Case Study
TRUEresult – Blood Glucose Meter With a Cause
Blood glucose meters by the American-Japanese company NIPRO do not need special introduction on the European market. Branded differently in the different countries, they are still the same exceptional quality product of a medical manufacturer whose budget for research and development in 2015 came up to US $ 52.1 million, and by the successful combination of the American technologies with Japanese perfectionism.
Every new product launch, especially of a home medical equipment, raises the issue of direct communication about its advantages and qualities with the end user, who is to make an informed decision. Blood glucose meters are among the goods of major importance for the diabetic patients and thus – reliabile and quality devices, designed to provide precise measurement, ease of use, safety and durability.
TRUEresult has successfully undergone all obligatory production tests, but in order to highlight its real advantages and since the producer takes feedback seriously in terms of improvements, during its introduction on the Bulgarian market and in order to improve the product even further, the local representative of the brand carried out two important tests: first with a wide range of users, including individuals for whom the daily blood sugar measurement is not a necessity (as a result of this feedback several changes were applied), and a second test with a clinical laboratory, where the TRUEresult data, compared to the one the professional laboratory instruments by Roche provided, confirmed the extremely precise measuring capabilities of the meter, compared to the professional lab equipment.
Usually, the introduction of a new home medical equipment goes along with its presentation in front of professionals, familiar with the disease – physicians, pharmacists, DME/ durable medical equipment sellers (training for the last group was provided by the importing company – CHRONO) as well as all kinds of distributors – advisors and channels, that are the decision-making authority to approve and recommend the product to the user. TRUEresult has also taken the inevitable route of local med authorities validation and approval, providing technical specifics, statistics and data about the meter, reasoning why it is named a first-quality product.
When the 6 ELEMENTS initially started working with TRUEresult, we had the traditional approach to a new medical product introduction going through the obligatory market launch; thus, we successfully fulfilled local representative’s expectations, requirements and market strategy preferences.
What more value could be added to a product, whose qualities are convincing enough both for the professionals and the end users, and the market positioning of which is stable and growing? There was nothing better, but to take the advantage of the product quality and make it useful in a non-commercial environment where it could serve and support a non-profit cause.
For us, a cause worth standing for, was fighting the stigma of the “diabetic disease”. The diabetes, while not a world top awareness priority (the way many diseases are), is still related to number of condition inducted complications and diabetic patients claim they are still objects of discrimination, such as polite but adamant refusal for the admission of a diabetic child in a kindergarten, refusal to hire an employee whose daily routine includes measurement of blood sugar and consequential injection of insulin; diabetes still proves to be an obstacle to the normal acceptance of a patient as an adequate employee or fellow classmate and in general – as a valued part of society.
In search for an added value, 6 ELEMENTS, together with CHRONO, developed and distributed brochures, providing information in two directions – rising general awareness about diabetes and giving detailed information to the diabetic patients themselves about their rights, access to care and social commitment of institutions.
Each of these two info flows targeted, on the one hand, to provide additional knowledge, break prejudices and ultimately lead to the necessary empathic acceptance and understanding of the diabetes without driving those involuntary mechanisms of compassion that are irritating to the patient; and, on the other hand, to inform the diabetic patients about their rights.
The campaign for social and health awareness was accompanied by a cross-campaign “Let’s cook together (for diabetics)” in which, in a simulation of a cooking class, a leading manufacturer of healthy confectionery products demonstrated to parents of diabetic children the many opportunities to cook excellent, tailored to the disease-specific diet food. The focus of the class was in the product combination, that is good to cook delicious children meals, risk-free and easy to make.
The diabetes awareness campaign efficiency results (provided to CHRONO) were more than satisfactory; TRUEresult blood glucose meter was marketed as a secondary information within the brochure and as a small percentage of the total content of the distributed materials, so it was hard to link the significantly increased sales with this particular channel and campaign. The actual marketing efficiency lied in the campaign functionality, where, along with the product, we enjoyed a warm welcome by the end-respondents, while the stats for website attendance, reached audience, feedback and effects were the less important part compared to the priceless reaction of the meter’s users and participants – the emotionally charged customer testemonials received in CHRONO’s office.
For us, this was one of the most educational and socially valuable campaigns we had the pleasure to join.
