Just as companies are coming to understand the value of the information that they can pick up through social media interaction with clients and prospects, so we should be able to envisage a wealth of information from healthcare prospects and clients, to enable the company to make far more targeted approaches and decisions. The pharmaceutical consultancy must understand the growing importance of virtual communication, yet be able to identify ways to plug in the value message. It’s important to analyse every aspect of information that is gathered in this way and to develop simple, yet effective ways of communicating with a prospect or client to generate this intelligence. Schedules and travel constraints being what they are, that when a meeting takes place, face-to-face time between the doctor and the sales rep can often be hurried or take place in a less-than-perfect environment. As such, a virtual style of communication could be seen as far more productive, as it would fit in with the schedules of each individual far more efficiently, by definition. Webinars and online methods of presentation enable high levels of communication through different forms of multimedia. Studies conducted by some pharmaceutical consultancy experts reveal that this can be a highly efficient way of reaching clients and of course it would be far more cost-effective as it cuts out the significant costs associated with travelling, together with the productivity trail off that is endemic. In the future, costs associated with the generation of sales could be reduced significantly, freeing resources to invest in virtual communication tools and software for both the company and its clients.

Pharmaceutical marketing training is growing to accommodate the latest methods of communication. While the pharmaceutical consultant is responsible for educating the sales rep appropriately, these strategies need to be rolled out only at a pace appropriate from the client perspective. While personal communication will always be an important ingredient, we can look forward to a time when productivity will be increased substantially as a consequence of the new virtual styles of communication.

Alan Gillies is the CEO of L2L Consulting, a cutting-edge pharma consultancy firm which specialises in optimising productivity and performance within international companies by applying tailored organisational strategies.

If we begin to think about the metrics that we used in the world of business, we find that we often applied a very general approach to all these issues. There is far too much generalisation and far too little segmentation, resulting in “below par” results. We can see evidence of this when we look at high-volume prescribers, who represent a favoured port of call due to the fact that they seem to have unlimited budgets. Little attention is paid to the individual doctor’s primary motivation, what he or she happens to like, dislike, or what happens to move the doctor to purchase; rather, an assumption is made that spending will be allocated in this niche, irrespective. It’s almost as if they are treating the professional as an automaton and this is surely not what pharmaceutical marketing training seeks to teach, is it?

Industry intelligence can be very valuable and can show how effective a company’s competitors are at reaching a particular professional. It’s not acceptable to use this metric alone when deciding to target, yet this kind of broad brush approach is often used. Surely, results are evident, but just consider how these could have been far more fruitful if a different tactic or approach had been employed. This is why it’s important to analyse the behaviour of different groups of end-users, so that the most appropriate drivers can be targeted. It’s time to stop making assumptions and to start digging deeper, to really understand what motivates a particular professional into making a buying decision. Through a process of segmentation, we can arrive at a variety of different categories and can start to explore more productive results. The pharmaceutical consultancy must embrace diversity and move away from a rather general, middle-of-the-road approach to pharmaceutical marketing training in the modern day.

While it may once have been okay to buy data, resources and other lists based on so-called “intelligence,” this should be questioned today. Many of our competitors could have access to the same lists and it is little wonder that certain doctors feel that they have been overly targeted and are suffering from consultant overloads. It is inconceivable that we could be relying on this style of approach considering how much is at stake and the pharmaceutical consultant really needs to steer senior management toward a better way of analysing data, to come up with a much better solution. Think how certain members of the salesforce may have accrued a lot of intelligent data, simply due to their experience and interaction in the field. Use this kind of intelligence wisely.

Alan Gillies is the Director of L2L Consulting, an elite pharmaceutical consultancy firm which specialises in Strategy Development and Implementation Excellence for prestigious multi-national organisations.

