Tim Frank, Triple Threat Communications’ managing partner, takes a broad view of his agency success. “When we think about what we’ve accomplished over the past year, it’s really the achievements of the brands that we work with,” he says. “We don’t measure it by how many people work for us, or how many people are involved in the organization.”
And while Frank may vicariously define his agency’s success through his clients’, that’s not to say the agency had a bad year, either. If organic growth is any indicator, the agency seemed to do quite well, actually.
Triple Threat brought on new AOR work for AstraZeneca’s omega-3 Epanova, Seroquel XR (bipolar) and Crestor (lipids) as well as other new projects, also with AZ, for CV Direct, Zoladex, Merrem (infecton) and Brilinta (MI prevention).
“A lot of organic growth came from AstraZeneca, which is our biggest client,” Frank affirms. “We’ve picked up some additional brands there as well as increasing the scope with some of the other brands we’re currently working on.” And that growth translated into a 40% increase in revenue year over year, as well as coinciding with two senior hires, John Lopos for strategic planning and Jesse Pease to lead digital.
To build on their recent success, Bob Hogan, the agency’s director of consumer and strategy, hopes to outfit client campaigns with a new a behavioral model. “It’s really recognizing at the end of the day, what we’re in the business of: driving behavior,” he says. “Whoever it is, and whatever it is, we’re driving behaviors. We have been really steeped in and worked closely with the people at Stanford Persuasive Tech, Stanford University. We realized that most agencies and most of the industry now is really focused on trying to motivate people. And it’s one of the hardest things to do. There’s examples of it everywhere, whether it be adherence programs or management.”
Armed with new behavioral techniques to inform their campaigns, Hogan says, the next step is to combine these motivating forces with accessible, digital tools. “We’re starting to look at how you can create some digital capabilities that really help drive these behaviors—we’re not interested in doing banner ads or websites. It’s about the interaction of any two people, any two customers whether it be a sales rep, physician, patient or a caregiver.
“We’re starting to look at how to help solve client problems as it relates to those different milestones throughout the patient journey,” he adds. “The digital world is a behaviorist’s playground. They couldn’t have dreamt up or created a more ideal environment.”
And while new models and tools are sure to help keep pace with industry changes, Frank sees reason for pause on the horizon—with a host of changes taking hold in the industry.
“The world our clients live in continues to change. Mergers and acquisitions as well as the generic influence on the market is changing the way they operate,” Frank explains. “The increase of delivery networks and organized customer groups—it’s all changing the landscape they live in.”
Even so, Frank is optimistic: “We want to continue to do great stuff for our clients. And the rest of the growth and where it takes place at the agency is going to follow that. As long as we keep that as our masthead, which holds and drives everything else, I’m wholly confident in the health of this agency.”
From the July 01, 2014 Issue of MM+M - Medical Marketing and Media
