Driving Innovation And Value Creation Through A Customer-Centric Culture
Pharma must seriously look at other sectors to learn how to deliver true customer centric thinking relevant to pharma, says Russell Powter.
‘Customer centric
culture’ is something that has been talked about in the pharma industry for
some time, but very few pharma companies actually deliver it to the same degree
as their ‘non-pharma’ counterparts. Yet it
is more important than ever as changing market models mean that consistently providing
real customer value and positive customer ‘experience’ is ever more critical.
Achieving sustainable,
long-term organic profit growth requires a combination of several elements: a
clear, relevant customer promise that is valued; delivering on that promise
consistently; continuously improving on it; periodically innovating beyond the
familiar; and supporting all this with an organisation that’s open to new ideas
and market feedback.
And yet if we are
honest, the words ‘customer centric’ are used but this kind of culture is not
widespread either in pharma.
So what is a
‘customer centric culture’? Simply put, it is all about understanding your
brand value and delivering it consistently to customers. This doesn't mean meeting every customer’s
need, nor satisfying every customer. It
means focusing on the things they value most that link to your overall business
strategy and brand promise. The essence
of marketing strategy…
The world’s most
valuable brands make significant investments to ensure that they can deliver on
their customer promises day after day. Although
the business operations of companies such as Google, Apple, UPS, Gillette and
Amazon vary greatly, they all recognise satisfied customers as one of the
pillars of long-term success. It is no
surprise that all of these companies are also recognised as leading innovators.
Customer satisfaction
builds trust, a key component of a valuable brand, which in turn supports
innovation. In fact, every successful
innovation strengthens the brand, while a strong brand encourages customers to
try the company’s new offerings and even makes them a little more forgiving if
these don’t immediately deliver as promised. Companies underestimate this link between
customer satisfaction, innovation and growth at their peril.
So immediately we hit
some challenges.
‘Brand’ marketing is
about the whole customer interaction, yet too often in pharma we just focus on
the tangible product or the ‘brand’ as a name and a visual expression of its
essence. A truly strong and successful
‘brand’ has a number of different components, which together build the customer
experience of that ‘brand’ as a whole.
Every valuable brand
has two shared attributes: customer awareness (within the relevant
market) and trust. Awareness can
be achieved through market presence and communications, but trust must be
earned by delivering on the brand promise and building familiarity over time. Great brands are based on great customer
experience, and then reinforced with excellent communications — not the other
way round.
Positive customer
experience has been central to the success of Apple for many years. In addition to
capturing headlines with its bold product innovations, Apple develops the
infrastructure and support required to ensure that its products live up to
customer expectations.
Innovation in the
molecular sense is a challenge. We all
know that the timelines, complexity and regulatory hurdles within
pharmaceutical development make major, rapid product innovation a challenge.
So perhaps we need to
look elsewhere and think differently about innovation. It’s important for any innovative company to
strike the right balance; overemphasis on trying to identify breakthrough
projects can distract from seeing customers’ immediate needs. We all know from our own experience that
customers can’t reliably identify their latent needs, nor can they tell you
whether they would buy such a product if they could.
But that’s not the
point. It is better to change our perspective from ‘completely new, never been
seen before’ to ’beyond the familiar.’ The
latter builds on what customers already know, rather than asking customers to
gamble on something completely different that the company may or may not be
able to deliver profitably.
Again, Apple is a
good example of this. Well known for
systematically rethinking existing product categories from the user’s
perspective, it learns from the technology pioneers and from its own early
mistakes, and relentlessly improves functionality and ease of use (building on
what is already familiar and intuitive to customers) - while still ensuring
high reliability and stunningly attractive design. Its brand promise is based on making
technology accessible and attractive to the wider market, not on breakthrough
functionality that only geeks will find useful.
Though seen as an
innovator, Apple is not a technology pioneer. The early Mac wasn’t the first personal
computer with a graphical user interface. Likewise, MP3 players were common before the
iPod, and iTunes wasn’t the first online music store. Yet it is Apple that dominates portable music
players and, more recently, smart phones with the iPhone.
In each case, Apple’s
customers really don’t care whether the technologies are radical or incremental
or whether Apple was first. Their main
concern is that the products meet real needs and that they are attractive, easy
to use, reliable and offer ‘value’.
So what could a truly
‘customer centric’ approach be for the pharmaceutical industry?
First up, LISTEN. Understanding what truly satisfies customers
and even more importantly what causes dissatisfaction is key. Really knowing what is important to them is
critical (i.e. being relevant). This
helps us understand the aspects of the brand ‘promise’ that we need to
consistently deliver on. For example, we
cannot ignore the fact that physicians want to understand the brand works in
the real world as opposed to the clinical trial setting; nor that payers want
to understand the true value it brings to healthcare delivery rather than the
theoretical value.
Next it is all about
creating TRUST with the customer. This
comes from the customers’ whole experience of the ‘brand’. The underlying product needs to deliver consistently
on its ‘promise’, one part of which is to meet or exceed performance
expectations. We can help that by
ensuring the product is used in the right patients.
When it comes to
INNOVATION, it is as much about the customer experience of using the brand as it
is about an entirely new molecule. For
some brands this can mean innovating the delivery mechanism. For others perhaps, it is about providing a
stream of evidence that fits neatly with where the physicians are heading in
their treatment thinking.
Relevance and value
are central to any good customer experience. Too often we do not offer the optimum level of
either.
The AuthorRussell Powter is Managing Consultant at Cello Health Consulting. He can be contacted at rpowter@cellohealth.com.
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