ProClinica
client Boots tried to enter the silver sulfadiazine burn-cream market against pioneering Silvadene with a generic
named SSD. But nurses didn't like the consistency of the product.
The company
reformulated into a cosmetics-quality product, and wanted to try again. But how to get nurse attention at the American Burn
Association meeting where the huge Silvadene exhibit towered over all other companies, and nurses looked forward each year
to the Silvadene bacchanalian buffet dinner and open bar?
InCoMed was a small medical instrument company with a unique solution to a common
OR risk: Pinhole leaks in latex gloves, which can often occur during surgery. Despite care and double-gloving, such leaks
can pose a real threat, especially when surgeons must operate on a trauma patient without knowing his or her HIV status.
The InCoMed
Barrier Integrity Monitor measured changes in resistance between the surgeon and the patient that would occur immediately
if a glove leak occurs, warning the surgeon to stop, clean up and re-glove. Specifiers of the instrument would be
OR head nurses -- and so, the Association of Operating Room Nurses (AORN) annual convention was a natural place to launch InCoMed's
device. However, anyone who's ever visited such meetings knows that big companies like J&J Ethicon and Baxter dominate
with huge exhibits and lots of little gifts for attending nurses. How could a small company like InCoMed, with only
a 10-foot exhibit in the back of the hall, attract any traffic?
ProClinica's tactic for both Boots and IncoMed was similar: Out-think and out-create,
not outspend. Direct mail was key to both programs.
For InCoMed,
ProClinica conceived a direct-mail teaser test: A folder with a latex glove inside, and challenged OR nurses to
find the pin-hole leak in it. We even offered them a small magnifying glass. "Find the hole and mark it, and bring it to the
InCoMed AORN booth for a special gift."
For Boots, we decided to play off the cosmetic quality of the reformulated cream. We hired
an artist renowned for his Lord & Taylor ads to design a special fashion-oriented invitation. "Come to the SSD booth at
ABA
for a free cosmetics and hair styling makeover...and after the Silvadene banquet, join us for a Neiman-Marcus fashion
show and a sumptuous dessert bar."
We knew that
the OR nurses would think they were pulling a fast one with the InCoMed piece – that they would simply blow up the glove
and put it a basin of water to find the hole. And we knew that burn nurses would warm to being treated as women, not customers.
· InCoMed attracted an average of 600 nurses a day
to its tiny exhibit, and needed an overnight delivery of additional gifts to handle the traffic generated.
· Burn
nurses left the Silvadene banquet early to dress in their finest for the SSD fashion show, which featured
men as well as women in casual, beach and formal wear, walking down the catwalk to the amplified sounds of Elton John classics.
When the male models stepped off the catwalk to the strains of "Sacrifice," and invited the nurses to dance, the reaction
was electric. The re-launch was a huge success.
The
InCoMed sales manager was ecstatic: "We had one of the worst locations in the hall, but with ProClinica's direct mail, we
made the other exhibitors look like the Maytag repairman."
