What is a KOL in Pharma and How to Identify Them?

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Before we even begin, let me bust a fundamental myth. KOLS ARE NOT INFLUENCERS!!! A Key Opinion Leader (KOL) is an individual widely acknowledged for their expertise and experience, both in online and offline spheres. In contrast, influencers are individuals who attract public attention due to their impact on specific social media platforms. So, next time someone asks you what is a KOL, you know what to say.

A Key opinion leader (KOL) can help pharma & healthcare companies reach their niche target audience. They can also facilitate word-of-mouth on a large scale and help the organization and its products earn credibility.

McKinsey divides word-of-mouth recommendations into two categories:

1. High-impact recommendations from established experts or close friends who we trust
2. Low-impact recommendations such as a random online review with less credibility

Who are Key Opinion Leaders (KOLs) in Pharma?

A key opinion leader (KOL) in the pharma industry is an influential researcher or physician held in high regard by their colleagues.

How did this come? Let’s roll down to a few pages in history.

In the 1940s, communications theorist Paul Lazarsfeld with the help of his students, established that, in certain areas, people trusted credible figures within their networks and were more likely to change their preferences and views based on the judgment of these “opinion leaders” than advertising.

In the mid-1950s, Lazarsfeld’s argument was extended to medicine when Pfizer conducted a study to determine what factors influenced US doctors to adopt a new drug.

And that’s when KOL management came into action and the focus was increased on identifying the right KOL to boost the sales of their pharmaceutical drugs.

What is the Role of KOLs in the Pharma Domain?

Pharmaceutical companies seek the expertise of medical professionals to develop and market new drugs. KOLs, therefore, can play an essential role in healthcare.

Doctors often help run research programs and design protocols during the development phase. The intimate knowledge they gain from working with the drug closely during the clinical trials helps them popularize its benefits within the medical community after launch through word-of-mouth.

The relationship between KOLs and pharmaceutical companies is constantly evolving. To create a new drug, pharmaceutical companies need medical experts at the top of their profession.

Once the drug is commercially available, other key opinion leaders from the pharma industry like senior general practitioners and primary care physicians can also help make the product successful.

Pharmaceutical and healthcare companies and KOLs enjoy a mutually beneficial relationship with each other. KOLs help organizations spread the word in the medical community about their latest products and services.

In the process, KOLs establish themselves as domain experts within a specific field of medicine, earning the reputation of being thought leaders.

How do KOLs Help in Pharma Sales?

Another research shows that high-impact recommendations are more likely to result in a purchase than low-impact recommendations up to 50 times. Companies that build long-term relationships with KOLs benefit from high-impact product recommendations.

KOLs in healthcare also provide a human touch to a business’s marketing efforts. People, especially members of the medical fraternity, will trust the advice of an experienced industry expert over a stranger on the internet.

A KOL helps Pharma and life sciences companies propagate their drug development and sales & marketing avenues. However, it’s not easy to search for the right KOL with relevant domain experience and networks in the medical community. 

In light of this, creating a KOL engagement plan with the right technology is essential. Here’s an interesting data solution that enables companies with KOL identification and profiling.  

Advantages of Having a Key Opinion Leader in Healthcare

KOLs are industry experts who help conduct clinical trials and also serve as ambassadors for new drugs within the medical fraternity. The influence, expertise, and reputation of KOLs complement the marketing efforts of companies.

As a result, KOLs play an essential role in healthcare strategies and have become indispensable in launching the operations of new drugs in the market.

KOLs are a part of drug discovery and research right from the beginning. They may work as Principal investigators (PI) in a trial or refer patients to participate in one.

They also help the ultimate marketing process, facilitating understanding of the disease and how the new drug treats the ailment. This allows the new drug to generate profit for the company, increase market share and promote the company.

How to Identify Key Opinion Leaders

In Oncology, a single physician cannot be an expert in all types of tumors or biomarkers. Typically, a community of oncologists relies on a much smaller group of experts to inform them about new and improved treatments.

Similarly, multiple physicians are involved in treating and diagnosing rare lung diseases. However, a small group of experts is acknowledged as thought leaders by their peers. They help understand and validate emerging therapies.

Must Read: Check out our detailed blog on KOL identification in the traditional and Data-driven way

The following attributes can help companies with their KOL identification process –

• Medical publications – KOLs of national significance can be profiled and identified through their speaking roles, citation history from sources such as PubMed, and publications as researchers and authors.
• Leadership roles – Physicians in leadership roles on advisory boards and committees like the American Rheumatism Association, American Heart Association, American Society of Clinical Oncology, and the National Comprehensive Cancer Network are often tapped by companies as potential key opinion leaders in the pharma industry.
• Longitudinal patient claims data – Pharmaceutical companies can connect the profiles of health care professionals (HCPs) to their relevant work with patients by collecting procedure level and diagnosis claims data. This data can be filtered by region or institution.
• Clinical trial data – Clinical trial data can help pharmaceutical companies identify key opinion leaders in the healthcare industry. Organizations can procure clinical trial data from their primary source, clinicaltrials.gov. They can also glean data from secondary sources like Sitetrove or Trialtrove.
• Social media data – KOLs who use social media platforms to discuss presentations from healthcare-related events and conferences, advise on patient management and diseases, and offer opinions on new therapies are also known as digital opinion leaders (DOLs).

Pharmaceutical companies can monitor social media channels like YouTube, Twitter, physician-only networks, and blog sites to identify and map KOLs.

Role of Data-driven Technology in KOL Identification and Mapping

One major challenge that pharmaceutical companies face is identifying KOL influencer networks in the healthcare industry. Technology can help identify key opinion leaders and see how audiences engage with their work.

Machine learning offers more nuanced insights and greater adaptability than conventional software. Artificial intelligence-driven solutions find it vastly easier to process substantially big data sets.

Machine learning tools help medical science liaisons (MSLs) extract invaluable insights from large data sets accurately and fast. ML algorithms train using examples of KOLs who successfully persuade large groups or audiences, identifying the underlying patterns that connect them.

Using this common thread, it can predict which key opinion leaders in the pharma industry are ideal for the unique needs of a particular MSL team.

Machine learning can aid MSLs in identifying KOLs who can help them reach the audience they want to target. It can also connect the idea or information that MSLs want to communicate with the KOLs, who can help them deliver the message.

Gramener Helped a Top Pharma Client Reduce Communication Gap by up to 15% Through Accurate KOL Identification

At Gramener, we used techniques like NLP, variable associations, and clustering to build an automated key opinion leader management visual app for one of our top pharma clients.

The analytics-powered dashboard compared industry experts by their digital presence, sphere of influence, and subject matter expertise, among other parameters.

The solution decreased rejections and increased KOL satisfaction by arming the sales leads with the correct information and aligning them. It also increased NPS scores and reduced communication barriers between the marketing and sales teams by up to 15%.

Read More: Top 10 NLP use cases in the pharma & healthcare industry.

Conclusion

Consumers find word-of-mouth 10X more reliable than paid media. Just a 10% incremental traction in word-of-mouth can result in a 1.5% increase in sales. Key opinion leaders can help boost your marketing efforts in a more cost-effective, faster, and more powerful way than traditional methods.

Connect with us to know how our solutions can help you build effective key opinion leader strategies.