Advice You - Business

Marketing your business can be quite overwhelming. There are so many choices! It’s difficult to know the right things to do. By properly preparing, you gain confidence and have a much greater chance for success. Even before

According to USFDA, a combination product is one composed of any combination of a drug and device; biological product and device; drug and biological product

completing any preparatory work, ask yourself these tough questions:

1. Why are you in this business?

2. Do you believe in your product/service?

3. What are you trying to accomplish?

When you believe in your product and

; or drug, device, and biological product and fixed dose combination would include two or more combinations of drug.

Examples of combination products may in

understand why you’re doing what you’re doing, the rest of the marketing process becomes much easier.

The results of the following exercise will provide material for all your marketing efforts. You can use the information o

lude drug-coated devices, drugs packaged with delivery devices in medical kits, and drugs and devices packaged separately but intended to be used together.

n your website, in your sales presentation, in your advertising, in your networking and everywhere else you ‘touch’ your prospects.

The first step in the plan is to know the features and benefits of your product or service

here is enormous increase in the number of combination products entering the market in the recent years. Combination products have proven advantages but fixe

(let’s say product). (If you have a service business, this list should include information about you.) For example, let’s say your product is office furniture. Describing the features of your product and your company might l

d dose combinations are still in the process of convincing regulatory authority on their advantages over the single ingredient formulations.

Combination pro

ook like this:

• Been in business 18 years

• Lots of variety – including home office

• Free delivery

• All price points

• 7 day guarantee

While knowing your features is very important, it’s even more important to ident

ucts have become life saving products for the pharmaceutical companies who doesn’t have many innovative molecules in their product pipeline and have been inc

ify the benefits of your product. This process involves more thought – you need to put your feet in your ideal customers’ shoes and ask, “What’s in it for me? (wiifm)” For example, “Why should I care if you’ve been in busine

easingly used in the product life cycle management. Even the companies having product patents are trying to extend their product life cycle through the combi

ss 18 years? How does that help me?”

To fully understand the benefits of your product, first list the features, and then answer the wiifm question for every feature. There are no rules for this exercise and there will likel

nation products and maximize the revenues. But the companies involved in this practice are overlooking that they are burdening the patients both economically

y be more than one benefit for some features. Getting back to our office furniture example, here are some benefits:

• Longevity – we’ll be here for you when you need us. We will remember you! You don’t even have to come int

and physically. They need to rightly judge the benefits of the combination products and they have to even look at the risks involved when combining the produ

o the store when you need something. Bottom line – a relationship, convenience and peace of mind.

• Variety – one-stop-shopping. No matter what you need, we have it or we will get it for you. We save you time.

• Free Deliv

ts. Some of the combination products were well accepted by physicians while others suffered. Companies involved in development of combination products are fi

ery – save you money.

• All prices – you will not be disappointed. When you come to our store, you will find what you want within your budget! We save you money and minimize stress at the same time.

• Guarantee – If it doe

ding difficulty in defining their combination products and facing various challenges from selecting a combination to marketing it.

Following aspects would a

sn’t fit or doesn’t look good, we’ll take it back – no questions asked. This gives peace of mind and freedom in making your decision.

If you get stuck determining the benefits, ask your customers! Why did you buy from us? I

dd to the challenges in developing combination products:

Which markets to tap where the combination products can do fairly well?
Which combination prod

f the answer is vague, be willing to go deeper and deeper until you get something useful. For example:

• “I bought from you because I liked the furniture.”

• You go further – “What did you like about it?”

• “It matched my

cts are meaningful and rational?
Which therapeutic categories to select?
Which Combinations can address unmet needs of the patients?
Do combin

existing office furniture.”

• “So, you appreciated the variety we offer? Did you look anywhere else? What did you find there – good and bad? Were there any other reasons you bought from us?”

This may be stressful for you,

tions increase the patient compliance?
What would be the developing cost?
How to tackle the risks encountered during combination product developmen

and you may feel like you’re bugging your customers. Again, put your feet in your customers’ shoes – do you think your customers want you to succeed? If your vendors called to ask you to help them, would you? If you’re stil

t?

As combination products don't fit into the traditional categories of drugs, medical devices, or biological products, the USFDA is in the process of devel

l uncomfortable, offer an incentive or gift to customers who help you to do this research.

Another way to define benefits that are important to your prospects is to determine their needs and define their problems. By fully

ping new procedures for reviewing their safety, efficacy and quality.

Professional from academic institutions, pharmaceutical industries, health care indust

understanding your potential customers’ needs and problems, you can better give them what they want. Sometimes your prospects don’t fully understand their needs and problems, so doing this research in advance and being prepa

y and representatives from various regulatory agencies are working out to design the regulatory requirements for manufacture and sale of combination products

red with this information, you can help them even more.

It’s critical to always keep your favorite type of customer (your target) in mind when doing this exercise. Match up what they most want and need with your benefits, a

.

As there is an increasing trend of the combination products companies manufacturing such products should be able to tackle the problems involved in the de

nd create a benefits statement that makes an emotional connection with your target. You may want to include points of differentiation in this statement.

Whether you do your own marketing or hire a consultant, you need to in

elopment. They need to be wiser in analyzing the market trends and the regulatory requirements.

Companies that provide selfless information through particip

timately understand how you and your target connect. Combined with a genuine belief that your product truly benefits your target customer, your benefit statements will bring you lots of business!

Copyright 2006 Audrey Burto

tion in industry events and feedback to regulatory authorities would be able to face the challenges and will be successful in developing combination products

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The travel industry seems to be growing by leaps and bounds, and the more it grows the more financial success you can expect for your business. Just for the United States, travel plays a huge part in the economy. People spend over four million dollars a year on travel and related travel expenses; wouldn’t you love to get just a small chunk of that?

Many times our jobs don’t require us to think in order to do them. Sometimes, our jobs require us NOT to think in order to do them. It is my experience that people know more about their jobs than their jobs require of them. They know more than what they do. In getting people to do more of what they know, leaders need to recognize that the people in their organizations are more than what their jobs have permitted them to become.

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