Creating the Infrastructure of a Co-Promotion Effort: Developing a Working Relationship

Many companies in the pharmaceutical industry do not take the necessary steps towards working with one another and identifying each company’s role when involved in a co-promotion effort, often leading to a failed effort. Partner companies in a co-promotion effort must agree on both the strategic and tactical logistics of the project to develop a working relationship and successfully launch the product. The following practices describe how some top pharmaceutical companies involved in a co-promotion alliance approach strategic and tactical issues. Based on interviews with benchmark pharmaceutical companies, this eight-page document examines how pharmaceutical co-promotion infrastructures are organized to ensure lasting positive relations and increased returns for the partnered companies.

Key Topics

• senior leadership involvement
• organization of co-promotion operational team
• strategic and tactical considerations in pre-launch activities
• training material development and distribution
• team building activities

• Consolidate control into one individual in each organization acting as a brand manager to create unity of command.
  *Six benchmark partners underscored the importance of consolidating control of a company’s efforts to one individual. One key sales executive noted that there has to be a person accountable. "Someone in both shops has to own the relationship. Their compensation and evaluation must be based on the success of this project.”
• Create a dedicated operational team from each organization to oversee and manage the co-promotion processes.
  *In one highly successful recent co promotion, the partners created inter-company teams staffed by members from both companies. In this inter company team model, three or four separate inter company teams were responsible for overseeing strategy and plan of action implementation.
• Produce materials for training by one organization and share those resources with the other organization to minimize duplication of efforts.
  *Co promotion veterans point out that traditionally the larger partner creates and deploys the training curriculum for both companies. By consolidating the training effort, resource duplications are minimized and the larger partner’s greater training experience is leveraged. Thus, partners will benefit from higher training quality and a consistent message.

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