New Service Shows Complete Picture of Pharmaceutical Sales Force
with the addition of prescription tracking
SINGAPORE and HONG KONG /Xinhua-PRNewswire/ -- GfK HealthCare Asia has concluded two highly successful pilots for its Sales Force Effectiveness (SFE) program, a new service that provides complete information on sales representative visits while detailing the scale and source of prescriptions filled in the Asian market. The cardiology pilots, conducted in Thailand and Taiwan, provide a dramatic improvement on what pharmaceutical companies are able to learn about the performance of their key products vs. the competition.
SFE, under GfK HealthCare Asia's Syndicated Services umbrella, has three main components. DRX calculates the number of prescriptions filled for all drugs in our survey. DREP tracks all sales representative visits. DRECALL logs what doctors recall about the visits. Together they provide an extremely detailed and absolute portrait of how a sales force is performing, from hard figures such as number of prescriptions written to softer qualitative details, such as what messages are being recalled vs. delivered. SFE shows precisely what influences a doctor to prescribe -- something which no other study in Asia currently allows you to understand.
One of the hallmarks of SFE is its ability to gauge a product's performance across multiple specialties.
"When a physician prescribes a particular drug for a hypertension patient, we can identify the source, determining whether it was a cardiologist, endocrinologist, nephrologist or GP who wrote the prescription," explains Ken Walsh, Director Syndicated and Surveys, Asia. "No other research firm can provide that level of detail on the Asian market."
The timeliness of SFE is another key factor. SFE supplies prescription volumes every month, as opposed to the industry norm of every six.
"Typically, companies see data on the number of prescriptions filled twice a year. They can only look retrospectively when making decisions about their future -- and they must wait an extended period to gauge the results. With monthly reporting, companies can see today what they can change tomorrow," adds Mr. Walsh.
Additionally, SFE provides all-inclusive information on sales force visits. Companies can see what doctors are told, what they remember and what they write -- again and again with the same doctors. This is critical, because pharmaceutical companies cannot currently assess the effectiveness of their sales force at the doctor level over time in Asia. SFE sheds light on what happens during the visit, and the ensuing take-away message. "Is a doctor told that a drug is superior because its efficacy is better than the competition, or because the side effects are minimal? SFE provides the strategic insight to answers those questions," says Mr. Walsh.
"In this market, many companies have been forced to operate in the dark, something that isn't recommended in healthcare. We're excited to be changing that," finishes Mr. Walsh.
About GfK HealthCare AsiaGfK HealthCare Asia is a specialist group of GfK, handling information services within the region's healthcare markets relating to product development, communication, image, pricing, market positioning and customer satisfaction.
About The GfK Group The GfK Group is the No. 4 market research organization worldwide. Its activities cover five business divisions, Consumer Tracking, HealthCare, Retail and Technology, Media and Custom Research. In addition to 15 German subsidiaries, the company has over 120 subsidiaries and affiliates located in 57 countries. Of a current total of around 8,000 employees, approx. 1,500 are based in Germany. For further information, visit our website: www.gfk.com
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