#22: The different ‘faces’ of detail aids

Besides being presented in the conventional booklet form, detail aids can also put on different ‘outfits’.

Flipcharts
Flipcharts are usually made up of 6-12 pieces of cardboard with information printed on single or both sides of every cardboard. They are normally placed on doctors’ desk. There are calendar flipcharts and patient education flipcharts.

Calendar flipcharts
Obviously dates are printed on one side of the cardboards, while product information, figures and data on the other. While doctors use the calendar side to check dates or mark important appointments, they are at the same time reminded of the presence of the product.

Patient education flipcharts
Patient education information printed on one side of the cardboards, where doctors can use them to explain disease to patients, and possibly treatment with the particular product highlighted in the flipchart. Again, as when doctors use the flipchart, they are constantly being reminded of the product.

Folders
Although not considered as a detail aid, but sometimes a conference kit folder – basically a paper folder with a pocket that is used to contain sample of clinical papers and writing pads - can have the relevant product information printed on the insides, hence serving as a simplified detail aid.

Others
In fact, detailing information can be presented in any creative way that you can think of. For example, treatment guidelines and product information printed on the four sides of a cardboard folded in a pyramid shape.

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#21: Working on a detail aid

As mentioned in my previous post, a detail aid is a marketing tool that helps your clients to promote their products. Therefore, understanding your clients' needs is the very first step to producing effective detail aids that fit nicely into their product marketing strategies.

Getting a clear brief from client
Before you start the project, most likely you will discuss with your client face-to-face on several aspects. You want to get answers on the following questions:

- What are the specific reasons for having this detail aid?
- Who is the target audience?
- What key messages should the detail aid convey?
- Are there any key published papers that support those messages?
- What kind of design style does your client like?
- What are the design elements to be included (eg, colors, images, photos, illustrations, logos)?

Where is the content?
Content in a detail aid comes from a variety of sources pertaining to the particular product.

Usually your client will provide the related materials, such as product monograph, existing detail aids, clinical papers, or abstracts from scientific conferences. Reading these materials carefully will help you understand their product better. You will also be turning some of the data and facts from those materials into content of the detail aid.

At times, materials provided may not be sufficient or up to date, you then need to do some research yourself. Start searching for review papers and clinical papers (the more recent the better) with PubMed.

How to ‘utilize’ the clinical papers
From clinical papers, you can:

1. Extract key results from the abstract.
2. Use the introduction to set the scene for the detail aid.
3. Get in-depth details and figures or charts from the study results.
4. Use the discussion to emphasize the significance of the key results.

Plan your story
The next thing you need to do is to plan a story for the detail aid.

Using a conventional 4-page detail aid as example, this is how you can divide the detail aid into different sections.

Page 1: The detail aid cover, usually carries an eye-catching design and title.

Pages 2 and 3: Spread the content between these two pages. For example, set the scene with an introduction to the disease or treatment concept, followed with drug product characteristics, efficacy and safety, data of which are supported by clinical papers.

Page 4: Keep the top part of this page for conclusion. You can use bulleted points to summarize the key information presented in the main content. Other things like product shot, references and logos are placed at the bottom part of the page.

Depending on the number of pages available, emphasis of the detail aid, or the amount of data you have, you may adjust the story or flow accordingly.

As with other projects, you and the designer are very likely to make a few rounds of changes based on your client’s comments before the detail aid can be finally approved for printing.

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#20: Let’s talk about detail aid

When compared with an event highlight bulletin or patient education brochure, the number of words in a detail aid is much, much fewer. However, the work involved is not. And many times you may need to rewrite, rewrite, and rewrite.

What is a detail aid?
Detail aid is a marketing tool containing promotional messages incorporated with creative elements. It is a sales aid that pharmaceutical sales representatives used to engage doctors in a dialog about a drug. The detail aid can be in a print form (eg, booklet, flip chart) or an electronic document (eg, PDF file, on the web).

The detail aid contains information about a particular product, including clinical data supporting the product’s efficacy and safety, charts and graphs illustrating those clinical data, and also possibly guidelines on dosing and administration of the drug.

Nature and style of a detail aid
Simply put, detail aid is all about promotion. Clients would like to see their product look good in a detail aid – the product must appear at least as good as, if not better than, the competitor’s product, either in terms of efficacy, safety, tolerability or any other factors of relevant significance.

While a detail aid can be produced to introduce a new drug or new treatment concept, it may also serve as a reminder of an existing drug, to provide latest clinical data, or to address specific concerns and issues regarding the use of the drug.

Sometimes clients may just want to focus the whole detail aid on a particular clinical paper by highlighting the positive results reported on their product.

If you have one detail aid sample in front of you, you will probably notice these few characteristics of a detail aid:

- The sentences inside are mostly short.
- Promotional language is maximized.
- Every statement is substantiated with good references.
- Design is creative and eye-catching.

So how do you get started on a detail aid? Well, find out in my next post! :)

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