“Thought leaders are an essential component of pharma communication”

In the last 10 years, PR has taken a different dimension, especially after the entry of social media and the rapid shift to digital, especially in the pandemic period. At the same time the industry has been facing stiff challenges, moreover client expectations have also increased, with more emphasis being given to digital and online reputation management. The industry has undergone a radical shift and the current times have pushed the industry to change gears.

In conversation with Adgully, Magline Rufina F R, Director – Communications, Boehringer Ingelheim India, speaks about how pharma communication has evolved over the years and what changes the pandemic period has brought about in this field.

The pandemic has disrupted every industry. What are some of the challenges the pharma industry had to face and how did you engage and communicate with your key stakeholders?

Over the past two years, people’s appetite to learn about various elements of healthcare – spanning correlation between medical conditions, role of specialised care and availability of infrastructure in their neighbourhood, etc. – has increased multi-fold. As people continue to remain eager for information, it has become imperative to consistently provide credible and expert content around various diseases. Thereby, consistent communication has emerged key to assuaging anxieties and enabling access to reliable and useable information.

Consistent engagement and personal interactions could best describe communication with healthcare experts. With enabling engagement on a digital ecosystem becoming a necessity, we at Boehringer Ingelheim, focused on developing content sources, digital competencies across teams and a channel infrastructure that was tailored to reach our various audiences.

PR has a major role to play in the pharma sector. Associations like OPPI are making every effort to educate doctors and end consumers on various diseases. What has been the role of Boehringer Ingelheim India when it comes to PR especially in the case of noncommunicable diseases?

Boehringer Ingelheim India has been working towards bringing value to patients in India, through its innovative therapy solutions and quality information on various non-communicable diseases, in close collaboration with experts. PR has been an integral part of our focus on patient value. Our strategy has been to engage with our audiences through consistent, comprehensive, easily accessible, audience-friendly and geographically relevant information programmes. We have made significant strides in enabling such a programme in the therapy areas of brain stroke, heart failure and diabetes with a 360-degree approach encompassing mass media, public relations, advocacy, and virtual events. One of our significant wins in this space has been a stroke awareness initiative that achieved a Guinness World Records title for “most pledges received for a stroke awareness campaign in one week”.  Our consistent messaging on stroke care through a mix of media that included multiple digital media touchpoints, radio and television helped us build familiarity and understanding around brain stroke identification and care. We look forward to replicating some of the learnings from such a programme in other focus therapy areas in the coming years.

Training and drawing strategy for each quarter with your field force is partially hampered. How are you engaged with your field force and how do you help them on the communication strategy every quarter?

With COVID-19 disrupting daily operations, we soon realised the potential of digital channels to engage with doctors and people in innovative ways. Our teams were equipped with knowledge to leverage technology and utilise new channels like webinars and social networks to create a more personalised experience. We continue to work with our field force to understand what works well and develop future communication strategies accordingly.

Digital has made a major dent in every other industry. How have you adapted to the digital transformation and what are some of the innovations you introduced to stay engaged with your stakeholders?

As with other industrial sectors, the pharmaceutical industry has considerably progressed in its ability to engage with its relevant audiences virtually over the past years. We leveraged similar tools to engage with our stakeholders such as virtual ad-boards, podcasts, webcasts, customer relationship management (CRM) systems, and social networks to understand preferences of the healthcare professionals’ community, understand patient needs and offer an improved and personalised experience. We foresee that such virtual engagements will continue to be an essential aspect of the new normal. These engagements help us offer improved access to global experts and knowledge on medical advancements to our network of HCPs in India. The digital medium is growing as a platform for credible information, personalised experiences, improved awareness, and innovative healthcare solutions, resulting in a pool of well-informed patients and better-connected healthcare experts.

Thought leaders play a very pivotal role in the pharma industry. How are you leveraging your various KOL to engage with multiple stakeholders and sending the right messages across the industry?

Thought leaders are an essential component of pharma communication as audiences seek information and guidance from experts. Commonly referred to as Key Opinion Leaders (KOLs), healthcare thought leaders also provide a valuable source of insights on needs of consumers, drug development, effective marketing or regulatory requirements. Additionally, they are role models for their community on various aspects of therapy and service. We have been working with such experts across key therapy areas to create much needed awareness around diseases such as brain stroke, heart failure and diabetes. Through our engagements, we have witnessed a few key trends emerge – need for short format packages of usable information, digital patient-doctor interfaces to support consultations, interactive knowledge platforms and significantly increased messaging on NCDs like diabetes, cardio-vascular conditions and neurological diseases.

Boehringer Ingelheim is a global pharma giant. What are the best practices that you draw from your international counterparts and follow in India more on the communication strategy and customer engagement front?

As a global pharma company, we have always endeavoured to be at the forefront of research and innovation. This also reflects in our communication strategy as we engage with our stakeholders through new ways to facilitate access to therapies and information around disease areas. We have engaged in the production of information programmes that are comprehensive, audience-friendly and region-specific. For instance, our information programmes around stroke included a 360-degree approach covering mass media, public relations, advocacy as well as virtual events.

With lifestyles and health needs changing during the pandemic months, we realised that there was a unique opportunity to raise awareness around various non-communicable diseases (NCDs) including diabetes, heart failure and brain stroke as there was a noticeable increase in people’s interest in health. Additionally, consumers are increasingly engaging in healthy behaviour to prevent diseases. Our objective is to eventually progress from awareness to engagement, wherein people are equipped with information to be able to engage with their doctors in a meaningful manner and to minimise the economic burden of healthcare to the country and their families.