Syntropy

NGP. What exactly is early phase communication planning, and how early is early?
RK. Communication begins as soon as somebody has something to say about their product.  So we believe that communication planning should be in place as soon as you have something to say, otherwise it will be uncontrolled and ad hoc.

Communication is the means by which a company will, over the lifecycle of the product, extract maximum value from their intellectual property. It’s also the means by which they must meet the legal regulatory requirements, so it’s extremely important.

In terms of how early is early, at the point at which a product is in late stage discovery, there is scientific information to convey. Ideally and in practice, early phase communication planning can begin with the product coming out of discovery and going into clinical development; D2D : discovery into development.

NGP. What should companies look for in a provider of early phase communication, and what experience and skills should an early phase communication consultancy offer?
PF. There are two primary characteristics of providers of early phase communication. The first is that they should be independent – their structure and their place in the market should allow them complete freedom to apply the best possible thinking to the communication needs at hand. The second is that they should be specialists in this area, as opposed to using a general agency, or somebody inappropriate for a very specific timeframe.

What experience and skills should they offer? Given the stage of development of the products, providers should have the ability to understand the science of the product, and they should be able to understand how to apply that science in communication development. They need to understand the drug development process in considerable detail; how, inside a drug company, teams are formed and how they operate to bring products through the development process.

They also need to have the ability to distill, in some cases, quite large quantities of data into information, and they should have a significant in-house pharma marketing or commercialisation background.

NGP. Don’t the service agencies in medical education, public relations and healthcare advertising provide something similar, and wouldn’t there be advantages for pharma companies in using one of their existing agencies?
RK. Early phase communication planning is done anticipating that eventually it may be applied across many different communication channels.  Consistency over time is going to be one of the fundamental requirements. We’re conscious of the fact that the messaging developed in early phase communication planning will be used by ‘downstream’ delivery agencies – in medical education, PR and healthcare advertising.

So would there be advantages for pharma companies in using one of their existing agencies? No. We’re all conditioned primarily to ‘look into our own backyard’ – it is human nature to default to the circumstances we are most familiar with, and therefore agencies will craft only what they need, expressed in the language of their own sector.  Early phase communication needs to take a broad, encompassing perspective.

NGP. What currently is a typical communication planning modus operandi in global pharma?
PF. As you might expect, there isn’t one. In contrast with other aspects of the drug development process, which in many cases are heavily regulated by external agencies, there is no accepted ‘standard’ for the communication planning process.

Laboratory work is regulated by Good Laboratory Practice. The clinical development phase is regulated by Good Clinical Practice standards. Manufacturing is heavily regulated by Good Manufacturing Practice standards.

When it comes to communication planning, however, there are no standards. In the majority of companies, and with the majority of products, many activities are left until relatively late in the development phase, often during phase III. The downside of this is often the loss of the scientific story, because when the product moves into clinical development, in many cases the research scientists are transferred off the product.

Importantly, by leaving communication planning so late, companies have to “recover” from messages which have already been disseminated in an inconsistent manner. And lastly, they miss opportunities to engage with their customers during the development process.

NGP. Why don’t all global pharma companies benefit from doing early phase communication planning?
RK.Traditionally, communication planning hasn’t taken place until later stages of development, but the picture is changing. The investment that’s needed to bring a new product to the marketplace over the last 20 years has increased more than twenty-fold, which may be one reason why we are seeing communication planning initiated at an earlier stage. Companies that have a vision of the future, realistic objectives and that know where they are going are generally the ones that plan their communication right from the beginning.

NGP. What advantages do you believe early phase communication planning offers to the companies, and what are the long-term benefits?
PF. With the advent of managed care and a greater emphasis on superior outcomes, pharma companies are developing a smaller number of more novel products. That’s a good thing, but it does mean customers may not automatically understand the mechanism of action, or the clinical benefits accruing. It takes time to get people to understand what is being offered. With novel products, there is also the issue of unexpected adverse reactions.

Given this, there are two main benefits of early phase communication planning. The first is the quality of product offering – enhancing the benefits that this novel product offers, and making sure the company meets its requirements of managing risk.

The second benefit is cost savings. If you pay every one of your downstream delivery agencies to independently develop the messages, you’re paying three times, or four, or five times over. The premise for early phase communication is – do it properly once.

NGP. Why specialise in early phase communication planning? How applicable are your skills and techniques to products already in the marketplace?
RK.We believe that early phase – as products go from discovery into clinical development – is the optimal time to do communication planning. Right from the word go, your key messages really need to reflect the sentiment surrounding your product, the molecule that you’ve discovered. Messages should be clear, robust and should convey consistency over time.

The skills applied to early phase communication planning may also have value later in the product life-cycle, even some years after launch.  We can review and revitalise an existing message platform. Where circumstances have required it, we have overhauled and revised existing message platforms in the light of changing market understanding and expectations – perhaps best described as a rescue operation. Also, new data often become available, and these need to be converted into messages as well, which would be equally appropriate at a review stage.

The most cost-effective way to do it is to: do it early, do it once and do it right. But on the other hand, it’s never too late.

PF. If we pull all of those things together and encapsulate the benefits of early phase communication, they fall into three categories: extracting maximum potential value from the investment made in the development of the product; managing risk in today’s litigious world; and meeting external pressures to reduce costs while maintaining quality.

Bios:
Rob Kemsley is a founding principal and director of Syntropy Medica Ltd. He has worked in healthcare-related occupations for over 30 years, and is a specialist in strategic communication planning and messaging, both market and product. In 2007, he was elected a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing – recognising his industry and service sector achievements.

Paul FitzGerald is a founding principal and director of Syntropy Medica Ltd. He has worked in the pharmaceutical arena for over 30 years, both in the industry itself and in the service sector. Over ten years in the industry, from medical representative to global brand manager, Paul was noted for his creative and innovative marketing.