Role of Medical Representative

Role of Medical Representative – A medical representative is a representative of a company whose job is to promote and sell their company’s products, whether that’s pharmaceutical drugs or medical equipment. And the Role of the medical representative is to create demand for an existing pharma product or launch new product ensuring availability at retailers and stockiest. In this article, we will give you all the information regarding Medical Representative, Role of Medical Representative, qualification, advantages, etc. Read the blog for details.

The role of a Medical Representative is very challenging and a difficult task. They are the key link between medical and pharmaceutical companies and healthcare professionals. The Medical Representative sells the company’s products, which include medicines, prescription drugs, and medical equipment, to a variety of customers including general practitioners (GPs), hospital doctors, pharmacists, and nurses. You’ll work strategically to increase the awareness and use of your company’s pharmaceutical and medical products.

Role of Medical Representative in a Pharmaceutical company

• A medical representative organize appointments and meetings with the community- and hospital-based healthcare staff
• He has the main hand in identifying and establishing a new business by Sales Achievement
• negotiating contracts
• Demonstrating and Presenting the pharma products to healthcare staff including doctors, nurses, and pharmacists
• Launching new products in the market
• Pharma Product Promotion and Market Feedback about the product
• Company Representation is handled by medical representation
• A medical representative build and maintain positive working relationships with medical staff and support administrative staff
• He should manage budgets for catering, outside speakers, conferences, and hospitality of the company
• Keep detailed records of all contacts and a further reportings
• Reach, and if possible exceed annual sales targets given by the company
• win new customers, as well as developing long-term relationships with existing ones
• Keep up to date knowledge with the latest clinical data supplied by the company, and interpret, present and discuss this data with health professionals during presentations
• A medical representative Follow up on leads generated by the company.
• Researching competitor’s medications and their respective market performances.

Job Profile of a Medical Representative

The job profile of a medical representative can be covered under three categories, namely

1. Prescription generation:

• The most difficult activity of a medical representative is to generate sales revenue and the most effective way to do this is to generate prescriptions for the Company’s products from the doctors he meets.
• A prescription is a written instruction given by a doctor to a patient that tells him which medicine to take at what dosage, how frequently, and for how long.
• When the prescription is for your product the amount paid by the patient to the chemist for purchasing the same is routed through the stockist and distributor to reach the Company.
• Thus, generating prescriptions for your product is the only force (or ‘pull’) that results in stocking and selling of your products by the chemists and generating revenue for the Company.

2. Customer coverage:

• The medical representative has to meet the doctors regularly.
• A medical representative has to be aware of the different specialties of the doctors and promote the right products to the right doctors.
• He also has to collect feedback about the products used by the doctors and satisfactorily resolve any complaints or concerns related to products.
• A medical representative has to meet the chemists in his territory to ensure the free availability of his products.
• It is obvious that only by creating a strong working relationship with one’s customers based on mutual trust and respect one can achieve the desired results for self as well as for the organization.

3. Market intelligence

• The success or failure of a business is decided by how well prepared it is to satisfy its customers’ needs in light of the competitors’ efforts and prevailing market conditions.
• Identifying the right customers, selecting the right products to be promoted to them, and overcoming competitors’ attempts to target the same customers for their products by prompt intimation to superiors so that the right marketing plan can be evolved is an important aspect of a representative’s job profile.
• A ‘prescription audit’ or ‘brand audit’ carried out at the chemist level is a very useful tool to generate valuable information about the prescription habits of doctors, stocking patterns of chemists, slow- and fast-moving products, and promotional activities conducted by competitors.

Qualifications and Training required

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), sales representatives, including medical sales representatives, are not required to have any particular type of formal education. The companies mainly ask the higher secondary education or bachelors from any reputed schools/institutions. But bachelors from the following subjects can improve your chances:

• Dentistry
• Life Sciences
• Medicine
• Nursing
• Pharmacy.

You don’t need a science degree, however, and a good number of medical sales representatives have a non-science degree. Some top universities also offer related programs like pharmacy, biosciences, healthcare, and business of four years duration. The admission to the schools/institutions will be based on entrance tests organized by them.

Entry without a degree is possible if you have a strong record in sales and business development.

Skills of a Medical Representative

There are many skills a medical representative. The important quality that medical companies seek in candidates is strong ethics, as it is vital to keep data and sensitive information secure. Some of the other skills that employers look for while hiring medical representatives are:

• Strong communication skills
• Good interpersonal skills
• The candidate should be result driven and have good planning and organizational skills.
• Good understanding of the product
• Strong verbal skills
• Customer service abilities and time-management skills
• Excellent communication skill and presentation skills
• Negotiating skills
• Sales and Customer relationship skills
• Confidence and Persistence
• Patience and Self-Motivation
• Analytical and Planning skills
• Strong Teamwork and Networking skills
• Commercial and Business awareness.
• Accepting challenges skill
• Good knowledge regarding the human body and Microbiology
• Should have sound product knowledge
• Ability to generate prescriptions
• Problem-solving skills
• Should know how to handle objections
• Good interpersonal skill
• Ability to handle different types of customers
• Should be able to handle the adverse situation
• Well mannered

Medical Representative Training

• It is not compulsory to have a medical degree to become a medical representative but you do need to know what you’re talking about when you try to sell drugs or devices.
• That’s why priority given to those have a bachelor’s degree or higher in life sciences or biology.
• A candidate also has to have a strong knowledge of sales and industry, which is why representatives who haven’t studied science generally have a degree in business, communications or marketing.
• Similarly, if a candidate has experience in business to business sales or the medical industry, the chances of job increases.
• Many candidates of medical reps work or volunteer at hospitals or doctor’s offices in order to get experience talking to doctors with the medical lingo they respond to.
• Any experience related to the medical or sales industries can help you when applying to the job for medical representatives.
• When you start with a pharmaceutical company, the first thing the company will do is provide training in their product lines.
• While it can be helpful to research some basics about the company’s products before applying, the company will want to provide more in-depth training so you know everything necessary about the products you are selling, the conditions they are designed to treat and how they differ from competing treatments.
• The company will also train you in the language to use when selling their products in order to ensure you properly communicate their desired message about their products.

Conclusion:

We hope with the help of this article you have understood the role of a medical representative in the pharmaceutical industry. If you are looking for more information regarding the Role of Medical representative then contact us. We are always there for your help.