How pharma’s sales and marketing teams are starting to use AI

This summer a fully AI-generated drug entered phase II clinical trials for the first time, as Hong Kong-based biotech Insilico Medicine broke new barriers with its potential treatment for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF).

The milestone is emblematic of the AI focus in life sciences, which to-date has heavily skewed towards applying the technology across its research and development operations.

Making the drug discovery process quicker, and more effective in terms of patient outcomes, is a logical target, given the huge investments pharma and biotech companies make there. For companies like Insilico and some of their peers the focus is also one that’s paying off, with years shaved off traditional research timelines.

But, while it looks like there will be no shortage of AI progress for pharma and biotech R&D, the sector has had less experience with applying the technology within its commercial organisations. Now, with the rapid ascent of generative AI tools, this year is poised to be the turning point for commercial pharma organisations and artificial intelligence.

Pharma customer experience trends and CX measurement best practice

Alongside my DT Consulting colleague Eleni Lee I’ll be appearing at the BHBIA’s 2023 Winter Seminar on Friday to present some of our customer experience data and discuss CX measurement best practices.

More details about the event, which is only open to BHBIA members, are available here. The full programme also includes Novartis’ customer experience activation director Ben Head and content strategy lead Krissie Mee exploring why CX is so important in 2023 and beyond.

Customer experience in Europe: a digital drop-off for the pharma content HCPs most need

There’s a digital drop-off for the pharma content that HCPs in Europe’s five biggest markets say they need the most from the industry.

That’s one of the conclusions from DT Consulting’s latest report on pharma customer experience (CX), which follows our similar studies cover global pharma and the US industry.

Based on a survey of 2,265 healthcare professionals (HCPs), the new research uses our Customer Experience Quotient® (CXQ®) methodology to measure how well doctors perceive their interactions with particular pharmaceutical companies.

Creating the right foundations for omnichannel success

Much like with ‘patient-centricity’, the overuse of ‘omnichannel’ in pharma is in danger of tarnishing the term. This would obscure the golden truth that resides at its core – that is, the way it can address pharma’s pressing need to better understand its customers’ needs and how best to meet them through a connected set of channels.

As the industry continues with the ongoing period of adjustment that characterises any omnichannel journey, one of the strongest indicators of how individual companies are performing is through the lens of the customer experience (CX) they provide. After all, if a company doesn’t shine when engaging its stakeholders, it is unlikely to find itself meeting their needs, let alone exceeding them. Currently, pharma is some way away from provide excellent customer experiences.

For its interactions with HCPs our CX research shows the industry provides what we’d consider a good, though distinctly average, level of customer experiences. Within that, digital channels as a whole lag behind their non-digital counterparts and HCPs highlight a multitude of content gaps when they talk about the information and services they want from the industry.

Webinar: HCP customer experience in pharma

On Wednesday 24 May I’ll be discussing recent DT Consulting research on how to best engage HCPs over digital and non-digital channels and what content experiences best connect with them.

We’ll look at what research on more than 6,200 HCP interactions reveals and talk about HCPs’ most pressing unmet needs, as well as sharing advice on how to take an omnichannel approach to CX planning and engagement.

• Register now for The State of HCP Customer Experience in Pharma webinar to hear more

Pharma’s social media problem

Elon Musk’s apparent ongoing campaign to dimmish his carefully curated reputation for business acumen through his mismanagement of Twitter has brought a number of damaging repercussions for pharma and healthcare.

The turmoil at Twitter, reflected to a lesser extent in the testing times being experienced by other platforms, is the poster child for the industry’s social media problem.

Since pharma use of social media went mainstream more than 15 years ago, first with corporate blogs, then with Twitter and Facebook, the main platforms have provided the industry with their fair share of challenges, but they’ve also remained relatively stable.