PEST Analysis in Healthcare Market Research

 

There are countless reasons why a healthcare organization would want to perform quantitative market research. Top catalysts include a desire to pivot to expand market share or to review current performance and determine potential areas for improvement. In both scenarios, The Brooks Group is a top healthcare consulting firm that performs PEST analysis on a client’s behalf to aid in creating a roadmap with a holistic review of external factors that directly impact efficacy.

Utilizing PEST Analysis to Synthesize Information

Healthcare organizations don’t work in a vacuum. They’re often influenced by and have consequential influence over the communities they serve. Decisions made at the executive level not only determine employee performance but can also affect health outcomes in their communities.

PEST analysis strives to review the multiple external components that influence an organization’s future course of action. Key stakeholders can confidently draft strategies that are not only informed but beneficial both for the organization and the surrounding community, by breaking down the market research into the following four core pillars:

- Political factors

- Economic factors

- Sociocultural factors

- Technological factors

Understanding Each Component of PEST Analysis

Crafting a healthcare strategy that balances the needs of a community with those of an organization is a critical skill. The Brooks Group frequently performs PEST analysis that provides key insights into those individual factors most likely to impact business goals and operational constraints.

Political Factors

Political factors can vary by location but usually include government healthcare subsidies, employment regulations, and consumer protections. Understanding whether subsidies are growing or shrinking, or that a new employee tax classification is coming, can help pharmaceutical market research companies understand how payroll requirements will impact labor costs or general revenue in the coming years.

Economic Factors

Economic factors typically refer to internal costs that a healthcare organization must manage. Anything from benefits, to interest rates from a redevelopment loan, can influence long-term goals and spending strategies. However, external scenarios also exist. For example, massive layoffs in a nearby town might see patient behaviors shift from prioritizing preventative or in-patient care and instead divert to urgent care facilities.

Sociocultural Factors

As communities across the nation continue to diversify, understanding how to properly engage with them and effectively convey healthcare messaging is a priority. Engaging in a PEST analysis can aid healthcare organizations in better identifying communication gaps — whether referencing language barriers or cultural value shifts — to ensure that the community trusts your organization and has adequate access to care.

Technological Factors

The healthcare industry continues to make strides with cutting-edge technologies that can improve patient care, communications, and interoperability between healthcare networks. And as more patients are demanding direct access to not just healthcare workers, but to their medical records, organizations need to determine how best to integrate these features without violating privacy policies or reducing the quality of care.

Building for the Future

Creating a 21st-century healthcare firm that’s adaptive and responsive to the community it serves is what’s going to set successful organizations apart as leaders in their respective fields. PEST analysis is critical because it provides a comprehensive macro approach that ensures your organization can make informed decisions that continue to move your business forward. The Brooks Group provides holistic support for healthcare organizations that includes support for new hire onboard training and account management training to build a stronger workforce.

This blog was originally posted on https://thebrooksgrouponline.com/2021/05/pest-analysis-in-healthcare-market-research/

Syndicated Healthcare Market Research and The Advocate

 

Pharmaceutical companies must always move towards innovation to maintain not only a competitive advantage but also to align with patient and customer needs. However, any strategies that are developed need to be based on sound research that incorporates current market conditions, customer needs, and competitor concerns that could impact outcomes.

While market research is a great way to gather this information, the expense can be a barrier for some organizations. However, syndicated healthcare market research can help reduce that burden while still giving your firm an informed and competitive advantage.

Syndicated vs. Custom Market Research

In general, there are two main types of market research — custom and syndicated. Custom market research is when a company employs a consulting firm to develop a research study exclusively for them. While effective, this method can be expensive since the client must bear the full cost associated with the project.

In contrast, syndicated market research[1] is when a client purchases a market research study conducted independently by a market research or consulting firm. For example, a pharmaceutical firm would purchase a pharmaceutical market research study that investigates the industry, outlines trends, and highlights potential openings that need to be addressed. One of the biggest benefits of syndicated market research is that the associated costs are significantly lower than with a custom option.

