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One of the things that salespeople talk to me the most about is qualifying sales leads correctly. Many people have challenges with their pipelines, which I find to be quite interesting. They have

According to USFDA, a combination product is one composed of any combination of a drug and device; biological product and device; drug and biological product

a lot of opportunities in the pipeline that are either taking far too long close, they have a low closing ratio or they cannot get return calls anymore (aka the customer has lost interest). This

; or drug, device, and biological product and fixed dose combination would include two or more combinations of drug.

Examples of combination products may in

is why I use a sales tool called BANT. Whenever I am prospecting for opportunities or new clients I will use BANT to determine if the opportunity is a legitimate sales lead or that it will turn

lude drug-coated devices, drugs packaged with delivery devices in medical kits, and drugs and devices packaged separately but intended to be used together.

into an eventual sale. BANT stands for Budget, Authority and Time frame. I will qualify BANT with a customer with the following questions:

If we are able to show a return on this project, do you

here is enormous increase in the number of combination products entering the market in the recent years. Combination products have proven advantages but fixe

have the budget to move forward? If they answer yes to this question, I will proceed to ask a number of open ended questions, such as: Who besides yourself would have to sign off on this agreemen

d dose combinations are still in the process of convincing regulatory authority on their advantages over the single ingredient formulations.

Combination pro

t? With this question I am trying to quantify the process of getting a purchase order, without coming out and asking about the order directly. If they tell me that they do not have the budget for

ucts have become life saving products for the pharmaceutical companies who doesn’t have many innovative molecules in their product pipeline and have been inc

this project. I would ask them what sort of returns they would need in order to free up budget from another department (cost center, project, etc) to fund the project. If they tell me they would

easingly used in the product life cycle management. Even the companies having product patents are trying to extend their product life cycle through the combi

not be able to do that, I would then ask, what would be the requirements to get the project in their next fiscal budget cycle, when that budget cycle is, etc.

The Authority portion of BANT can

nation products and maximize the revenues. But the companies involved in this practice are overlooking that they are burdening the patients both economically

ctually be a little bit more challenging. Many people (especially if you are dealing with people who are low in the organization or in certain departments like purchasing) do not want to admit th

and physically. They need to rightly judge the benefits of the combination products and they have to even look at the risks involved when combining the produ

at they do not have the power to make a decision. I will try the same approach as with the Budget question to begin with.Who besides yourself would be involved in this decision? If they are open

ts. Some of the combination products were well accepted by physicians while others suffered. Companies involved in development of combination products are fi

and give you some names, I would then begin to negotiate access to those other people. After all you want to make sure that everyone involved in the decision has firsthand information from you on

ding difficulty in defining their combination products and facing various challenges from selecting a combination to marketing it.

Following aspects would a

the details of your proposal. If they did not give names (or say they do), I would then start to ask questions that were less around their power to make decisions and move onto more questions th

dd to the challenges in developing combination products:

Which markets to tap where the combination products can do fairly well?
Which combination prod

t are related to process.

What is the evaluation process you will go through? Is there a committee of people who would evaluate this service or product? I would ask a serious of open ended and c

cts are meaningful and rational?
Which therapeutic categories to select?
Which Combinations can address unmet needs of the patients?
Do combin

losed ended questions to make sure that I understood fully whether this person could make the decision alone or not before moving on. Timelines are often a missed opportunity when it comes to BAN

tions increase the patient compliance?
What would be the developing cost?
How to tackle the risks encountered during combination product developmen

T. A lot of people will ask something to the effect of, what is your timeline to make this decision? Or when do you need delivery of the product if successful? I think this is a missed opportunit

t?

As combination products don't fit into the traditional categories of drugs, medical devices, or biological products, the USFDA is in the process of devel

y and can lead to major frustrations if not explored fully. I would begin by asking the actual timeline question, but I would then follow that up with a serious of questions that are geared towar

ping new procedures for reviewing their safety, efficacy and quality.

Professional from academic institutions, pharmaceutical industries, health care indust

s understanding what may delay the process. Questions like: What are your costs (loss opportunity, penalties, etc) if this project does not finish by the timelines? Are there other priorities (he

y and representatives from various regulatory agencies are working out to design the regulatory requirements for manufacture and sale of combination products

y I’m fishing for other opportunities here too) that could bump this timeline if they become more important or miss their current deadlines? I have found over the years, that whenever I have chal

.

As there is an increasing trend of the combination products companies manufacturing such products should be able to tackle the problems involved in the de

lenges with opportunities in my pipeline that it usually means that I forgot to correctly identify BANT or a component of it. This is simple to rectify with a few phone calls or quick meetings, y

elopment. They need to be wiser in analyzing the market trends and the regulatory requirements.

Companies that provide selfless information through particip

ou can go in and get those sales opportunities back on track and moving towards closure and greater commissions. Although BANT is a simple concept it takes practice and discipline to make it easy

tion in industry events and feedback to regulatory authorities would be able to face the challenges and will be successful in developing combination products

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