Comment from the West Coast (quote from one of you).

I was at a marketing seminar recently where some of the world’s greatest marketing gurus were telling us that before we can expect anyone to do business with us, we need to take interest in our potential prospects and figure out ways to add value to their lives. It makes total sense, as once we humans receive a random act of kindness (kind words, a cup of coffee, or a hand to help us fly) we immediately take an interest in the person and want to do something nice back for them. What’s interesting is how refreshing I found this concept coming from the marketing experts considering that I grew up w/ my father who throughout his entire life continually bent backwards to help others w/o being asked to. I strongly believe that if we can remember to take the focus off of ourselves and put it on the other person (in this case the doctors we are trying to do business with), we will be guaranteed to witness the development of lifelong relationships where pull vs. push marketing will start taking place.
Josephina

Shrink your sales message! Shrink it again! And then shrink it!

In the era when we are bombarded by thousands of messages everywhere and every second, what you say and how you say it is the ultimate way of getting your audience (your doctors ) attention.
This is from the book “Position for Profit” by Jon Ward. Please do not skip, read  and enjoy this powerful and simple wisdom.

There was once a Chinese emperor who assembled a few of his most trusted ministers and issued this command: “Travel throughout the world, gather all the wisdom you can find, and assemble it in one place here in the royal city.” The ministers set off, north, south, east and west, accompanied by soldiers, servants, carriages and provisions. Years passed until one by one they returned, hauling behind them caravans of books and scrolls. A vast library was constructed, covering many acres, and the world’s wisdom was carefully sorted and stored on its miles of shelves. One fine day, the emperor was invited to a grand opening of the collection. He stepped into the library, gazed this way and that, and sighed. “I may be emperor, but I’m a mortal man. How will I ever be able to read even a fraction of this great treasure? I need you to reduce it to something more… manageable.”
Crestfallen, the ministers recruited teams of scholars who set about pouring through the great tomes and parchments, selecting, editing, simplifying and distilling the material. After ten years had passed, they were ready to present the result to the emperor. Proudly, they invited him to a single room, lined with books from floor to ceiling, all the way around. The emperor stared at the book-lined walls, and sighed. “Ten years ago,” he said, “I would have been content to shut myself in this room and spend my remaining years reading all these wonderful texts. But alas, the candle of my life is burning low. You must reduce this further.”
Exasperated, the ministers doubled their army of scholars and set them to work scoring through the books for the most essential wisdom each had to offer. Five years of grueling labor followed, and the ministers were ready for the emperor again. By now, he was too feeble to move, and they brought their results to his palace on a large red cushion. It was a single book, entitled “All the Wisdom of the World.” The emperor smiled weakly, and began to thumb through its hundreds of closely written pages. He sighed again. “Too much, too much. Don’t you see that my days on this earth are numbered? Reduce this again.”

The ministers withdrew with their massive book, and for the next 100 days and nights they labored, with barely a pause or a short nap, to do the emperor’s bidding. On the 101st day, they anxiously ascended the palace steps and approached the emperor’s throne, led by the chief minister. In his hands, he carried a small, exquisitely carved jade box. Bowing low, he presented the little chest. With trembling hands, the emperor raised the beautiful jade lid. Inside the box, he found a single square of parchment. Lifting it close to his failing eyes, he discovered that it was inscribed with just five words:
“There Is No Free Lunch.”
The emperor smiled, sank back in his throne, and expired.

Getting your Doctors’ attention. WSGAT rule.

So, to review what we said so far ( please review the old posts as needed ):
1. No ATTENTION from the docs – no transaction of info- no sales for you.
2. Deliver info that is important to THEM.
3. Only deliver when the moment is right FOR THEM (not for you).
4. Best sales are by those who managed to become the source of VALUABLE INFORMATION.
5. Bond to your Brand yourself and target BONDING your docs with it.