Amplifying the Patient Voice

One of the most important ways a pharmaceutical company can build for the future is by centering the patient while crafting strategies. The Brooks Group has created a syndicated pharmaceutical market research tool called The Advocate: Supporting the Patient Voice. This annual report began in 2018 and is targeted around the relationship between pharma and advocacy groups and how this impacts policies developed and programmatic support. More importantly, this critical tool also focuses on:

- Corporate reputation

- Leading manufacturers in advanced patient treatment, programmatic/policy support, and professional relations

- Knowledge of PBMs versus payers

- Awareness of copay accumulator programs

- The impact of non-medical switching

Advancing Patient Advocacy

Along with providing a thorough overview of the market landscape, The Advocate also highlights how various pharmaceutical organizations are viewed by their customers while also providing critical benchmark data that outlines industry growth and track records year over year. But what is most useful is that The Advocate polls respondents from professional associations and advocacy organizations — ensuring that the data collected is directly relevant to patient advocacy in the pharmaceutical industry.

Innovating with Credible Intelligence

Innovation is essential to maintaining relevance, exceeding internal goals, and meeting the needs of patients and customers. But to achieve these benchmarks, organizations need credible intelligence that provides a comprehensive and accurate look at the industry, outlines areas for improvement or synergies, and helps identify a path forward.

This blog was originally posted on https://thebrooksgrouponline.com/2021/04/syndicated-healthcare-market-research-and-the-advocate/

Relationship Building for Key Account Management

 

Being a leading Healthcare management consulting firm, at The Brooks Group, we understand that successful account managers do more than simply meeting sales goals. This critical position serves as an intermediary that must balance not only internal growth strategies, but also meet and exceed your clients’ needs. To do this, you need to have an understanding of client needs and a strong relationship with key stakeholders within their firm.

Understanding Client Infrastructure and Organization

Your primary contacts for an account may not be the final decision-makers in that company. Consider that there are three main knowledge levels in an organization:

- Governance

- Formal organizational structure

- Networks within the organization

By knowing who possesses the mission-critical information and who is authorized to give final approval, you can present solutions that are effective for your client and that they would be receptive to. This may require networking with individuals outside of your primary points of contact.

The Importance of Integrating with the Governing Body

Healthcare organizations rely on a governing body to manage oversight as well as key business decisions. This group may be composed of physicians, non-physicians, or a combination of the two. Building relationships with these individuals is critical for ensuring that any recommendations you give to your clients are more likely to be not only considered, but approved.

The Organizational Component

While having a strong network with individuals at the governance level is important, you still need to have alliances with client members who manage the day-to-day tasks. A key account management training program can train you to identify the various organizational levels within your client’s company and leverage those relationships.

In general, most healthcare organizations have three key levels: strategic, operational, and tactical.

Strategic Level

These members are entrusted with making decisions that directly impact not just your account projects, but the profitability and viability of their company. Typically this segment makes up five to 10% of the total workforce.

Operational Level

The operational team members are the individuals that strategize and manage the daily oversight for projects. While they still report to people at the strategic level, these people have a greater understanding of the company’s objectives and current pace at a macro level.

Tactical Level

Members at the tactical level are the people implementing any changes approved by the strategic team that are later organized by operational members. Although not as influential as the other levels, this segment understands the company’s pain points at a granular level.

Identifying Key Targets for Networking

Knowing your client’s organizational flow and governance component are important. Healthcare executive coaching helps you to identify the core roles account members play as this will impact your success. Typically, every client organization will have a decision-maker, information provider, influencer, and gatekeeper.

While the decision-maker may seem like the only important role to befriend, note that this member may rely on the expertise or opinion of others before making a choice — so you can’t neglect the other roles. For example, a gatekeeper is someone who screens information before sharing it with a more influential individual. Building a relationship with this person ensures that your communications are consistently heard by the right people.

Prioritize Relationship Building for Success

Understanding how to effectively build relationships not just with your account team, but external influential members is essential to success. A good account manager is trained to be able to balance internal company sales goals with their client’s needs in a way that not only builds trust but also eliminates the risk of losing an account to a competitor.

