Vicky McLellan reviews some of the key papers from June’s EphMRA conference
Vicky McLellan
17 Jul, 2007
EphMRA Conference Review
Malta
20 Jun, 2007–22 Jun, 2007
The team at BHI have just returned from this years EphMRA conference, aptly named, ‘A look through the Kalediscope’. The focus of this year’s conference was to understand the rapidly changing market environment in which we as brand researchers have to operate and explore the challenges that face sales and marketing teams in countries where new culture and business practices exist.
All of the papers presented at the conference stimulated interest and food for thought, however two papers in particular struck a chord with BHI, ‘Unlocking Growth in China. Challenges and Opportunities’ [link opens PDF] and ‘The breast cancer journey. It’s as vital as the air that they breathe’ [link opens PDF].
At BHI, we are very focussed on emerging healthcare markets. Over the past year we have conducted research in over 26 different countries including China. Earlier this year, Third Tuesday included the article ‘Profiling China: The emergence of a new healthcare giant’, therefore ‘Unlocking Growth in China. Challenges and Opportunities’ was of particular interest and relevance.
As we are all aware, investment in China is growing significantly each year with the expectation that in the future China will become a key market. The paper provided an overview of the current healthcare in China, the challenges that it faces and the government’s commitment to encourage more multinationals into the market. This will mean moving away from the more traditionally, and sometimes corrupt domestically led healthcare system (a case in point is the former head of China's food and drug watchdog who was executed on the 10th July 2007 for approving untested medicine in exchange for cash, as the country's product safety crisis spread to Europe). Market research is seen as playing a vital role in assisting this development as a means of providing much needed strategic insight into what is required to gain a competitive edge in what is becoming an increasingly competitive market.
‘The breast cancer journey. It’s as vital as the air that they breathe’ was a paper based on a market research study conducted with women suffering from breast cancer and their families/ carers. Given this focus it appealed to both market researchers and marketeers alike. The study looked to understand both the rational needs and the emotional needs of breast cancer patients and their families. At BHI we see rational and emotional needs as of equal importance. Current neuroscience shows that the ‘rational’ and the ‘emotional’ cannot be disengaged from one another but are intimately entwined. By taking us through the journey that patients and families experience, the research highlighted both the clinical and psychological needs of the patients and how a ‘softer’, more customer focused approach is required by pharmaceutical companies. The paper concluded that it is only by considering and acting on both that a client can truly gain a competitive edge.
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