Let’s take it from here.
You NEVER KNOW WHAT OTHER PEOPLE KNOW or THINK.
The only assumption you can make that anything that you ever say only truly impacts if it carries the answers to two questions: WSGAT ( what’s so good about that ) and WIFM
(what’s in it for me ). WIFM also means for most docs “What’s in it for my success with my patients”.
Every time you walk in the office and every time you are ready to pitch, know the answers to these questions. If you are not ready today , your best bet is to stick to
the topics of general humanity and general news ( “it is raining doctor… will that impact your weekend plans”, so to speak).
It’s OK. But:
I encourage you to always prepare the topic answering WSGAT and WIFM questions for your next week. Have two or three messages ready and experiment with them every week, figuring out which is better for what client. Analyze what worked, what was natural for you, and what didn’t or wasn’t.
Before you walk in you must be ready if the moment is right ( Cialis figured that one right).
Do not ever settle with failure ahead of time. Most popular comment: ” I am leaving you some XYZ and some ZYX, let me just grab you JH…” doesn’t sell anything.
It reflects either lack of prep work, fear of failure, or that “your moment is never right”.
You are not in the business of serving meals ( ” here is some pasta, some chicken, some olives….”). You are in the educational marketing business.
Yes, some docs won’t ever listen to you, period. Don’t let them give you 80% of your pain. They may not be your primary market at this time. Learn from your experience with them so that you can apply it with your next client.
Some others, only want to talk about their agendas ( hobbies, needs and blah, blah, blah..).
Slowly but confidently steer them to start thinking of you as a source of knowledge and valuable info. It may take a while but work on that. Don’t just say “we need your help with XYZ”. Very few will help on these terms.
But at least that group listens to you when you talk, so you do have a chance. Right?

This part of Getting Your Doctors attention is very important. Please comment if it answers your concerns. Let’s debate.

When it comes to your interactions with your doctors, what do you hate?

10 % of your clients give you 90% of your pain. What is it that hurts you the most?

Bond your Docs with your Brands.

OK. Let’s see. The majority of you identified Volvo brand promise as “safety”. You are right, it’s about safety. But do you guys see safety sign in their logo? More than that, do you actually remember their Logo? I don’t. So how then that logo that only few of you remembers , which in fact doesn’t have any safety sign on it, creates a brand promise of Safety that you correctly identified.
The answer is that Volvo as any other successful brand created feelings and perceptions in you that are BONDED in your brain with that little guy somewhere in one of your brain hemispheres that says : if i want safety i know where to go, I’d go to Volvo. Branding is all about BONDING.
Bonding with your feelings, perceptions and later with a call for action. Bond is trust that if you choose XYZ then you will be sure to get ZYX features, qualities, safety, etc. This is not unlike your products. When your docs are Bonded with your Brands for certain conditions your sales are climbing. Try to sell logos or images of your meds to them and see your branding efforts stall. Make them trust , make them bond with the main Brand promise and you are good, very good. So think what is your Brand’s main promise that your docs will be Bonded to…..
In fact, are YOU YOURSELF BONDED TO YOUR BRAND?????

Master your influence.

As you might remember I promised to post the second part of the “Getting your doctor’s attention” on Sunday/Monday. I decided to wait a couple of days. The reason is that this Blog is not a monologue. It is created and meant to be an open forum where we discuss and learn from each other. You need to overcome your reservations, pick screen names (nobody knows who you are) or even stay anonymous, and place your comments. You will quickly learn that THIS IS THE ULTIMATE WAY TO GET ATTENTION. This will give you a ton of practice in the most useful success building topics. Trust me, if your comments draw attention of your peers and if you learn to contribute value to the others you will be golden.
Remember the amount of success you reach in life and the amount of wealth that you create are directly proportional to the amount of value you create for others.
The more beneficiaries you create , the more successful you will be. It is not unlike your everyday work. More value to more client/doctors =more money in your pockets.
This is a place to learn these skills.
Do you want to increase your own audience, discussion groups, learn feedback from hundreds instead of dozens, become a successful contributor to value of learning? If you like what you learn here , go to other blogs and invite people to join you here on DrugRepTime .com. Send emails with your invitations to those you want to benefit. And do it NOW.
Think about something. Many of you told your friends about this blog and invited them. How many of your friends actually came here? One, two? Do you know? Is it any different from talking to many doctors about your great products and getting no scripts?
It is well established in traditional marketing that a circle of influence of each individual is about 250 people. Will talk more about it in the future. But with the social media in place your influence through horizontal networking on the Internet can be multiples of that. So speak up to grow your own audience.
Aren’t you MASTERS OF INFLUENCE? Find what works in engaging others and you will be reach.
Doctor

