Successfully branding a product may take many years and require tens of millions of dollars. Since a product lifecycle averages about seven years, there is a lot of pressure on marketers to perform. When successful, marketing leads to more informed patients who are better able to manage their health. Nevertheless, return on investment (ROI) is the classic way to determine whether or not marketers are performing and producing effective marketing campaigns.

Traditional marketing and direct response (DR) marketing forge and appropriately motivate target audiences in different ways. Traditional marketing is one-way communication designed to build top-of-mind awareness with mass appeal that ultimately affects attitude. DR marketing is designed to achieve two-way dialogue with the prospect. The one-on-one nature of direct-response marketing is ultimately designed to affect behavior.

This article is a review of a presentation by Keli Bennett, Consumer Marketing Director at Abbott Laboratories, made at the CBI Forum on Pharmaceutical Branding held August 14-15, 2003, in Princeton, New Jersey. Bennett contrasts and compares DR marketing and traditional DTC strategies and presents a Case Study showing the ROI benefit of integrating the two approaches.