twentyeightb

Category: CLM Basics

Agency Resource

CLM best practice guidelines for web font assets

By Nick Woolnough /

Like images or video, fonts need to be licensed from the rights holder for use in any sales aid displayed within a CLM player such as Veeva Engage or IQVIA OCE Remote Engagement. In reality though, fonts can often be a forgotten component in the handover of assets from design to development – an oversight that can lead to real challenges further down the road. Our resident ‘font of all knowledge’ and Chief Technical Officer, Paul Cryer breaks down what you need to know.

The role of fonts in sales aid development

A sales aid without any written content probably isn’t going to get very far in the review and approvals process, so it’s a fair guess to assume then when artwork arrives for development, it’s going to include one or more font choices.

With the nature of CLM presentations being that they can be delivered in-person and ‘offline’ via an iPad, or online via other means such as video calls, it is important to remember that there are two destinations for a font file. When we create a CLM presentation with custom web fonts, we need to be able to:

  • Host the files locally (‘self-hosted’ on the iPad itself) for embedding within pages
  • Distribute the files as part of the CLM presentation deliverables

Let’s talk font licensing

When handing over a sales aid for development, it is preferable to request from the pharma marketing team a brand pack that contains various approved assets. Alongside brand/style guidelines, images and video assets, this may also include unlimited licences to any brand fonts that are used in the sales aid. These web font files can be passed on for use in the project.

One common issue is a lack of web font versions (WOFF/WOFF2 format) of the brand fonts within such a brand pack. However, assuming that the pharma company holds the appropriate licences, the desktop formats that they do possess (OTF/TTF format) can be converted fairly comfortably.

Will a desktop licence suffice?

To be frank, no. Where the creative agency holds a desktop licence to the font(s) that allows them to produce images and print materials, this type of licence will generally permit the conversion of the purchased desktop fonts for web use. Ultimately this means the development of a sales aid can’t progress and the agency would need to obtain licences for web font usage. 

A rare exception to this would be if a solely image-based presentation was being created. The creative agency is permitted to produce artwork using their licensed font, and they in turn allow the developers to use their artwork. No fonts are included inside the project itself, therefore no web font licence is required. If licensing is an issue within a project, this is one of the upsides of our CLM Lite solution. 

What about Adobe TypeKit?

Adobe TypeKit is an online service that provides its subscribers with access to its font library, under a single licensing agreement. A crucial drawback of TypeKit (and various other online services) is that they do not allow for ‘self-hosting’ of the font files. This means that whilst it is possible to use TypeKit fonts inside a CLM presentation, the user will need to maintain a persistent internet connection for the fonts to display correctly, which is a high risk strategy for a rep who may be presenting face-to-face, reliant on public wifi.

Is it worth taking a chance?

If anyone involved in the project is unsure whether the appropriate licences are held, they should double check and then check again. While not owning font licences isn’t the sort of offence that will draw attention from the ABPI, it can carry hefty fines and significant embarrassment and reputational damage for the pharma company. While the cost of a font licence may seem rather high for something that is often seen as being ‘free to use’, the potential price of non-compliance is far greater.

Font licences – the key points to remember

  • Pharma brand teams should provide a brand pack/ brand font assets. These can be converted to the appropriate formats assuming their assets are licensed appropriately. The creative agency should also use these same font files where possible to ensure consistency.
  • If brand assets are not available or the agency decides to use a different font, the creative agency needs to supply web font packages for each typeface used (including italic and weight variations where used) that are licensed for use within the project.
    • If the above is not available, appropriately-licensed desktop font packages (including italic and weight variations where used) that allow conversion to the appropriate web font formats will suffice.
  • Only if the requirement of a persistent internet connection is acceptable, can online services such as Adobe TypeKit be considered – subject to testing.
  • If a ‘safe’ fallback is required urgently, Google Fonts or other open-source providers generally offer fonts under very permissive licensing terms – however, the licence for the specific font should always be checked to confirm it is suitable for our usage
  • Web font formats required for modern iPad compatibility (in order of preference): WOFF2, WOFF
  • Desktop font formats that can be converted to web font format: OTF, TTF

The handover from creative to development can be fraught with complication, so we hope that this guide provides some extra insights on an often overlooked subject. Having been developing CLM presentations for a decade, our team has amassed vast experience in requirements gathering and on-boarding, so if you have any questions about the sales aid development process feel free to get in touch.

