals of organizations and teams will outpace their professional peers. While it often seems as though the industry is constantly and rapidly changing, my advice heading into 2024 is to take a moment to set your intention for the year ahead and decide what one thing will make the biggest impact on your work. Build your professional goals around that intention, reset during the holidays, and hit the ground running in the new year. Given how much transformation we have witnessed in the last year, I also advise figuring out how an AI application can help maximize your output, which will enable you to stand out as a leader in your organization.
Become a lover of “zero.” Zero-party data (that which the audience gives you willingly in exchange for value) is more precious than gold. As cookies get phased out in 2024, this data will provide additional ways to keep the conversation going with your audiences.
Be open to the increasing number of possibilities we can realize through data and technology, but don’t let it lead you; let it empower you.
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