We loved our beautiful product. We forgot about all the pain and heartache. It was special and unique. We waited anxiously for the market to respond. And waited. And waited. For some reason, the market didn't appreciate our new product the way we thought they would. We had a bang-up launch plan. We had all the tools in place. We had sales materials, patient brochures, a digital media campaign, we trained all the sales reps, we had supporting clinical data. But sales uptake was slower than we expected. Our senior management started asking questions about why we were behind expectations. Our sales team got frustrated and blamed marketing for all their problems. Our board started asking questions. Nobody knew why it wasn't working. I started thinking about this dilemma when a colleague of mine wrote a series of excellent articles on overcoming inertia in life science product launches and the need for more powerful value propositions to drive change (The Marketer's Challenge, Changing Behavior, and Tradeoffs and Unintended Consequences). I wondered, why is creating market change so hard? It turns out I learned the answer in 8th grade science class. That was the year that we studied a series of modules that were supposed to expose us to the many exciting disciplines of science. We did a module on space and the origin of the universe and was time travel really possible. The chemistry module was fun ­ usually something blew up. Biology was great, we got to dissect things. But physics, BLEGH. Boring. Not something we What Newton's Laws of Motion Teach Us About Launching New ProductsLori Thompson, Managing Director, Red Team Associateswould ever use. Until now. Because Newton's Laws of Motion explain a lot. And they point to a possible solution to our marketing problem. Newton's first law of motion, also dubbed the law of inertia, says an object at rest will stay at rest. And an object in motion will stay in motion at the same speed and in the same direction. Unless an external force pushes on that object. Think about that. Nothing changes unless an external force creates a change.So, if a physician is currently prescribing a drug for their patient, the easiest thing to do is click "renew" in their EMR system. Why do something different? Maybe there CXO INSIGHTS6
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