Relevant Resources

Veeva Engage
CLM Basics

Our Industry Insights and Trends from 2020

By James Harper /

It would be something of an understatement to describe 2020 as being an ‘eventful’ year in pharma. However, the year that started with a mysterious virus and ended with a vaccination roll out and hope of ending the COVID-19 pandemic also saw some startling changes in technology adoption and a surge of interest in one of the industries major players, Veeva.

One element of their product ecosystem – Veeva Engage – saw a 3000% increase in search interest in just two months.

Veeva Engage

Remote engagement becoming a reality

The knock-on effects of COVID-19 have been felt across every industry and called on businesses to question the necessity of face to face interactions. In the pharma space with the attention of healthcare professionals (HCPs) very much drawn to combating the spread of the virus and treating the sick, meetings with medical sales reps slipped down the priority list, while the notion of inviting them into the healthcare facility for a meeting evaporated!

From this, the desire for more considered, focused, higher quality video meetings became an absolute necessity. Subsequently, ‘remote engagement’ became the new buzzword.

Remote emngagement

As far as Google is concerned, remote engagement simply wasn’t a term people were using at the turn of the year. However, by April 2020 searches were up by 2850% from just 30 recorded global searches in February 2020.

The challenge of maintaining the same or better ratios of good sell outcomes became very real for medical sales reps, with pharma brand teams and agencies hunting down best practice guides for adapting their technology and presentation styles. Detail aids needed adapting for remote presentations and reps were led to consider how to keep their audience interested and engaged. Behind it all, was the catapult to prominence of Veeva Engage.

Lift off for Veeva Engage

While Zoom took off among the general public, Veeva Engage became the go-to platform for pharma video conferencing. Google searches for Engage rocketed up by 2967% either side of the COVID-19 outbreak in Europe and the US.

At twentyeightb, we were asked (and found on Google for) all manner of questions on Veeva Engage. Varying from the basic ‘what is it?’ to the more complex ‘how do I adapt CLM content for Engage?’.

Google searches

As the initial scramble to adapt died down, interest in Engage and how it has become a gateway for better implementation of the wider Veeva ecosystem hasn’t faded. With pharma companies having to fast track their adoption of Veeva, the opportunity to enhance their digital content from flat to functional, while capturing and analysing valuable performance insights has only increased. We’ll be seeing plenty of Veeva Engage in 2021, that’s for sure.

Digital meetings generate data

With an increase in CLM content built to make use of Veeva’s analytics and provide actionable analysis, interest in Veeva MyInsights grew over the course of 2020 and is set to increase further in 2021. At twentyeightb, we saw a real spike in people finding our website for MyInsights related terms in both May and September, while over the course of 2020 there was a steady increase in Google search queries, with October 2020 being up 90% on the start of the year.

Enhanced detail aids result in enhanced data collection, which means 2021 could be a big year for Veeva MyInsights. You can get your head around the Veeva MyInsights basics in our article. 

Last but not least, Veeva

2020 was a huge year for industry big hitters, Veeva. A vast suite of tools spanning data management & security, content management, CRM and crucially, compliance – Veeva’s stranglehold on digitisation in the life sciences industry has grown further still.

Veeva

While the company stock price has soared, general interest in the business and its product ecosystem has steadily risen too. In the year where the phrases remote engagement and business continuity became commonplace, Veeva was the bedrock of the pharma industry.

Our relationship with Veeva as a Multichannel Partner continued to grow in 2020 and we’re looking forward to collaborating on further projects in the year ahead. If you’re getting started with Veeva, looking for development support across the solution suite or keen to press on in enhancing the performance and richness of data achievable through the platform, then get in touch with our expert team.

Relevant Resources

James Harper MCM meetup
CLM Basics

Unlocking the potential of CRM/CLM – MCM Meetup [Video]

By Paul Cryer /

Did you miss ‘Effective storytelling across the pharma multichannel mix’? The first in a series of meetups organised by our Director James Harper and three other prominent voices in pharma marketing – Rich Brassett, Nick Saalfeld and Christine Mackay – the inaugural meeting held on 3rd October explored four key facets of the multichannel mix.

Within his talk, James explored the latent potential that exists within pharma CRM and CLM. Have a watch below or take a read of the key takeaways.

Functional content to unlock potential

Functional content engages reps

Flat, PDF-style edetailing fails to engage the field team in the same way that navigable content design can. If the rep isn’t engaged with what they’re presenting, how can we expect the customer to be?

Functional content gets used more

While the ability to measure interactions lessens with simple content design, interactive capability simply creates more. When you look beyond static design, both the rep and customer will actively seek to use the engaging elements within the presentation.