A lot of information can be revealed before you even talk to a prospective seller. But hold on for just a second, are you really sure that you possess the level of enthusiasm you need for this type of business? Is the industry that you are looking at of particular interest to you and do you really want to get actively involved in everything that it represents? Be advised, that unless you want to be a completely “absentee” owner and are considering the many additional steps that you need to take if this is the case, you should be enthusiastic about the business that you are getting involved in.

A process of due diligence requires you to inspect all kinds of documentation:

* Financials: these documents will include balance sheets, payroll records, tax reports, reconciliation documents and profit and loss statements. If the seller claims a considerable amount of “cash sales” but cannot point to these within tax declarations, then they cannot be counted and you must ignore them.

* Employee records: including information on individual behavior, attendance, length of service and pay scales.

* Licenses: including federal, state, city, county as appropriate, plus any certification licenses you must possess to operate the business. Be prepared to consult records independently to see if there have been any discrepancies or problems in the past.

* Equipment records: detailing the age, cost of replacement, any required inspections and associated results and details on maintenance investments.

* Inventory records: including turnover, condition, and re-saleability.

* Supplier contracts: are they transferable, do you have alternatives and is there goodwill?

* Property records: including rental agreements and portability – the latter element is of considerable importance.

When you have inspected all agreements, contracts, licenses and records, you may find they are in good order and will work for you and then need to turn to the question of setting a good value as you buy business assets. There are many different ways of looking at this. Some of the methods used to calculate include:

* Asset-based multipliers, are where a total value of the assets is used to determine a value.

* Rule of thumb, where industry benchmarks are used to establish the value (not recommended).

* Revenue-based multipliers – a percentage is applied to monthly or annual revenues (not recommended).

* Cash flow multiplier, is where a business owner’s profit level is added to his or her salary and any other perks and certain expenses are deducted. This method is most commonly used to determine the value of a business.

Any number of documents and figures can be used by the owner to back up a claim and it is up to you to take these at their value and determine the appropriate conclusions. What is the age and reputation of the business, the level of competition expected, its physical location in many cases, the legal structure of the business, the quality of the premises and/or the difficulty in obtaining a new lease. When looking at a business for sale, take everything into account as you determine whether you should buy a business like this.

Richard Parker is the President and founder of the Diomo Corporation – The Business Buyer Resource Center. His inspiring materials, seminars and consulting have assisted thousands of business buyers with achieving their life long dream to buy a business.

Here lies the main point, the problem that has faced the motivational speaker or corporate trainer for years, now. It may be relatively easy to propel a salesperson to make a plan and to thereby establish a relative goal, but the execution is often the challenge. Theory in the classroom is one thing, the practice is another, with the important goal being to make the salesperson actively aware of real-world challenges and threats and positioning them so that they can cope when the pressure is on. So many divergent factors are in play when the salesperson is talking one-on-one with the prospect and, little understood but probably the biggest hurdle of all, is the problem standing in between the sales person and the contract – the subconscious activity going on in the mind of the salesperson him or herself.

It is very important that pharmaceutical sales training does not set up subconscious, relatively impossible and/or psychologically negative barriers, potentially compromising effective implementation. We often hear that nothing less than a 100% result is acceptable and this often forms the basis for setting sales goals in the first place. Such a “set in stone” position can often result in failure, however, and we must view opportunities from all different angles. It is sometimes better to accept a result that can be classified as a significantly high percentage, rather than striving to get 100% of zero.

A sales person must be taught that a display of persistence in the face of adversity is important. This is not to say that the person should push forward under all circumstances, as it is equally as important to understand that certain parameters may have made any kind of sale unattainable. This requires a person to adapt and evolve and use internal motivation to dodge the final line of defence and score the goal.

To create a solid foundation, the organisation must provide absolute commitment in terms of training, resource availability and a strong product, to support the sales force from the beginning. This is where critical, key account management training works best, infusing the right person with the right amount of knowledge and ability, allowing them to implement effectively and according to unequivocal guidance from senior management personnel.