This blog was originally posted on https://thebrooksgrouponline.com/2021/04/relationship-building-for-key-account-management/

4 Essential Skills for Pharmaceutical Account Managers

 

Developing key account management skills helps you become a trusted advisor for influential accounts and become a strong candidate for future executive positions.

Here are four key skills that every pharmaceutical account manager should be trained in, to successfully retain the most important accounts.

1. Developing a Value Proposition

How exactly do you convince a potential client to continue to choose your products and services over competitors’? By developing a convincing value proposition.

A value proposition is a statement that shows a potential client exactly how they will benefit from your products and services, and more importantly, why they should choose you.

An excellent value proposition will:

- Generate faster, more profitable sales

- Create a long-standing relationship with key clients

- Outline precisely what your company will do for its customers

- Speed up the client acceptance process

When you put an emphasis on customers’ needs, you’ll be able to create a value proposition that is hard to turn down.

2. Accessing & Integrating at Strategic Levels

In order to become a trusted partner of your account, you must be able to understand their needs and behaviors and leverage this information to boost mutual value creation.

To become an invaluable part of your customer’s team, you must integrate yourself at the strategic level. That means you must create relationships with key players within your account’s organization and position yourself as an integral part of the strategic process, rather than just a replaceable supplier of products and services. This will allow you to grow and profit with that account indefinitely.

3. Gap Analysis

In most organizations there is a gap that separates where they are today and where they want to be. Account managers need to understand this gap and evaluate how they can assist the Key Decision Makers (KDMs) to bridge the gap.

Typically, key problems that most businesses face fall into one or more of these four categories:

1. Strategic

2. Financial / Operational

3. Products and Services

4. Marketing

Account managers should become a trusted advisor to the KDMs by devoting time, effort and energy in helping them overcome their most pressing business challenges and reach their long-term goals.

4. Executive Level Presence

Executive level presence is the ability to show confidence and competence that earns you the respect of colleagues and clients alike. Learning how to maximize your executive presence, exemplify confidence and project competence will drive your success in any professional environment.

Knowing who to talk to about what in an organization is only half the battle. By developing an executive presence, you are guaranteeing that clients and colleagues alike will stop, listen, and seriously consider what you are offering.

Gain These Skills and More with Excellence in Account Management

With The Brooks Group’s Excellence in Account Management program, you’ll learn how to understand and predict the complex needs of your clients so that you can become an invaluable part of their organization

Become a respected part of your own organization by retaining influential accounts and becoming a key component of value creation. Contact us today.

More:

Read about the signs suggesting your account managers need training here

Interested in created a custom learning experience for your account managers? Learn about our instructional design capabilities here

This blog was originally posted on https://thebrooksgrouponline.com/2021/03/4-essential-skills-for-pharmaceutical-account-managers/

Gamification of Employee Onboarding - Is it Helpful?

 

Traditionally, onboarding process consisted of a classroom like environment with presentations and tons of documents that the new employee would go through to learn the policies and procedures of the new employment. The typical process is tedious and boring, and it didn’t lend itself to full knowledge acquisition, or long term retention. 1 in 4 employees leave within 180 days of onboarding.

Gamification of the onboarding process utilizes interactive gaming techniques to engage with the new hires, by using their competitive nature and desire to win. But is there a benefit to gamification over the traditional methods of onboarding? The Brooks Group’s customized interactive instructional design services offer far more benefits to employers than traditional classroom learning. As stated in the demo video found HERE, a few gamification benefits include:

- Increased long term engagement

- Longer knowledge retention

- Increased business goal success

- Employee enjoyment leading to the desire to learn more

The New Employee

The world is changing, and as younger people enter the workforce, they expect more interaction and a sense of accomplishment from their employer. This is true during the onboarding process as well. Transitioning into a new position, a new role or a new company isn’t always smooth. Understanding the company, the rules, and employment expectations are essential for both the employer and the employee, but the traditional knowledge sharing methods are no longer a viable way of learning new information. Employees retaining the vast amounts of information given to them in the first few weeks of employment is crucial for long term productivity and success. Attention spans have globally been narrowing down in recent years, so it is important to present information in an engaging manner. Having interactive onboarding training for new employees increases their chances of retaining the data by 50% and leads to greater productivity once the workflow begins.

