New Zealand Marketing magazine

Patient work

Originally published in NZ Marketing November-December 2009, page 34

How Roche is persuading specialist clinicians to listen

When a partner company withdrew from New Zealand, Roche goods, a leading supplier of pharmaceutical products, was faced with the problem of communicating the benefits of its product Neupogen to its primary audience, hospital-based cancer specialists.

A new strategy and a clever direct marketing campaign resulted in 36 percent growth in sales and a market share of 20 percent, within a year. The annual campaign exceeded sales forecasts by 16 percent.

Background

Neupogen is a daily injection used to boost the immune system of chemotherapy patients. The drug encourages the growth of white blood cells, which are depleted during chemotherapy, exposing patients to infection and decreasing treatment effectiveness.

Although Neupogen is a proven drug, backed by strong clinical evidence, market research in late 2006 revealed that New Zealand doctors were administering six once-daily injections versus the ideal ten, compromising the drug’s effectiveness and reducing revenue. Poor understanding of the clinical benefits with the optimal ten day dosage was a major barrier to switching the market to the long-acting form of Neupogen, Neulastim.

Roche planned to launch Neulastim, which offers the equivalent effect of ten day’s of Neupogen in a single injection, at the end of the year. A great story for the country’s 120 cancer clinicians, but only if they agreed that patients needed ten days of Neupogen. Unfortunately they didn’t.

What’s new

With no in-market sales representation, Roche chose direct mail as the key communications channel. The objective was to position Neupogen as a 10-day therapy and prepare the market for the launch of the long-acting Neulastim.

Messaging

With a limited budget, the Roche marketers saw an opportunity to deliver a smart message to specialist doctors, who are time poor and tend to ignore promotions from the pharmaceutical industry. The resulting five mailers are witty and simple.

Results

Customer research showed that, unusually, most cancer specialists interviewed recalled the 10-day message and several of the mailers. Even clinicians who protested at the simplicity and frequency of messaging, or who claimed to be immune to such advertising, responded to the mailers’ messages. An impressive response rate of more than 40 percent for the second mailer of the series was achieved against typical direct mail responses of ten to 15 percent.

The programme’s success was based on a clear understanding of the market issues, situation and customers.

Post-programme analysis confirms the success of the direct mail campaign—the first time Roche has conducted research on the effectiveness of a single campaign element.

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