Teva research found that 36% of Canadians self-identify as caregivers. So when the Israeli drugmaker rolled out its global rebrand in Canada, it decided to focus on that very group.
Teva created caregiver resources—handouts first later converted to digital materials—and developed relationships with pharmacies.
Why pharmacies? In a region where direct-to-consumer marketing is verboten—like Canada—pharmacies are a front door to patient relationships. Plus, Teva’s data dive into the caregiver demographic found 83% of those who identified as caregivers pick up medications for someone else, said Carol Baubock, Teva senior VP of global brand and corporate marketing.
So, Teva created a program to designate caregiver-friendly pharmacies. The chosen ones complete online training, distribute bag stuffers that direct to the Teva website's digital caregiver resources and display caregiver-friendly stickers on the door. And on the website, Teva created a map of those designated pharmacies so patients and caregivers can find them easily.
RELATED: Transitioning Teva revamps branding to emphasize brand-generic unity
Baubock said the caregiver focus “tapped an opportunity in the market and kind of a white space, but also something that struck everyone as ‘why did we never look at this before?’”
For their part, pharmacies quickly picked up on the value of the program, which not only gives them resources but also helps them create relationships with about 15% of the population they were misidentifying as patients themselves. A move as simple as asking, “Are you picking up this medication for someone else?” opens up a different and new line of conversation for pharmacists.
Pharmacies are also looking to convert those caregivers to customers themselves. Statistics show caregivers tend to pick up their own drugs somewhere else. For instance, caregivers retrieve their parent’s medications near that parent’s house, but their own prescriptions near their own homes.
For Teva, connecting to caregivers is important to keeping patients on their meds; caregivers are the ones, after all, who ensure that meds are refilled and picked up. So its resources include guides to navigating the healthcare system on someone else’s behalf, a pharmacy checklist of questions caregivers may need to answer about the person they’re helping and individual guides to a variety of conditions.
And it doesn't leave out the caregiver, either. There's a self-assessment caregivers can use themselves to gauge their own health and wellness.
RELATED: Teva's transformation continues with patient portal launch
Teva tallied 106,000 unique visitors to the area of the Canadian website with caregiver information, and in an even more encouraging stat, racked up an average 11 minutes of time spent there.
The Canada caregiver rollout is part of Teva’s larger global rebrand as it looks to meet specific needs in different geographic markets. Israel is another country where Teva is using a similar caregiver approach and is just beginning to launch there.
“Because they’re pharmacy-driven markets, people can request a brand which they can’t do in other areas of the world like the U.S. We’re in a position where building equity for the brand is actually very important,” Baubock said.
Editor's note: The story has been updated with an adjusted percentage of Canadians who identify as caregivers.