Retaining talented employees who work hard and produce results is arguably the most important driver to success and growth for any company. According to studies, having a structured and interactive training program is a positive experience that results in a 69% increase in new hires staying with their new company past the first six months of employment.

Gamification of the Onboarding Process

The world is changing, and younger employees who grew up with gaming consoles and digital technology readily available are entering the workforce in droves. It’s crucial to keep up with the change in worker attitudes and remain competitive by retaining the best of the best. This means every aspect of the job needs to be engaging, helpful, and give employees a sense of accomplishment, including the onboarding process.

Using games, fun, or sometimes even silly interaction to keep a new employee engaged in the process is smart. When employees feel motivated through personal accomplishment, they will strive to work harder and keep getting better. This, in turn, keeps morale high and productivity moving at a swift pace. If an employee realizes, through a fun and engaging onboarding process, the company they’re about to work for will set challenging but reachable goals, they will stay, and the company will retain top talent in their field.

The Brooks Group

The Brooks Group has done extensive research into interactive onboarding and training programs with proven results. In addition to our onboarding programs, the company offers an array of training programs to set up your new employees for success, including:

- Sales and Account Management Training

- Healthcare Executive Leadership Training

Contact us today to learn how you can create a fun and positive learning experience for your new employees that produces long-term success for your organization.

This blog was originally posted on https://thebrooksgrouponline.com/2021/03/gamification-of-employee-onboarding-is-it-helpful/

Top 10 Trends Shaping the Pharmaceutical Industry in 2021 - Part 2

 

 

In part one of this blog post we discussed emerging trends in the pharmaceutical industry, such as the growing use of AI, increased interest in precision medicine, biologics, cloud technology etc.

We are back with part two to discuss more emerging trends in the pharmaceutical industry, and how The Brooks Group can help your brand utilize these trends to maximize profits and growth in 2021.

Discounts and Rebates

Overpriced medications have been the focus of much public ire in recent years, especially when the drugs are considered life-saving. For this reason, both lawmakers and governmental agencies have made it a goal to reduce the cost of drugs with discounts and rebates.

With the growing concern over the prices of life-saving drugs like insulin and epinephrine, it is likely that this pattern of drug price scrutiny will continue into 2021 and beyond. Brooks Group’s managed care training seminars help sales and account managers understand the future of the healthcare market and how it will impact drug pricing.

Biologics

Over the past few years, there has been a growing body of research on the role genes play in disease resistance and susceptibility. This has created a rapidly growing interest in the fields of pharmacogenetics, epigenetics, and genomes.

In other words, pharmaceutical researchers are beginning to focus more on unique genetic factors when developing new treatments for cancers, viral infections, and other conditions. It is expected that genetics will be at the forefront of clinical research and development moving forward.

Focus on R&D

One of the key challenges for research-focused pharmaceutical companies is to make R&D a more efficient process. R&D efficiency is measured by the successful approval of New Molecular Entities (NMEs) and therapies versus the monetary investment required.

With the growing need for research, pharmaceutical companies are having to come up with novel ways to create meaningful R&D without hurting their bottom line. The rapid development of the COVID-19 vaccine has been a marvelous achievement of the biotech and pharma industries in 2020.

Note: The Brooks Group can provide pharma companies with market research to help explore how emerging technologies can improve their R&D efficiency.

Consumerization of the Patient

Now more than ever, patients are expecting more out of their pharmaceutical provider. Given the saturation of the pharmaceuticals market, patients have more control over the medications they choose to take. This means that pharmaceutical companies can no longer just provide medication, they have to take a more personalized, customer-centric approach to drug distribution and marketing.

Creating a more empathetic approach to drug marketing will help pharma companies set themselves apart from the competition.

Pharma companies can learn the right insights that will help them understand the needs of patients and personalize treatments with The Brooks Group’s market research offering for patient advocacy in the pharmaceutical industry.

Digital Training

Digital training is a great way to ensure that employees are properly utilizing new technologies. In the pharmaceutical industry, digital training ensures that employees are operating within the strict parameters of regulatory compliance. Additionally, this form of training maximizes employee efficiency.

