Question

For each of the following sales positions, state whether an e-detailing solution is appropriate. Provide your reasoning. (a) A representative of a company that sells implantable knee joints. The company competes with DePuys, one of the large manufacturers of implantable knee and hip joints. (b) A representative of disposables such as gloves and bandages, who calls on material managers for hospitals and group practices that run ambulatory surgery centers or free standing endoscopy units.

Answer 1

Answer:

A) Implantable Knee Joints

Implantable Knee Joints are not medical supplies that can be classified as common. They are very specific to major surgeries involving replacement or modification of knee joints often containing metal and or plastic components that are highly engineered to mimic the skeletal function of the bones in the knee joint. Implanting a Knee Joint is not a straightforward process neither is it a common procedure. When a product upgrade or a new similar product is introduced into the market, you'd want to give very detailed reasons to a highly targeted market about why they should buy.

Armed with such information, surgeons will be armed with very precise information about their procedures to make the right choices and to confidently explain to patients (who may be jittery about the new transformation that will occur in their body) what is required for them to get better.

Therefore, e-detailing is appropriate for the representative of the company that sells Implantable Knee Joints.

B) Gloves and Bandages

These are very common and require or no in-depth explanation about how they are used and for what they are used. Therefore, e-detailing is not required in this case.

Explanation:

Recall that E-detailing refers to the use of information technology devices/mechanisms and or processes for communicating information about new and existing pharmaceutical products to customers such as health professionals, patients, medical practitioners, pharmaceutical shops/outlets, etc. For example, information about a drug can be collated electronically and pushed to a database of clients via their various channels on their mobile devices. Channels such as video content, Short Messaging Systems, social media channels, etc.

E-detailing helps to enhance engagement with customers because customers are able to make more informed decisions about what they are purchasing.

It also enables the company to capture data about whether or not customers understand the information being passed to them.  

When e-detailers are created in form of a mobile app, it becomes easy to update content, store content, create highly targeted information based on pre-registration details during the installation of the App.

Cheers