• In 2018, only 15% of businesses were incorporating artificial intelligence (AI) and only 31% indicated that they planned to use it in 2019. According to Veeva, pharmaceutical sales has the potential to be transformed by AI technology. Directly from the article: "Not only will AI continue to improve sales rep effectiveness with suggestions on their next best action, but it will also become more pervasive and embedded in commercial processes."
• According to Accenture, AI could help workers to use their time more efficiently, increasing labor productivity by up to 40%, which is just the sort of boost that sales reps need.
• Even before the pharmaceutical sales rep meets their customer, the impact of AI can be enormous. Artificial intelligence machine learning can segment customers into very specific areas which would allow sales teams to personalize their activity to a higher degree. For example, in addition to the therapy area, doctors can be segmented based on factors including interest in new drugs, location and availability.
•  Novartis decided to use AI to better inform its sales reps what to say during meetings. Novartis’ former pharma chief executive, Paul Hudson, told FiercePharma that the company’s ‘virtual assistant’ will make sure his sales team are “talking about the things that the healthcare professional is absolutely interested in.”
•  In 2017, Pfizer Australia partnered with AI provider, Complexica, to simulate sales and marketing strategies and resolve tricky ‘what-if’ scenarios.
• AI could completely change the way inventories are taken at pharmacies. For many sales reps inventory taking can not only be tedious, but it takes away valuable time from interacting with health professionals. Additionally, doing a manual inventory can be riddled with errors. Instead, images could be taken of the pharmacy’s shelves and then analyzed using artificial intelligence to provide useful data about a company’s own drugs, as well as those of their competitors.
• When data is provided to an AI system, pharmaceutical companies, and their sales teams can target the right customers, personalize messaging, and determine the most appropriate type and frequency of interaction.
•  This link provides five use cases for AI and machine learning In commercial pharma. The subjects covered are; taking the next best action with customers, dynamic customer segmentation for improved engagement, AI-driven planogram solutions to improve the productivity of field reps, automated data matching and clean up for better insights, and industry benchmarking to improve business performance.

Conclusion

#1 Case Study: How AI is Aiding Pharma/Medical Sales Team

• AI is helping pharmaceutical sales representatives become trusted advisors. By utilizing machine learning in analyzing a large amount of data, they can make appropriate recommendations concerning specific approach and information that will impact on a physician.
• Artificial Intelligence will be used to assess historical data from a doctor's prescribing habits, demographics of the serving area, newly available treatments, impact on drugs they sell, and drugs being used by other physicians in the same specialty.

•  Quartic.ai is the fastest growing technology leader in industrial AI according to CIO Review Magazine. It was founded in 2017 by veterans in the automation process, manufacturing, and reliability together with data scientists to improve the functional use of information via the deployment of AI.
• According to Rajiv Anand the CEO of Quartic.ai, their AI technology enables SMEs to build their solutions using its machine learning platform.
• The platform automates the implementation of machine learning which allows the SME to ascertain the aspects and features that represent the problem meant to build the exact models. Users will be able to understand and explain the output of models in all stages including the building, testing, validation, and deployment.

#2 Case Study: How AI is Aiding Pharma/Medical Sales Team

• Pharmaceutical representatives can use AI through machine learning to provide dynamic segmentation. This can be achieved through highly complex segmentation to personalize engagement with a specific group of physicians, that track countless variables that the human brain is incapable of tracking.
• According to a Pharma Voice report that states JLABS' Dr. Merton's findings, AI will better process individual aligned data enabling targeted dissemination of information to customers.
• A top pharmaceutical company in the United States used physician-level intelligence exposed by multichannel marketing optimization activity data to increase its promotional implementation and strategy.
• By using a unique segmentation, targeting, and promotional campaign that focused on optimizing ROI, the company increased its sales by $25 million in six months, with no additional marketing cost spend.
•  Machine learning can be used to provide predictive customer behavior which is key to engagement. Numerous variables within its context is considered when using AI, giving representatives the information they require in real-time.

•  PetalMD provides solutions that optimize organizational performance, improve healthcare access, help save valuable time and secure exchange of information.
• The company won the Artificial Intelligence Disruptor Award with its physician scheduling solutions called Petal Scheduling. It uses AI that relies on complex variables and algorithms specific to each group of physicians.
• Benefits that their AI provides doctors include time saved through automated scheduling, distribution of shifts in an equitable fashion within the group of physicians, and better life quality due to optimal respect of professional and personal constraints assigned to each doctor.

#3 Case Study: How AI is Aiding Pharma/Medical Sales Team

• It digitizes the entire hiring process for nurses and doctors to enable job matching, payments, insurance, and applications. The marketplace helps save both time and money.

•  AI adoption in marketing and sales within the healthcare space has increased by 17% according to a report by McKinsey.