Alan Gillies is the Managing Director of L2L Consulting, specialising in enabling pharmaceutical companies to achieve new heights of productivity and performance, throughout all levels of management and revenue generating activities.

There are many definitions of key account management but fundamentally it is the process of handling significant accounts by offering them a consistent package of products or services that are entirely tailored to their requirements. It’s far from as simple as that, of course and depends on many complicated and often associated factors. Company executives often find it difficult, if not impossible to establish a set of criteria to determine how they should handle and manage appropriately. In many cases, significant customers will be looking for enhanced value through selection of preferred suppliers. As they do this, they seek information that could help them strategically, look for partners to help them with certain projects, or sophisticated levels of economic financing. Depending on their level of proficiency, they may also seek and demand that their suppliers maintain a sophisticated approach to the relationship and even become party to the adoption of certain accounting, procurement and delivery methods.

It is unlikely that two key accounts will have similar make-up, structure and behavioural characteristics and it is likely that each will have specific demands, putting considerable strain on the pharmaceutical company, from a logistical and resource allocation perspective. Expect to come across complex demands, ensuring that sophisticated techniques must be initialised before the client can be classified as satisfied. The underlying challenge is to make the client feel as if their company is the only organisation that matters to the pharmaceutical company.

While many of the techniques deployed by the pharmaceutical sales training company during key account management training may be strictly confidential and essentially hidden from public view, the company will want to ensure that the net result of its activities will result in reputational gain. Some external parties may view the relationship as a successful and developing one – and as such, key account management deployment can be beneficial in terms of attracting the attention of new clients, in the future. Not surprisingly, pharmaceutical sales training always has many different perspectives and potential goals.

Alan Gillies is the Managing Director of L2L Consulting, specialising in enabling pharmaceutical companies to achieve new heights of productivity and performance, throughout all levels of management and revenue generating activities.

The healthcare industry touches almost every individual in the country at some stage and due to its sheer size, drug spending is always a subject of great attention. Indeed, it is estimated that spending on pharmaceuticals can account for up to 15% of the total amount spent within the health industry and with such high numbers at stake, marketing proficiency, or a lack of it, can have big consequences.

The sales force is critical to the success of the pharmaceutical company as it spends much of its time directly interacting with front-line professionals, advisors and practitioners. It is so important for the sales executive to interact successfully with a professional if progress is to be maintained. As the executive engages with the professional, a lot of time and effort can be put into trying to achieve a result, but as the practitioner is often turned off to marketing practices and advances, this can be a ‘tough nut to crack.’

Indeed, a healthcare professional can have a lot of other sources of input, being focused and highly educated to start off with, including first-hand experience, personal training, scientific paper research and advice from colleagues. There is a danger that he or she could believe that the pharmaceutical company sales executive has but one motive in mind and as such, the sales executive requires fairly advanced communication and marketing skills to succeed.

As the pharmaceutical industry matures, more emphasis is being placed on these product areas and with advances in medicine, an increasingly higher level of education is important for the sales team. This level of complexity can be worrying to the senior management of a pharmaceutical company, as they have enough to worry about with regard to political lobbying, the enforcement of regulations, development of products and numerous economic issues. In these times, many turn to pharmaceutical consulting firms to advise them and principally, to steer and educate their sales forces.

Generally, pharmaceutical consultants have a great deal of first-hand experience within the market and specifically with regard to dealing first-hand with professionals and end users. They can advise about correct motivation and the proper balance of training versus direct, “feet on the street” time. In most cases, pharma consulting can help to instil the correct amount of urgency within the sales staff member, while helping to ensure that the team works across different tangents. The executive must not only work with the best interest of the employing company at heart, but must seek to engage the acceptance and trust of the end-user professional at a critical stage in the product life. Applying the correct amount of direct motivation and training smarts represents the required balance.

Alan Gillies is the Director of L2L Consulting, an elite pharmaceutical consultancy firm which specialises in Strategy Development and Implementation Excellence for prestigious multi-national organisations.

