Two leading pharmacy benefit managers, Progressive Medical and PMSI merged to become the largest provider of workers’ compensation pharmacy cost containment solutions. While the company was determining the name for the newly formed entity, it wanted to maintain its position as an industry thought leader in the highly competitive workers’ compensation industry by increasing its share of voice in trade and national media. It should also be noted that the company would eventually introduce its new brand, Helios, to the market. The announcement of the new brand made it more critical than ever to increase coverage.
Prior to the merger, Marketing Works had conducted a Share of Voice analysis annually on behalf of Progressive Medical. The analysis measured quantitative and qualitative media coverage of Helios using the previous year as a benchmark. Another important impact of the Share of Voice analysis is to compare Helios’ coverage with its competitors. The analysis is used to determine annual benchmarks for media engagement. Recommendations are also provided to help position the company to successfully increase its visibility as a thought leader by increasing its total share of voice.
Because it was critical for the newly formed company to increase its share of voice in the marketplace, using Progressive Medical’s most recent Share of Voice analysis as a benchmark, enabled Marketing Works to make recommendations to increase qualitative coverage in ideal trade publications article placements and bylined articles. Two recommendations made were to add more subject matter experts to serve as a source for media and industry analysts as well as to secure coverage in publications outside of the insurance industry such as verticals and national media.
A content calendar was created to align media engagement with company activities. It included tradeshows, new white papers, editorial opportunities, speaking engagements and news releases. A greater number of news releases were issued on topics such as board appointments, executive promotions, awards and other significant announcements. Target media lists were expanded to include vertical trade publications, and company positioning was solidified on a longer list of approved topics. Helios’ available pool of experts was expanded to increase access for commentary in topics regarding predictive analytics, legislation and drug trends. Efforts also encompassed timely media outreach, interjecting on legislative issues and trends surrounding opioid abuse treatment, and promotion of the company’s predictive analytics solution to reduce the potential for improper drug utilization. In addition, speaking engagements and the company’s annual drug trends report were leveraged in an effort to set up valuable media briefings with industry analysts and reporters at major industry tradeshows. The new brand, Helios, was also announced midway through the year. Special effort was made to secure additional media coverage to generate recognition of the new brand and its position in the market.
The impact of media relations initiatives was measured in the next Share of Voice analysis. Results included:
- Overall media coverage for Helios in 2015 increased by 117% from 2014 media coverage
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Helios secured the second most amount of media coverage in 2015 among competitors
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Helios and Coventry were the only two PBMs in 2015 to contribute byline articles
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Negative coverage of the PBM industry by ProPublica mentioned a number of competitors, as well as Helios