•  Nomad Health is a marketplace online that connects physicians straight with medical facilities to do short-term work. Consequently, providing on-demand healthcare to clients where ever, in special circumstances that relate to their schedule, expertise, and talents.
• Nomad Health is a Joint Certified Commission technology company founded in 2015 by Kevin Ryan (founder of Business Insider and Gilt Group) and a team of entrepreneurial doctors.
• The company is a leader in the healthcare staffing industry that is helping simplify staffing processes in the medical field since it is considered an unusually complex task.

Research Strategy

Case Studies — Using AI in Pharma Sales & Marketing

1. AstraZeneca

•  AstraZeneca is a pharma company that uses AI in its sales efforts.
•  Axonify is a company providing AI sales solutions to AstraZeneca.

• AstraZeneca's sales reps use advice and analysis provided by machine learning as additional resources for their sales efforts.

• The specific type of AI provided by machine learning and used by AstraZeneca is described as "data generated from thousands of field-coaching forms."

• AstraZeneca said that the use of AI in its sales efforts is resulting in "[i]mproved interactions and better development of sales reps' strengths."

•  Sales managers at AstraZeneca are also using AI to bolster the coaching they provide to their sales reps, as is it enables them to provide more-creative coaching, reduces the number of reports that need to be generated, and saves them time.

• AstraZeneca's AI system for sales uses data "from self-reported field coaching forms filled by both [sales] reps and managers that capture their interactions. The thousands of inputs are analyzed through a rubric plotted against measures that drive business results. Through their dashboards, managers can see sales coaching efforts across many employees and conversations."

• AstraZeneca is already seeing the benefits from using AI as part of its sales efforts, as it "is revealing new insights to sales leaders and changing the dynamic between reps and managers to focus on coaching that best helps an individual."

• A spokesperson for AstraZeneca stated, "AI has given us a true line of sight into what we’re focused on at multiple organizational levels, which provides us the ability to ask ourselves, 'is that what we want?' and 'is that what we intended?'"

2. Sanofi

•  Sanofi is a pharma company that uses AI in its sales and marketing efforts.
•  Google is a company providing AI sales and marketing solutions to Sanofi.
• Sanofi and Google partnered in June 2019 "to establish[] a new virtual Innovation Lab."
• As part of that partnership, the companies "plan[ned] to apply AI across diverse datasets to better forecast sales and inform marketing and supply chain efforts."
• Sanofi announced that it "will use AI to improve sales forecasts and help direct marketing and supply chain efforts by using real-time information about geographic, logistical and manufacturing factors."

Research Strategy

Cardinal Health

•  Cardinal Health is a medtech company that has employed artificial intelligence in its sales and marketing process.
• Cardinal Health's mission is to approach, connect and partner with large health systems. The company approached Bigtincan to further this goal.
• The company uses Bigtincan's hub to bring together all its products and services in one place.
• Bigtincan allows users the ability to see how often their content is shared and viewed. These analytics mean marketers can determine what content is working and what requires work to get attention.
• The hub has meant personalizations for clients, quicker preparation time and content creation optimization.

Bayer

• Bayer a large pharmaceutical company has used artificial intelligence when launch its new oncology drugs.
• The company choose to use Verix when marketing its new oncology drugs in 2017. Noting that the first three months of a products launch is the most critical.
• Prior to using Verix, Bayer was relying on 11 different platforms to provide the necessary reports.
• Verix monitors the drug's performance and determines how the launch components have been influencing one another.
• Verix's analytics saved Bayer time, and over $2.5 million.

Use cases of AI in the pharmaceutical and/or medical technology companies

1) Simplification of tasks and handling of the paperwork

• AI is being used to provide assistance services in handling complicated healthcare processes by companies like Zocdoc.
• Examples of services that are being handled are: insurance verification, appointment booking, and finding doctors.
• Overall most companies use AI tools to automate and simplify tasks.

• According to an article from McKinsey Global Institute, 40% of time spent on marketing related tasks can be automated with AI.
• An additional proof that process automation and simplification is a big trend in the industry is that ever since 2017, when Merck Italia launched the first pharmaceutical chat bots through Facebook Messenger, it has become more and more popular.

2) Delivering personalized engagement and support programs

•  76% of patients believe pharmaceutical companies have a responsibility to provide services that complement their products.
• Less than 1 in 5 patients are aware of the services that pharmaceutical companies provide.
•  85% of companies are raising their investment in patient-centric capabilities over the next 18 months
• To satisfy this need, companies like UC Health, UnitedHealthcare, Cochlear, MissionPoint are using Salesforce's CRM platform to better support their patients or clients in general.

3) Modeling and combining data to track user behavior

• With the amount of data in the pharmaceutical and medical world, having a way to synchronize all that data onto one platform has become crucial. 
• Companies like Adobe and Salesforce have been the go-to companies for pharmaceutical companies that are looking for a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tools.