Functional content increases sales effectiveness

The ratio of desirable sales outcomes increases with interactive content, yet too many companies continue to supply their field teams with e-details made up of flat un-engaging, powerpoint like content. The pharma industry now has access to some incredible sales effectiveness and customer engagement tools and it is our job to help them unlock the potential of these platforms.

If you’re interested in finding out more about the Pharma Multichannel Marketing group and future meetups, you can read more here. Got a quick question for James on functional content? Get in touch using our quick question form.

Relevant Resources

certified content partners
IQVIA

Everything you need to know about qDialogue (IQVIA Remote e-Detailing)

By Matthew Beevor /

So, what is qDialogue?

qDialogue is IQVIA’s cloud-based platform enabling the remote presentation of Digital Sales Aids (DSA) to customers. If you’re wondering who IQVIA are, in November 2017 QuintilesIMS rebranded following a previous merger between IMS Health and Quintiles. In short, it

Why use this remote detailing solution?

qDialogue has all the benefits of traditional e-detailing, such as:

  • More engaging content than static PowerPoint presentations
  • Capturing of analytics and usage metrics
  • Greater control over approval process and release of content

However a remote DSA-based presentation can be delivered to multiple HCPs, in different locations, simultaneously by a single representative. Remote detailing can reduce travel time for representatives as well as providing greater reach to field based HCPs and an alternative communication channel to any HCP with limited availability.

Who is it optimised for?

Local brand teams are the primary users of the remote detailing application in conjunction with the HCP, who has somewhat more engagement than in a passive face-to-face meeting. The data generated will be manipulated by the business intelligence team and used by salesforce management, marketing and strategy teams.

Is it integrated with IQVIA’s CRM/CLM solution MI Touch?

As with Veeva’s equivalent system, Engage for Portals, the slides used are built using HTML, so to some extent, existing MI Touch e-detail presentations can be recreated in qDialogue. Unlike Veeva CLM and Veeva Engage for Portals, however, there are fundamental architectural differences between MI Touch and qDialogue meaning content cannot be simply ported between them. Significant cost savings can be made if developers know in advance that the presentation will be dual-targeted, so it is always worth planning ahead if you can.

MI Touch does not support the sharing of reusable elements in a single source file meaning changes to a standard element need to be repeated individually in every file throughout the entire DSA. Conversely, qDialogue shares everything in one place.

If developers know at the beginning of a project, then they can develop an automated build process to take a single common set of source materials and convert them into either MI Touch (no shared content, fixed sizes) or qDialogue (shared content, resizing), meaning a relatively small additional initial outlay will greatly reduce the overall cost of the wider development project.

How is it delivered?

As with MI Touch, IQVIA recommend using separate slides for each element of a presentation. However, in this case, it is to allow their remote detailing wrapper to list out an index of all the slides to allow the presenter to quickly navigate around the presentation.

It is still possible to include navigation within pages using regular anchor tags. However, this highlights some limitations: each file is still discrete, transitions between slides are not seamless and there are restrictions as to how fluid the presentation can be.

Furthermore, as there is no way to break content down into sub-presentations, i.e. every slide appears in the index, it might be better to build multiple smaller presentations rather than trying to put everything into a single oversized, cumbersome presentation.

an index of slides in qDialogue

What is the output?

The result of the developer’s efforts will be a series of zip files containing each slide of the presentation, linked together if required, which are then sent to IQVIA for installation.

Are there any limitations?

Unfortunately, yes. As with all DSAs, there is an element of compromise required in some areas.

  • MI Touch and qDialogue being separate systems means having to maintain two different build pipelines or even two totally discrete DSAs. This can result in higher maintenance overhead, as for example, simply updating a logo (e.g to remove the black triangle) would entail running two separate build and QA processes.
  • The size of a presentation is limited by what can be reasonably listed in the wrapper index structure, or what can be coded in manually as a navigation mechanism.
  • The names of the packages displayed in the wrapper index are very short and as such, care needs to be taken for them to be understandable to the user.
  • The numbering of slide packages is a requirement from qDialogue, further reducing the characters available.
  • The qDialogue wrapper itself does not resize. It is necessary to break out code in order to achieve a responsive design suitable for display on different size screens as found on the desks of various HCPs. This break out code could be broken at any point by IQVIA performing a change to the qDialogue architecture.
  • Use of videos is discouraged as there are some concerns that the wrapper may not always handle them effectively and streaming to tablet devices can be a concern. Where videos are used, it is strongly recommended to use only one video element per page and not to use separate sound and video elements.
  • In general, frameworks such as Edge should not be used as they add further complexity inside the qDialogue iFrame based wrapper.
  • The chances of screen readers and other accessibility aids working nicely with the qDialogue wrapper are slim and should be tested thoroughly if a requirement of the project.