These days, key account management training is so important as the company develops a line of procedural guidelines, disseminated from the highest levels for clarity. However, one of the major challenges facing the company hierarchy is one of communicating to its sales staff through pharmaceutical sales training and in turn ensuring that the level of communication, both outgoing and incoming to and from a client organisation, is perfectly formed.

So important is the level of communication, that relationships between the buyer and seller can hinge entirely on this element, as tenuous as it might be when based on interpersonal and effective relationships between two key people — the client representative and the key account manager at the pharma company.

As soon as a pharmaceutical company knows that a certain account is “key,” pharmaceutical sales training kicks in to ensure that the details of this relationship are perfectly disseminated and communicated throughout the company to all of those who are impacted. In doing so, these actions and responses are coordinated and consistent. Not all parts of this policy can be automatically rolled out as we have to remember that human foibles can often interject. Never put so much attention on a certain individual at an interface, so that the relationship breaks down if something goes wrong. Rather, it should be necessary to build a network of channels between the company and its clients, both formal and informal if needed, so that the risk of catastrophic failure is minimised.

The pharmaceutical company would be best served by establishing and implementing regular development, planning and review meetings and exercises, with the clear aim of “over delivering” to satisfy the relationship.

The primary motivators behind the ongoing establishment of a relationship are seldom restricted to finance alone, and it is likely that the sharing of pertinent and confidential information between both parties could be key to the ongoing relationship. As such, the pharmaceutical company must be well aware of who, within the client organisation, is the key person responsible for receiving such information, clearly identifying the role and ensuring success. Without putting too fine a point on it, interpersonal communication and relationships must be very sophisticated, but it is equally important that the focus is not on the particular personality associated with the individual fitting the role. From time to time a “key” individual may leave his or her role and should this happen, ongoing functionality will not be compromised.

Alan Gillies is the Director of L2L Consulting, an elite pharmaceutical consultancy firm which specialises in Strategy Development and Implementation Excellence for prestigious multi-national organisations.

One of the primary reasons why a sales team member may fail to consummate a deal with the prospect is due to a lack of understanding of the potential client’s problems, issues and concerns. He or she should remember that financial details associated with the sale are not to be treated as primary, yet much further down the list. Today, the marketplace is very competitive and it’s not realistic to assume that a product will be sold just because it is available. On the contrary, many questions arise and all issues must be dealt with before the front-line professional will be at all ready to even trust the business, let alone engage and move forward. This arena is very delicate, a hard approach to selling will always fail and as such, a sales executive who isn’t very familiar this type of business approach should be specifically counselled by the pharmaceutical consultant.

When interacting with the client, pitching the benefits of the product must await its particular time and place. Due to unwelcome hard sales tactics deployed by old style salespeople, a certain lack of professionalism and the emergence of years of distrust, a degree of hostility can be expected in any potential relationship at a primary stage. This hostility can be difficult to overcome and one of the first tasks of the executive should be to build trust to enable the ratio of effective implementation to improve.

These days, pharma consulting firms are well versed with the difficulties ahead, have considerable practice in the industry and know how to overcome the expected barriers. This will require a focused approach, the training of adequate sales techniques, an understanding of territorial application and time management and, of course, product education, as without all these the sales closure ratio will be poor. As margins are so narrow, the company does not have the luxury of padding in this area and must ensure that the pharmaceutical sales team is as prepared as humanly possible to engage in bringing results.

Motivation is important when it comes to the sales team’s results, but financial remuneration or a convoluted bonus structure should not be primary, rather job dedication and performance satisfaction should be powerful incentives themselves. Financial remuneration alone will always tend to skew the executive’s approach to the task and he or she may not view the consummation of the deal as a two-way and ongoing relationship with a new client.