• They offer platforms that allow marketing teams to build customer profiles using many data inputs including CRM databases, social media activity, or other offline avenues.
•  Salesforce has reported an overall an increase of up to 30% in lead conversion and sales, an increase of up to 35% in sales productivity and customer satisfaction as well as an increase of up to 38% in customers decision-making and of up to 25% in revenue.
• All in all, a CRM can help marketing and sales teams identify and categorize leads, increase referrals from existing customers, offer better customer support, and improve products and services.

4) Personalization and prediction at scale

• Healthcare brands use tools like Crossix, to understand customers and provide personalized recommendations. These tools allow them to use AI to scale personalization and targeting across all their media outlets
• Sales teams use forecasting as a tool to estimate future sales and thus gain insight into how to handle the resources of a business. This helps predict inventory needs, determine which product to continue developing and upgrading and see how sales and lead time vary by season. With AI algorithms, it is easier to predict next quarter's total sales with more accuracy.

Types of AI tools that can help sales teams

Clara

•  Clara is a scheduling service that uses machine learning to coordinate when, where and how sales professionals connect with potential clients.
• Clara obtains the scheduling requests from emails, then automatically engages with potential clients to check their availability in order to schedule meetings.
• Sales teams use this service to not only manage their outbound efforts but also to handle meetings, reduce drop-offs, book more pitches and thus close more deals.
• The tool's price is not publicly available but the company can be contacted through their website.

Crystal Knows

•  Crystal offers AI tools and features that are designed to provide well-rounded and accurate insights into potential customers that sales professionals work with.
• This allow sales professionals to better understand and learn more about their interests and values in order to successfully earn their trust and thus increase their business and client list.
• The tool's price is not publicly available but the company can be contacted through their website 

Base CRM

•  Base serves more than 6,000 customers around the world including Groupon, Expensify and Sinclair Broadcast Group, with its next-generation CRM software.
• Sales teams use Base CRM to consolidate workflows and increase their efficiency.
• A breakdown of the pricing is available on their website 

Conversica

•  Conversica offers an AI-based sales assistant that helps sales teams focus more on closing deals with customers instead of wasting time chasing down leads.
• The Conversica sales assistant deals with prospects in a two-way human conversation mode and keeps reaching out to every lead as many times as needed thus increasing sales and making marketing more effective.
• The tool's price is not publicly available but the company can be contacted through their website.
• They can also be contacted via their support email address, support@conversica.com, or this telephone number: +1 (888) 778 1004

Future prospects

• According to an article by Pega (an international software development organization), AI will help companies build a more customer focused corporate culture, optimize marketing goals, customize their engagement and pitching process, save time on finding and converting leads, reduce the time and cost of their sales by automating the whole process and make sales tasks more streamlined.
• As quoted by Gartner, "AI bots will power 85% of customer service interactions by 2020."

Prescriber360

• The website for Prescriber360 can be found here.
• Prescriber360 is an "advanced pharma software company specializing in business technology development and implementation for pharmaceutical and life sciences companies worldwide."
• The company offers sales and marketing solutions for the pharmaceutical industry that include a pharma sales and operations management tool and analytics as a service.
•  Microsoft's Cortana Intelligence Suite is the AI behind Prescriber360's tools and allows pharmaceutical companies the ability to offer a personalized experience, discover hidden trends, and identify sales opportunities.
• There is no public pricing information available. The number to call for more information is 732-703-6100.

Aktana

• The website for Aktana can be found here.
• Aktana is an AI-driven life sciences platform that unites each "key stakeholder in the commercial process — brand, ops, sales, IT and analytics," to create a more personalized and responsive experience for healthcare providers.
• The company offers the Aktana Decision Maker, which is a "suite of products that uses AI to help life sciences commercial teams make data-driven decisions for more effective, personalized customer engagement."
• For sales, this product helps sales representatives make better sense of big data by removing analysis from their list of job duties. The platform synthesizes data for the representatives and provides meaningful suggestions and insights that are immediately actionable.
• For marketing, this product provides marketers with the ability to adjust campaigns quickly and easily based on real-time insights. It also ensures that no touch points are missed and that conflicting or redundant messaging is eliminated.
• Pricing is not available publicly, but the number to call for more information is 888-707 3125. Interested parties can also complete a web form to receive pricing information.

Verix

• The website for Verix can be found here.
• Verix is an AI-driven analytics platform for sales and marketing in the life sciences and CPG industries.
• For life science companies specifically, Verix offers an end-to-end sales and marketing solution that includes solutions for sales force effectiveness, new drug launch, prescription tracking, management, market access, pre-call planning, and consumer health portfolio management.
• AI is used to analyze data for target identification, enable accurate planning and precise positioning for drug launches, follow the customer's journey to improve brand performance, spot and assess threats and opportunities, identify new customers, execute sales calls, and "track and analyze the strength and performance of key geography and brand intersections, based on strategic goals."
• The AI used is a proprietary Java-based technology stack that runs on Linus and Windows servers.
• There is no public pricing available, but the number to call for more information is 650-949-2700. Pricing information can also be obtained via email at sales@verix.com.