This discussion interviews Harshit Jain, a physician turned entrepreneur and founder of Doceree, a company solving healthcare professional marketing challenges focused on pharmaceuticals.
Harshit highlights the exciting opportunities in pharma marketing today which include targeting capabilities and data enablement. He emphasizes the importance of harnessing data to power marketing programs and enable precise targeting.
Marketing has seen a shift in focus towards the middle and bottom parts of the customer journey, which are closer to the point where prescriptions are written. Digital channels like EHR and telehealth are becoming increasingly vital for pharmaceutical brands to engage with healthcare professionals effectively.
The biggest challenges are linking data together across various touchpoints, channels, and platforms. Harshit suggests that an open ecosystem approach, with seamless data flow between touchpoints, can help brands stitch together a cohesive and personalized customer experience.
Listen or read the transcript below to learn more.
Michelle: Hi, my name's Michelle Benz, content director here at Fierce Pharma. I'm joined today by Harsha Jain of Dockcare. Thank you so much for taking the time to join me.
Harshit: Thank you, Michelle, for inviting me. It's my pleasure to be here. Would you
Michelle: like to tell us a little bit more about yourself and your company before we begin?
Harshit: See, I'm a physician by training, but I practiced back in 2006. Don't practice anymore. Uh, built two startups, uh, worked in advertising for a while, and now started doCare. Just over three years ago. And so we started doCare to address challenges of healthcare professional marketing focused on pharma.
Michelle: What are the most exciting opportunities for enablement in pharma marketing today?
Harshit: I think pharma marketing is really at an advantageous position in terms of how digital Marketing is like taking shape with the entire [00:01:00] identity conversation and a targeting conversation. I feel the, the, the great opportunities that pharma has is about targeting capabilities and about data enablement. I think there's a lot of conversation happening around data.
Harshit: And I had a session in the morning around data, data everywhere as well, right? I think it's about how data can be utilized to start powering the programs that brands are really creating. And it can enable the targeting and other activities.
Michelle: In what ways are digital capabilities? Enabling pharma companies to personalize and impact the customer experience.
Harshit: Yeah, it's an interesting question and I think different people have different take on it. So I think the way I look at it is about looking at the customer journey, right? I think Till now, most of the investments were happening at the top of the funnel in the customer journey, which was way far from where a script is being written, [00:02:00] right?
Harshit: Now, through data and the other channels and digital enablement. We are seeing a lot of focus on the middle and bottom parts of the funnel, which actually really matter to pharmaceutical brands because it is closest to the point where script is being written, right, especially the bottom of the funnel where EHR and telehealth comes in, where the actual patient physician encounter is happening and a script is being written.
Harshit: So those channels are becoming increasingly more important. In the overall digital ecosystem, where we are started to look at customer journeys
Michelle: as an industry expert. What do you think the challenges that life science brands face reaching H U P s effectively? And what do you suggest could be one of the solutions to tackle this?
Harshit: Yeah, so in my mind, I think the biggest challenge for life sciences marketeers is to how to link the data together, right? And it is not just about the silos in which [00:03:00] data exists, right? I think silos are being broken and data is coming together, but it is about being able to establish connections between various touch points, between various channels, between various platforms, right?
Harshit: Because All the investments cannot be moved to a single platform, right? I think what they need is more of an open ecosystem play where there are pipes flowing between various touch points seamlessly through which they're able to stitch an experience together.
Michelle: Thank you so much for joining me today. I really appreciated hearing your perspectives.