Thus far Josefina is leading the contest. You better hurry up. That fellow needs your help..

Congratulation to all "Barbie Dolls"!

3/4 of poll respondents thought that they have ”a better chance”.
Do you agree?

Contest time

The same person as in the posting below, needs to propose. His “dream” is on the phone with her credit card company trying to dispute a charge. He has no time because unless he actually says what he is supposed to say within next 1 minute the ring will go up in price 100% ( promotion expires ). What should he do? or say?

Start here. Get your Doctors’ attention.

OK. Most of you in your responses to the survey said that this is the topic of value to you. You are right on the money, because without their attention there won’t be any transaction. Can you educate when one wants to get out now, needs to answer a phone call now, is bombarded by 3 different conversations, dying of thirst or simply can’t hear you.
Would you ever think to ask her to marry you while she is on the phone with her credit card company trying to dispute a transaction?
If you think “yes” -rethink. And if you do it- Good Luck…
Your message delivered in the absence of her/his attention looses it’s immediate impact. Moreover it looses it’s potential to have any value or power in the future. You know why? Because in the midst of noise their brain catches something without reaching their awareness. You think it’s OK, because next time their brain will recognize it as something familiar, something already heard.
Right? Maybe on paper. In reality their brain will associate that message with the negative circumstances and instead of bonding with your message , the brain will get frustrated with it and what’s worse with YOU next time when the same message and the messenger are back. The more of the same you do, the smaller your chance to ever deliver your next message will get. Instead of becoming an educator ( that you all said you want to be) , you become an “irritater”.
Slow down, visualize their attention, watch and once they ready – you go.
What’s the best manifestations of their attention? Their direct question addressed to you, their direct eye contact with you, their mouth shut and ears unplugged, so to speak. Identify these simple signs and you are ready to go.
Even if you are dying to share your new indications, your new sales line, still slow down, take a look around, feel what they feel, think if the current circumstance allows, if not, see if it can be modified to benefit their attention (not your itching to talk).
By showing respect and making a neutral comment important to them you either will modify the circumstance right away or will get a better foundation for nourishing their respect to you in the future. Remember, it is all about THEM, not about your product.
And yes, with some of them you won’t succeed because it is rather late to correct established patterns of disrespect to you, or else because some of them are genuine jerks, but so what?
Don’t let those 20% that can’t stand you give you 80% of your pain.

OK, guys, we officially started. I want to see your comments. I know that you come here to read and learn but it is a conversation, not a monologue. Without your comments, I can’t get myself going…Also please forward the links and invites to your peers.

The next topic will be part 2, and the most important part of “Getting their attention”, called YOUR ATTENTION GRABBING PITCH. Coming on Sunday or early AM Monday.

Your doctor is in love with your competition.

Anonymous said…
Getting the relationship going with a doc who is in love (and has been for a while) with a competitive product and the rep that promotes it. Do I have any chance at all or should I move on to somebody who may actually prescribe my drug ?
November 11, 2007 8:04 PM

YES, Doctors learn from YOU whether they will ever admit to it or not! A story of the rep who got my attention..

