Fueling Launch Success With Integrated Customer Data

Over the past decade, the number of emerging biotechs launching for the first time has tripled. While the stakes are always high when bringing a new drug to market, they’re even higher for first-time launchers. Here’s how access to comprehensive healthcare ecosystem data for healthcare professionals (HCPs), key opinion leaders (KOLs), and patients increases the odds of a favorable outcome.

The importance of engaging early

HCPs and KOLs have many competing priorities, so starting outreach up to two years before launch to build strong relationships with them is essential. The first step is gathering information on their clinical and academic interests, networks, and social media activities. This may seem straightforward, but doing so manually can take many hours and dedicated resources. With constant updates on information, it’s also challenging to know if you have the latest data.

Switching from a manual approach to integrated data and software makes it easier for your stakeholders to access customer data digitally. This data can provide relevant insights to create better connections and establish rapport with HCPs and KOLs leading up to your launch. Using comprehensive, integrated customer data from day one, you can engage sooner and more efficiently with these contacts who are key to your product launch.

The rise of digital opinion leaders

Many KOLs have also taken to digital channels to distribute information, creating the rise of digital opinion leaders (DOLs). Digital channels like social media make it easier and faster to share updates and opinions versus traditional methods like publications. In April alone, there were more than 4.6 million tweets from DOLs broadcasting their commentary on new clinical research data.¹ DOLs are the first to communicate when there are changes in the scientific landscape, encouraging scientific exchange and debate in real time.

This new way of communicating has increased the volume and velocity of data. If you manually follow DOLs, you could easily miss critical insights, and medical field teams could lose out on valuable information to personalize their interactions.

Companies of all sizes need compliant access to social media feeds, while medical field teams require insights embedded in their engagement software. Having a solid digital foundation with one place to access real-time data for DOLs makes it easier to keep up with their current focuses, opinions, and speaking engagements.

Capturing HCP consent through email

Emerging biotech companies often wait to set up their field forces closer to launch, but with access to comprehensive data for HCPs, you can build your database in tandem. While in-person meetings remain the primary form of engagement with HCPs, email is the second most widely used channel to communicate with this group. Therefore it can be a powerful tool for digitally engaging with HCPs before launch.

Pairing email with complete and reliable HCP data helps you capture consent for future interactions at the first digital contact. Your field teams can then hit the ground running and do so in a compliant manner.

Applying customer data and rich intelligence in your launch

Launching a new drug requires careful orchestration of many components. Starting early and using customer reference data and deep KOL data can set your team up for success.

By augmenting its customer data foundation with rich customer intelligence, Shionogi was able to identify key medical and scientific experts and initiate medical discussions ahead of launch. Shionogi gained access to integrated customer insights that immediately impacted two of their upcoming drug launches. Field teams could search the whole HCP universe, expand their target lists, and use affiliation data to understand how their target hospitals were structured.

To learn more about how an integrated data approach can transform your launch strategy, read this e-book.