Alan Gillies is the Director of L2L Consulting, an elite pharmaceutical consultancy firm which specialises in Strategy Development and Implementation Excellence for prestigious multi-national organisations.

Healthcare can be seen as a growth industry for a considerable time ahead as the baby boomer generation starts to age and comes to a period when more strain is likely to be placed on the healthcare system. This will call for innovation and the provision of additional services and products by the pharmaceutical company. Competition in the marketplace is sure to evolve.

Costs will be under the microscope in the near future and insurance companies will be torn from both sides, due to their role as the intermediary. Healthcare professionals are sure to receive pressure, as they weigh up the advice that they should give their patients in the light of new rules and rafts of legislation. In short, a period of uncertainty can be expected to add even more pressures to an already pressure packed environment.

In the future, pharmaceutical consultants, already in high demand, will be even more valuable as the role of pharma consulting extends to decipher these new rules and implications. A company’s workforce will benefit from the training provided by these consultants, as they deliver results and draw on years of experience, training and expertise. The parent company’s executives have much to do dealing with the daily concerns and requirements associated with regulatory pressures and production issues. They should devote valuable time to staff administration, maintenance and training. To help ensure that sales executives are deployed correctly and return as high a value as possible to the company, the pharmaceutical consulting firm is ready and willing to take on this important task.

The healthcare business is one of our most dynamic industries and pharmaceutical and healthcare consulting is a critical internal component. Not all organisations interested in the development of a pharmaceutical company can be classified as “friendly” and this puts significant pressures on the company. A pharmaceutical consulting firm is best positioned to advise the company’s executives, by interpreting each position and working out how to approach and handle each party from a position of strength. Make no mistake, there are challenging and risky times ahead, yet these times could also be potentially lucrative and the consultant can be an additional pair of ears and eyes, together with a valued resource. The company is advised to consider a long-term engagement with the pharmaceutical and healthcare consulting firm accordingly.

Alan Gillies is the Managing Director of L2L Consulting, specialising in enabling pharmaceutical companies to achieve new heights of productivity and performance, throughout all levels of management and revenue generating activities.

The key client understands why it should be designated as “key,” whether that is purely to do with revenue levels or not or whether, as more likely, it is a product of strategic positioning as well. This client will expect a certain level of attention from the company and will be looking for leadership positioning in the industry, as part and parcel of the agreement to do business in the first place.

Always maintain a two way association between the company and the client. Where competition is rife, options are always available and the company must ensure that it is always doing more than could be expected of it. Within the very make up of a company, all staff should be infused with this philosophy, but this can be a difficult position to achieve. A pharmaceutical consulting firm can be worth its weight in gold in these situations. Due to the amount of experience that they have built up, pharmaceutical consultants can be really knowledgeable and can even understand a client’s requirements better than the company itself. Consultants should be engaged to help train staff at all levels, to bring them up to speed with the necessary intricacies of dealing with clients.

For example, a client will often be looking for the company to be proactive, to be always looking for ways to improve the relationship and to help the client act on data and information that they already have. Interaction in this way will not necessarily result in a direct revenue increase and therefore if the sales executive is only motivated by revenue related bonuses, this level of incentivisation may not work in everyone’s best interests at all.

It is often not as “black-and-white” as this and even the most sophisticated incentivisation scheme employed by the pharmaceutical company can fail to break down the invisible barrier to success. A lot of experience is called for in this situation and each key account must be handled carefully and with precision.

Hidden costs are often involved and the pharmaceutical company must understand that it should be very sparing in its designation of “key” account status. Senior management must be able to read between the lines and see the strategic importance of the relationship, over and above pure revenue and cost line items. These days, pharma consulting firms can help reveal these points of reason and can in certain circumstances help the company to understand that a particular client may not in fact represent the company’s best interests.

Alan Gillies is the CEO of L2L Consulting, a cutting-edge pharma consultancy firm which specialises in optimising productivity and performance within international companies by applying tailored organisational strategies.