The Role Of Sales Managers in the Pharmaceutical Industry

The Indian pharmaceutical industry has been witnessing rapid growth in recent years. Owing to the rise in the consumption of medicines throughout the world, the demand for exporting medicines from India is also increasing. Up to 50% of the global vaccine demands are supplied from India.

To handle all these sales operations, the role of sales managers in the pharmaceutical industry is pivotal. They are the dynamic pillars for a business to function properly, meaning their work demands a lot of traveling to client locations.

In such cases, the management needs a powerful medical rep tracking app to continuously track and monitor the various activities of the sales team. From building a sales team to managing the clients, the role of sales managers is overwhelming sometimes as they have so much to do. 

Indian Pharmaceutical Industry – Overview

As in the Indian economic survey 2021, the domestic pharma market is expected to grow 3x by the next decade. The worth of the Indian pharma industry is estimated at 42 billion USD and ranks 3 in volume and 13th in value worldwide. The below graph shows the projected growth of the Indian pharma industry in the next decade. 

Now you might have realized how big our pharma industry is and how important is the role of a sales manager in the same. In this blog, let’s discuss the roles and responsibilities of a sales manager in the pharmaceutical industry in detail. Before that, a glimpse of what are all the challenges faced by the pharma sales teams would help us to understand their work better.

Challenges faced by Pharma Sales Teams

1. Cost Cutting 

The first and foremost challenge faced by pharma sales teams in recent times is cost-cutting. Hence the pharma business owners focus on cutting unnecessary costs and optimizing the use of available resources.

It is in turn the responsibility of a sales rep to increase sales by closing deals faster, reducing the no.of visits to the client’s place, and increasing the company profits. Using Lystloc as your company’s sales rep tracking app will help you in this issue with real-time location intelligence features. By using this, you can track your employee’s current location and check whether he is taking the shortest route to the client’s place. Hence, you can cut down the fuel costs to a greater extent.

2. Sales strategies

Being a salesperson in the pharmaceutical industry, you may need to talk to doctors, pharmacies, or hospital management for selling your company product. In each case, the way of reaching them, creating awareness of your brand, explaining the uniqueness of your product, and convincing them to buy is different. Devising flexible sales strategies depending on the scenario and analyzing past sales history will help you to overcome this challenge.

3. Online Sales

Due to the Covid restrictions, the majority of the sales processes became online through emails, audio, or video calls. For a pharma sales rep, it is challenging to build trust in the product while explaining it in a demo call with the clients.

It is different from an in-person meeting. Doing proper background research and connecting with the responsible person prior through professional platforms help you to know more about them personally which will help the sales.

4. Work-life balance

Being in sales may be hectic at times. To avoid burnout at work, try to enroll in training sessions that improve your sales skills. As we know, increasing your productivity during work hours will give you the necessary breaks and time-offs. Lystloc app increases salespeople’s productivity through its outstanding features like location-based attendance, task management, and also an automated reporting feature named Lystdata. These features help the salespeople to organize and update their work regularly, saving time and energy.

Role Of Sales Managers in the Pharmaceutical Industry

Sales managers in the pharma industry should be capable of multi-tasking as their work demands that. Let’s see the varied roles and responsibilities of a pharma sales manager:

1. Client Acquisition – In the pharmaceutical industry, the clients being doctors, hospitals, etc sales managers need to keep track of the information about all the doctors in the area and form territory-based teams. They are also in charge of acquiring new clients by reaching out to new doctors/hospitals and assigning the sales reps for giving a brief about the product and its uses.

2. Employee Tracking – Medical sales tracking apps are of great help to the sales managers to monitor the sales reps in real-time. Lystloc app is successfully used to track the employee’s location and get updates of the meetings instantly as soon as they upload the meeting notes and required documents in the app. These tracking details and task status can also be viewed later at any point of time for any reference, with accurate date, time, and location details.

3. Analyzing product performance – Sales managers in the pharma industry should be constantly in touch with the marketing team to analyze the market conditions to know how a particular medicine is performing in the market if there is any sudden rise or fall in demand or if any other market fluctuations caused by external factors like economy. Tracking the KPIs and managing the sales pipeline are also the responsibilities of the sales manager.

4. Customer engagement – Client retention is underestimated by many people. But it is the best way to increase a company’s revenue. Sales managers should be in touch with the existing customers to know whether they are happy with the product, or are they expect any offers or changes in the current value. It is mandatory to check for any loopholes to avoid customer churn.

5. Monitoring competitor activities – There will be many competitor companies for generic medicine, so the sales managers should train the reps on how to highlight their company product and convince the customer. Monitoring your competitors will give an idea of what works for them, how to come up with a competitive advantage, and other sales strategies to stand out in the market.

6. Sales Forecast – Data analytics and sales forecasting are of major use to overcome the barriers in sales. Sales managers should use proper tools and knowledge to interpret the data to form strategies too. Choosing Lystloc as your company’s medical sales tracking app will make you avail of all the accurate data reports and you can save and view all the potential leads information anytime. This will help the sales managers effectively manage the sales pipeline.

7. Team building activities – As a sales manager, it is your responsibility to build your team strong first. Offer necessary training sessions for the sales reps to improve and update their sales skills periodically. Also, engage them in brainstorming sessions, fun team activities, and any other team-building activities. This will encourage them to actively participate and communicate with all coworkers without any hesitation. Happy minds create a healthy work environment which in turn helps the business.

Summing up

Having said that, the roles of sales managers in pharma industries are not only confined to these points but extend beyond that. When it comes to the pharma sector, sales managers should follow the ethics and principles that the job requires to be successful.

To manage your team of sales reps and clients effectively, you should try using a tracking app like Lystloc. Renowned companies in medical technologies like BPL, Elixir medisystems, Athenese Dx are using Lystloc successfully for years. Lystloc’s powerful features are of great help to the sales managers to track the team and manage the client data reports in one app.

“If you are not taking care of your customer, your competitor will”.

Remember, as a sales manager, you should never give that chance.