Moving with the times: Adapting to a hybrid HCP engagement landscape

Ashfield Engage explores how the COVID-19 pandemic has transformed the way pharma companies interact with healthcare professionals (HCPs), and what it means for the future of HCP engagement.

It’s now been a year and a half since the first reports appeared in the press of a new Coronavirus outbreak in China. Since then, COVID-19 has spread across the globe, taking lives and causing disruption across every economic sector, including the way pharma companies engage with healthcare professionals (HCPs).

Now, as global vaccination programmes continue to accelerate, many countries are looking to re-open their economies again.

It is no surprise, then, that many in the healthcare industry are looking forward to going back to something approaching pre-COVID normal, at least where HCP engagement is concerned, with more face-to-face interaction.

Face-to-face is coming back but remote HCP engagement is here to stay

There is still, evidently, an appetite among HCPs to hear from pharma companies about the latest innovations in healthcare. Accenture research¹ found that an impressive 88% of HCPs say they want to hear about new treatment, in spite of their pre-occupation handling the pandemic.

However, HCPs themselves don’t think we’ll be returning to pre-COVID levels of face-to-face conversations and relationship building anytime soon. On the contrary, they expect the share of remote interactions to double by 2022² compared with pre-pandemic levels. This rise in remote interactions is expected to actually push up total interactions to just above pre-COVID levels over the next 12 months.

Adapting to the new hybrid era

For pharma companies, this new era offers exciting opportunities for further growth, provided they have the infrastructure, resources and expertise in place to manage remote HCP engagement.

So, how can pharma companies ensure they have the capability and capacity to reach their target HCPs, providing them with the information they need and using the channels they wish to be reached on?

We explore this question in part 1 of our new white paper, Adapting to New Realities: The Future of HCP Engagement.

Including research by Sermo, Accenture, and STEM Healthcare, an Ashfield Advisory company, the white paper takes a look at the latest trends in HCP engagement. It offers in-depth insights and key learnings from our experts about how companies can rethink their sales strategies, and reconsider team resource to harness hybrid and omnichannel engagement more effectively.

If you’re considering how to adapt to a more digital and omnichannel HCP engagement future, and want expert advice, then read Adapting to New Realities today.

Alternatively, if you would like to learn more about how we can help your HCP engagement evolve and thrive, contact our expert team