What are the benefits?

The benefits derived from using e-detailing are intrinsically linked to the ability to increase the reach to new HCPs and structure presentations in a manner amenable to the qDialogue wrapper.

Need to know more about qDialogue?

twentyeightb are certified IQVIA partners on the MI Touch platform and can advise on any aspect of delivering content. Our experience of working with both agencies and brand teams to deliver e-detailing projects is substantial, so if you are looking for more information on qDialogue or any other CLM platform, we would be happy to help so why not get in touch?

Relevant Resources

agnitio tablet user
CLM Basics

An introduction to Agnitio

By Paul Cryer /

What is Agnitio?

Agnitio is a digital software solutions provider, specialising in multichannel marketing tools for pharma and life sciences. Its primary products are Rainmaker and Sharedoc.

What is Agnitio’s Rainmaker CLM?

Rainmaker is the primary multi-channel closed loop marketing (CLM) product offered by Agnitio, which integrates with Sharedoc to provide an end-to-end solution for digital content delivery to healthcare professionals (HCPs).

What is Sharedoc?

Sharedoc is a cross-platform solution available for both Apple and Microsoft devices (laptop and tablet). It enables the delivery of content to HCPs and patients in HTML5 format, as well as PDF, PowerPoint and Word.  It integrates with Rainmaker to provide a seamless mechanism for providing leave-behinds and patient information directly from the same shared content source as the brand marketing assets.

Why use the two in conjunction?

Using Rainmaker and Sharedoc together allows HCPs access to a wide variety of consistently branded and approved content; while allowing the brand team to follow trends and improve their messaging.

Pharmaceutical representatives can increase their reach and power by using the Rainmaker software to provide tailored engagement for their presentation via a range of different channels and using far more engaging and interactive content than the static slide approach previously deployed. Fully integrated webinars and compliant email allow for a mass-spectrum delivery; hitting multiple targets with a single effort.

Who would use Agnitio?

Both local pharmaceutical representatives and HCPs can directly access content in Rainmaker since it provides an integrated experience for representatives to provide face-to-face or remote detailing together with self-guided, on-demand detailing directly by HCPs.

Delivering for Agnitio

The primary mechanism for content delivery in Rainmaker is HTML5 containers. It is also possible to use PDF or PPTX files, however, doing so limits the flexibility and does not provide an interactive or engaging experience for the ultimate end user.

By choosing carefully a single HTML5 file can be reused in multiple presentations. Planning a sensible architectural approach in advance enables the same content to be deployed across multiple devices (laptop, tablet, Apple, Microsoft) and platforms (edetailing, remote Detailing, webinar, compliant email).

Rainmaker uses ‘slides’ which then fit with ‘modules’ to form a presentation. As with other Digital Sales Aid platforms, developers are able to automate aspects of the build process in order to programmatically share content between slides and ensure a consistent set of messaging and branding.

While Rainmaker does include localisation tools to translate and adapt global content for regional markets, in our experience it is usually better – budget permitting – to create custom content for each region which can be more carefully targeted and designed to suit specific local needs.

Limitations

The Agnitio platform is not free and if you have already rolled out existing sales aids on Veeva or are using Salesforce as your CRM then while the integration with Agnitio is useful, it can create the inefficiency of running two platforms side by side. Using a single consistent platform for all your materials, deliverables and analysis is, of course, more effective and can prevent mismatched data.

Benefits

Once the first few interactions with HCPs have occurred the real benefits can start to be felt as Agnitio provides a full set of analysis and tracking tools which can be drawn together in the dashboard. These provide brand teams with deep insights into how their brand’s key communicators and accounts are performing.

It’s possible to integrate Rainmaker with existing CRM systems such as Microsoft Dynamics or Salesforce as well as pharma-specific platforms such as Veeva.

Using Agnitio can provide a number of benefits dependent upon the actual business case that underpins the drive to migrate content and activities into the platform. The wide range of different tools on offer is such that using Agnitio may improve everything from the strategic direction of marketing materials through to representative performance and even potentially managing PASS studies via the ShareDoc mechanisms. This allows HCPs to pull down content and share it with their patients, all while being tracked and analysed.

If you’re new to Agnitio or feel you’re not getting the most out of the platform, get in touch with us to see how we could help with your Agnitio projects.

Relevant Resources