Yesterday, we looked at Eli Lilly's changing sales approach. Today, there's word on just how Pfizer plans to move forward with fewer sales reps. According to Medical Marketing & Media, the company already has expanded its spending on online promotions by more than 90 percent. Yep, its spending on electronic sales pitches has almost doubled, to $27 million through the first 11 months of 2009, compared with the $14 million spent during the same period of 2008.
That spending puts Pfizer's e-marketing efforts in second place behind Merck's $62 million. And as MM&M points out, the increase points up the fact that Pfizer--like Merck--intends to expand its online promotions to help fill any vacuum created by the hundreds of sales-rep layoffs.
There are certain advantages; electronic detailing and online events let doctors check out drug information when and where they choose, rather than having to meet with a live rep during office hours. Plus, e-marketing can be carefully controlled; an electronic sales pitch can't choose to go off-label.
Just where has Pfizer been deploying its electronic sales pitches? In support of the Alzheimer's drug Aricept, for one; e-marketing for that drug cost $3.6 million through November 30, up from $316,000 the year before. Then there's the pain drug Celebrex, which accounted for $3.2 million of that e-marketing, up from $803,000. Third, there's the antibiotic Zyvox, with a $2.6 million e-campaign, up from $642,000 in 2008.
- read the MM&M story