Tailormade CRM solutions in the pharmaceutical industry and the healthcare sector
Traditional solutions are increasingly unable to meet the growing demands of the pharmaceutical and healthcare industries. Industry-specific solutions are needed that are able to compete in the age of digitalisation and cloud technologies.
There is a growing demand for advanced and innovative IT solutions in the pharmaceutical and healthcare sectors. Increasing customer expectations, ever stricter regulatory requirements, data security regulations and customised products are constantly placing new demands on software systems.
So-called legacy technologies - systems or platforms, software solutions that are no longer supported by developers, or for which patches or updates are no longer released - are unable to meet these increasing demands, and in most cases are not even compatible with newer tools or software versions. In turn, databases based on segregated and disparate systems cannot provide a complete 360-degree view of customers and business processes, especially when they span multiple departments. These disparate systems are increasingly expensive to develop, integrate and maintain.”
- said István Szegedi, Salesforce Architect, Deloitte Digital Hungary.
Salesforce Health Cloud, Veeva CRM, Vault Platform
Recognising this, Salesforce is striving to create customised solutions that meet the needs of the industry with Health Cloud. Built on the foundations of the Salesforce Lightning Platform (similar to the Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, and Experience Cloud solutions that are at the forefront of the CRM world), but targeting the specificities of the industry, it is a state-of-the-art answer for the healthcare sector. A similar insight led Veeva Systems, which was founded 15 years ago: the CEO of the company held the position of Vice President of Technology at Salesforce before setting up his own company. Veeva Systems' mission is to build its own "Life Sciences Industry Cloud" for pharmaceutical and medical device companies. Their solutions include CRM systems built on the Salesforce Lightning Platform as a basis to support sales and marketing activities, as well as the proprietary Vault Platform. The latter supports a variety of document and process management and runs key software and covers a myriad of software needs related to research and development in addition to commercial activities.
Why are healthcare and pharmaceutical specific CRM products needed?
There are basically three key players in the healthcare industry: the patient, the institutions providing and financing healthcare services (clinics, hospitals, insurers) and the pharmaceutical and medical device companies. The interactions between these actors are not really manageable in classical CRM terms: they are not based on potential customers (i.e. lead), sales opportunities and forecasts. Rather, the relationship between the patient/insured and the healthcare institution needs to be described, data on patient conditions and treatment steps, medication dosage or vaccination protocols need to be managed accurately and securely. It is for these types of data that the so-called EHR (Electronic Health Records) standard was invented, which requires a complex data model and corresponding software components.
The same is true for the management of communication between healthcare providers and pharmaceutical companies. The work of pharmaceutical sales reps is subject to strict regulations: their visits must be documented, product presentations and emails sent must be traceable, and the content of emails must be strictly controlled and pre-approved. All details of events and conferences are similarly documented, from the speakers to the participants, the venue and the costs incurred. These tasks are supported by Veeva's CRM software, which has its own mobile app and is also available online.
Due to industry specificities, the software needs of the healthcare sector and pharmaceutical companies are quite specific. Traditional heterogeneous solutions, built years ago, are increasingly unable to keep pace.
- added Dorottya Fábián, head of Deloitte Hungary's healthcare industry-focused team.
Salesforce Health Cloud and Veeva CRM address these specificities, building on state-of-the-art cloud-based technology solutions to meet these growing challenges.
Meet our expert
István szegedi
Digital Customer
Senior Speacialist Lead, Salesforce System and Application Architect
