Project Smartsize, overview:
*CONFIDENTAL*
Health care delivery is rapidly evolving and all the feeding industries are forced to change with it. Pharmaceutical companies are large bureaucratic organizations that are desperately fighting the changes.
In the 1960’s and 70’s the “detail man”actually served a valued purpose. Typically one representative in a geographic area promoting the portfolio of company products. They provided information on the product and market as the internet had not been developed. The representative consulted with pharmacists, physician and their staff with regards to the company and it’s products. They developed relationships in the territory and this was a good job.
The industry recognized that developing products in chronic disease states would provide tremendous revenue streams and by the 1980’s and 90’s the market was flooded with new products and representatives numbered almost 100,000 at peak. There were frequently more reps than patients in many offices. Companies had to compete for physician access and Pfizer and Merck recognized the correlation between detail and scripts, thus the reach and frequency model was born. Companies hired legions of MBA’s to crunch new data now readily available and this was the beginning of the end. Physicians began to experience fatigue with the number of reps and access restriction was underway combined with all of the 80’s and 90’s products experiencing patent expiration, companies were forced to begin the downsizing.
Marketing in the attempt to salvage their 150K/yr jobs blames the problem on the failure of sales to execute their strategies. They invested millions in market research to understand that efficacy is an important factor in why providers prescribe a product. They developed strategic plans sending multiple reps to the same offices with the same products attempting to see different physicians failing realize that it does not work. NNI in diabetes has never been NNI. When your call deck consist of 15 Endo’s and the remainder PC, your not a NNI representative.
This round of layoffs is the continuation of what has been going on for 15 years and will continue for many years to come. Ultimately NNI will have territories with 1/2 reps total calling on about 250 physicians. Look around, the two companies that started the arms race, Merck and Pfizer are shells of what they once consisted of. These two companies used to have pods 10 reps for every 300 providers.Each rep having 2-3 products weighted slightly different. Today, they lead again. Each company has no specialty or hospital sales teams, 2 reps per 250-300 provider territories. I’ve seen some NNI plans to have what we refer to as a NNI sales group with about 200 total providers per rep. Huge geographies. In areas where access is available a contract group would be employed to drill deeper into the PC market.
It’s not cyclical and it’s not coming back. There will always be some form of NNI representation but it will never be what it once was. I’m fortunate to be able to remain. I have plans to retire in two years and I’m prepared either way. If your age 50 or less you should be looking elsewhere.
*CONFIDENTAL*
Health care delivery is rapidly evolving and all the feeding industries are forced to change with it. Pharmaceutical companies are large bureaucratic organizations that are desperately fighting the changes.
In the 1960’s and 70’s the “detail man”actually served a valued purpose. Typically one representative in a geographic area promoting the portfolio of company products. They provided information on the product and market as the internet had not been developed. The representative consulted with pharmacists, physician and their staff with regards to the company and it’s products. They developed relationships in the territory and this was a good job.
The industry recognized that developing products in chronic disease states would provide tremendous revenue streams and by the 1980’s and 90’s the market was flooded with new products and representatives numbered almost 100,000 at peak. There were frequently more reps than patients in many offices. Companies had to compete for physician access and Pfizer and Merck recognized the correlation between detail and scripts, thus the reach and frequency model was born. Companies hired legions of MBA’s to crunch new data now readily available and this was the beginning of the end. Physicians began to experience fatigue with the number of reps and access restriction was underway combined with all of the 80’s and 90’s products experiencing patent expiration, companies were forced to begin the downsizing.
Marketing in the attempt to salvage their 150K/yr jobs blames the problem on the failure of sales to execute their strategies. They invested millions in market research to understand that efficacy is an important factor in why providers prescribe a product. They developed strategic plans sending multiple reps to the same offices with the same products attempting to see different physicians failing realize that it does not work. NNI in diabetes has never been NNI. When your call deck consist of 15 Endo’s and the remainder PC, your not a NNI representative.
This round of layoffs is the continuation of what has been going on for 15 years and will continue for many years to come. Ultimately NNI will have territories with 1/2 reps total calling on about 250 physicians. Look around, the two companies that started the arms race, Merck and Pfizer are shells of what they once consisted of. These two companies used to have pods 10 reps for every 300 providers.Each rep having 2-3 products weighted slightly different. Today, they lead again. Each company has no specialty or hospital sales teams, 2 reps per 250-300 provider territories. I’ve seen some NNI plans to have what we refer to as a NNI sales group with about 200 total providers per rep. Huge geographies. In areas where access is available a contract group would be employed to drill deeper into the PC market.
It’s not cyclical and it’s not coming back. There will always be some form of NNI representation but it will never be what it once was. I’m fortunate to be able to remain. I have plans to retire in two years and I’m prepared either way. If your age 50 or less you should be looking elsewhere.