It’s a WOW time! The results of the poles and the survey showed that:
1. You all , meaning 100% of the respondents, want to know HOW TO BE A VALUABLE SOURCE of information for your docs.
2. At the same time almost 3/4 of you either think that currently you are not or that you are unsure if docs want to learn anything from you.
Do you see the conflict here? Do you see how one can get depressed going to work and hopelessly leaving samples asking for an autograph? Do you see how this may not help your self esteem?
Cheer up people! Good news! According to my experience and communication with dozens and dozens of docs and reading physicians blogs and reading medical periodicals YOU are the ones that we use as the main every day educational source. So for those of you who feel like REPtilias I suggest to look in the mirror and reframe your thinking to become REPtigers.
Respect yourself and you will be respected.
Here is a perfect example of how you can become a great educational value to your docs.
I call it : “A story of a rep who got my attention”.
Busy Monday late afternoon, I am behind, the waiting room is filled with 10 patients. A new to our office rep walks in and unloads his samples. I can’t even pronounce the name of his medication. All I know is that I do not care. Here is the dialogue while i am writing my notes:
Him: Wow, it is one busy office.
Me: Yeah..
Him: And they all waiting to see you?
Me: I guess most of them.
Him: I saw a lot of older folks in the waiting room. They must be most challenging. They all must have 5-10 things you have to pay attention to. And you have to address every detail when there is so much to check in the short time you get to spend with them. (Please note, it’s all about me, nothing about him, his products or interests).
Me: Aha…
Him: You probably wish sometimes that one simple question could point you in the direction of identifying a major health problem especially those common ones that take away from quality of life of these older folks that you see. I counted 7 people in your waiting room who look over 60.
By the way of example, statistically 2 of them have an XYZ condition.
( Do you see how this kid is setting me up for a sale? He grabbed my attention, he provided me with an educational fact (I didn’t know that every fourth person suffers from XYZ), he is ready to come out with his smoking gun).
Me: What are you talking about? Is XYZ really over 20% prevalent. I didn’t know that.
Him: Yeap, and the sad fact is that unless you ask your patient a simple question “…….smoking gun???…..” she/he may never volunteer that to you until XYZ is far advanced. Once you establish XYZ your treatment options are pretty easy. ( Perfect set up of buying criteria).
…..mg of XYZ (medication name) and both of those folks in the waiting room (He reminds me to use the question/screening tonight, since “the folks” are here) will likely feel better in less than 48 hours ( He is indirectly teaching me that the medication takes that long to start working).
Me: What is your name? You’r good. ( I like the guy).
He got it all done in 2 minutes. Now he is my educational source on the subject. Did he sell yet? Maybe yes, maybe no. But HE GOT MY CONSENT TO LEARN MORE FROM HIM.

Our first topic will be: HOW TO GET YOUR DOCTORS ATTENTION. I will post it on Wednesday! Remember :No attention - no sale!
You must get their attention to be able to convey your message……..

Are you valuable to your docs?

So far answering to the pole most of you said either “NO” or “Sometimes”. The pole is still open.
So far out of a bunch of answers to the survey ??? over 70% of you said either “NO” or “UNSURE”. Both the pole and the survey will remain open for two more days. I am frankly shocked. You know why? Because before I even opened my mouth to share any of my experiences, thoughts or suggestions with YOU, you are already educating ME with your answers.
Please post your comment where and how, you think, the practicing docs learn. And be sure to have some space in your stomach for a good desert, because I will tell you very soon how we/doctors learn. Just wait….It’s coming!

I need to know what YOU guys struggle with.

Marketing in the past: new product-promotion-sales.
Marketing at present: promotion-feedback from consumers-new product-sales.

What I am saying is that I need to learn about you to build this blog successfully.

So, when it comes to your job what do you struggle with?
One, two, three thoughts…
Don’t spend time thinking. Say whatever pops in your head first. Spit it out.
Doctor.