PHARMA NEWS, MULTICHANNEL & CROSSCHANNEL MAKETING

Bayer’s Facebook ad campaign for multiple sclerosis drug Betaseron and its Betaconnect injector launched this month with several firsts. It's not only Bayer’s first Facebook ad, but it's also the first time Facebook has enabled a scrolling ISI inside a pharma ad.

Scrolling safety information allowed Bayer to stay inside text and photo limits of a pre-determined ad box but still meet FDA guidelines for necessary risk information. While some pharmas already do that in banner ads, it had not been done inside Facebook ads until this campaign, said Craig Hashi, Facebook Health client partner, who--along with Ozgun Demir, associate director of emarketing at Bayer--talked about the work at the Digital Pharma East conference last week.

Another new feature of the ad is the “call now” button, a feature Facebook added last year for business ads. However, for the Betaconnect ad, the phone button is connected to a live nursing-staffed line. To accommodate the real-time interaction, the ad was set up to run only between the weekday hours of 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.

The Betaconnect Facebook campaign is using Lead Ads, which allows users to click to sign up for more information without leaving the site and with the ability to input the person's Facebook account data, such as name and email address, into the form. Going from the initial idea for the ad to publish took about four weeks, Hashi said.

The importance of talent has not gone unnoticed at Bayer, for instance, which embarked on its own digital transformation in 2014. Jessica Federer, Head Digital Development, highlights leadership from the top and a very dedicated implementation team as the two pre-requisites for a successful digital transformation, but sitting at the top of a list of the keys drivers in any successful transformation, is talent.

“The number one thing for us is always the talent – the people. We do have people in our organisation who are world leaders in digital marketing and multichannel marketing and integrated customer experience. We have brilliant people here and you’ve just got to have people that get it and understand it.”

But where do life sciences companies find such extraordinary talent – it can be elusive – and how do they build the necessary skills?

Federer’s colleague Gerhard Arnhofer leads the centre of excellence for integrated multichannel marketing for the pharma business at Bayer. Set up some nine months ago, the centre is one of a number of CoEs within the company, designed to inspire and transform the organisation.

Each deals with a different competency area such that the bundled competencies available within the centres enable the wider organisation to build up its skills, competencies and knowledge in specific areas of focus. This approach is seen as the quickest and most effective way of building digital capability within the organisation.

After several years of impact, individual CoEs are dissolved once they have done their work, at the stage that the organisation as a whole understands more than the CoE can then deliver. Traditionally, this knowledge transfer takes three to five years. This is a technique that Bayer has applied for several years.

One solution is homegrown talent. Bayer runs a dual study programme for undergraduates who spend time at a university on technology and economics programmes and then half their time on the job within the corporation. Bayer is able to hire fresh talent out of that stream and can shape individuals early on in their careers.

Currently, there are a number of people within Arnhofer’s team writing their dissertations and the organisation is interested to see whether this approach will accelerate the digital transformation or not. Topics covered by the students include AI, evaluating concepts of remote detailing, and business decisions analysis, among others. Team members fresh from university have a very keen eye for evaluating problems but need considerable time spent on nurturing them.

Additionally, Berlin has a thriving start-up scene, with a large number of talented people from the digital community originating from all over Europe. This represents a significant talent pool for the company.