Pharma embraces new sales channel

Leading healthcare media company Australian Doctor Group (ADG) announced today that its new digital sales channel, AccessPlus has “exceeded expectations” with 12 brands signed-on to the platform across a range of therapeutic areas, including respiratory, diabetes, weight loss, dermatology, smoking cessation, female sexual health, mental health, and oncology.

Launched late last year, AccessPlus is a channel that allows pharmaceutical marketers to access and engage with doctors in a novel way.

Australian Doctor Group now boasts a 41,000-plus HCP subscriber base of highly engaged prescribers, predominantly GPs.

ADG’s commercial director, Martha Peacock says AccessPlus fills a “glaring gap” in the market. “With over 39% of GPs no longer seeing sales reps, pharma has been desperate to find a new way to access and engage doctors cost-effectively,” Ms Peacock said. “In many ways AccessPlus mirrors and supports what the rep does in the field by educating, informing and promoting, yet it is in the data, segmentation and insights that the platform truly shines.

“Our pharma clients have never had access to this type of data before. It’s like gold to them.”

According to Ms Peacock, AccessPlus is a flexible platform that suits brands of different sizes. The early adopters have used AccessPlus for a range of brand objectives: To increase brand engagement, to access hard-to-reach doctors with a succinct brand ‘sell’, to drive quick and broad brand awareness at launch, to promote private-script drugs in a cost-effective way, to drive user acquisition to a pharma website, and to augment sales and marketing activity when the fieldforce has been reduced or cut.

“Our clients are already seeing an ROI at a fraction of the cost of a face-to-face sales rep visit, and they are gaining access to HCPs they couldn’t reach before” she said.

“AccessPlus affords marketers previously impossible cost and strategic dividends.”

Source: Australian Doctor Group is the leading healthcare publisher in Australia, #1 across both print and digital with General Practitioners.