The Brooks Groups' digital training programs help ensure that employees are properly utilizing new technology to boost efficiency and reduce compliance violations. The Brooks Group can save organizations money by training personnel on-demand from anywhere.

The Brooks Group Can Help You Leverage These Trends

Understanding what the future has in store for the pharmaceutical industry will allow you to effectively manage your marketing and R&D strategies to keep up with emerging trends.

With The Brooks Group, you can count on expert training, market research, consulting, and instructional design services to help your pharmaceutical brand maximize its growth and profits.

Here is a look at our learning demo sheet for a peak at the kind of insights and training we have to offer. Contact us here for more info.

This blog was originally posted on https://thebrooksgrouponline.com/2021/02/top-10-trends-shaping-the-pharmaceutical-industry-in-2021-part-2/

Market Research in Healthcare: A Must for Avoiding the Blind Spot

 

Healthcare is all about helping people and providing the highest level of care. But, if you don’t know what people need, how can you best serve their interests?

Market research is a must for healthcare and biopharma companies. It’s an in-depth dive into the trends in the industry and the needs of the patients to help organizations make educated decisions about where to direct their budgets and the directions they need to take their organization to. Without adequate research, valuable opportunities might be missed and important customer relationships might be lost.

Instead of reacting to market changes and merely surviving, companies need to be proactive in order to thrive. Market research is essential to learn what the market wants, to avoid blind spots, and to create effective strategies to grow your healthcare practice.

What Is the Blind Spot?

A blind spot is an overlooked opportunity. Whether it’s a missed demographic or misplaced funds, a blind spot is essentially an inefficiency in your business strategy.

In a study, managers were asked which stage of the buyer’s journey is most important for driving revenue. Over half replied that attracting new customers was the most important, which is where they spent most of their budgets.

Only after in-depth market research was it discovered that a 5% increase in renewals from existing customers would boost profits by 25%, and acquiring a new customer is between five and 25 times more expensive than keeping an existing one.

What was the blind spot? Their existing customers. These companies were spending a large portion of their budgets on attracting new customers, when retaining existing customers would have earned them much higher returns on their investments.

Blind spots aren’t only about funding the wrong buyer’s stage. Here are some of the most common blind spots companies overlook:

- Not understanding the real reason prospects make decisions.

- Knowing which marketing incentives are most effective.

- Using the wrong strategies.

- Not knowing where your customers come from.

- Chasing the wrong demographic.

- Misunderstanding perceptions of your brand.

While there’s no finite list, it’s easy for healthcare companies to fall victim to any one of these blind spots.

Benefits of Performing Market Research

To avoid blind spots, you need to know what they are. And the only way to do that is with proper market research.

Healthcare market research is the epitome of the phrase “knowledge is power.” With in-depth analytics, healthcare companies can easily see how to maximize efficiency and best serve their patients, leading to numerous benefits:

- Identify the core factors that drive customer decisions.

- Better understand a patient’s experience.

- Bolster marketing strategies.

- Identify gaps in service.

- Stay on top of market trends.

- Optimize R&D investments.

- Learn how customers perceive your brand.

Without market research, healthcare businesses would have to react to changes after they happen instead of being proactive and getting ahead of the changes.

The Brooks Group: Healthcare Market Research Specialists

The Brooks Group is one of the leading healthcare management consulting firms that specializes in market research. We perform in-depth research for healthcare, pharma and biotech companies to help them create effective business strategies. Some of the services we provide to our clients are -

- Survey organizations to identify the voice of the customer.

- Review responses to identify helpful themes, comments, and messages.

- Conduct internal and external gap analyses

- Provide tools to support patient advocacy in the pharmaceutical industry.

- Perform specialized research into case studies, retrospective analysis, and market trends.

- Create marketing or R&D strategies based on response data.

- Concept testing.

Armed with a thorough understanding of how to optimize your operational strategy, companies can avoid blind spots and grow their brand. If you’re ready to take your business strategies to the next level, contact us to get started.

This blog was originally posted on https://thebrooksgrouponline.com/2021/01/market-research-in-healthcare-a-must-for-avoiding-the-blind-spot/