Developing unbranded educational initiatives has always ranked among the trickiest assignments tasked to life sciences brand teams. Nobody doubts the utility of these programs, especially when there’s a true awareness, educational or differentiation need (and it’s rare when there isn’t one). The issue has long been that unbranded campaigns force life sciences companies to walk a tightrope: They must address an educational need without referencing product specifics or crossing any other regulatory boundaries.
That’s why, as unbranded initiatives further entrench themselves as cornerstones of disease-awareness and early-engagement strategies, collaboration between commercial and medical teams has become increasingly crucial. When done well—when the campaigns adeptly fuse scientific rigor and strategic insight—they drive clinical impact while steering clear of regulatory challenges.
Few dispute the appeal of unbranded content. In contrast with promotional, on-label campaigns, which require pages of fair balance and safety information, unbranded content is more agile. The tricky part is that, to benefit from this agility, life sciences companies cannot cross certain lines, lest they “brand” themselves within the campaign.
Because of this, unbranded education only makes sense if certain conditions are met. There must be a true educational need, an ability to communicate specifically enough that key points are useful to HCPs and a realistic window where impact can be realized.
It’s the collaboration aspect that trips up many such efforts. Historically, boundaries between medical and commercial teams have been sharply defined: Commercial handles brand building and promotion, while medical affairs serves as the keeper of the scientific narrative and remains ardently non-promotional. But because unbranded initiatives are non-promotional, responsibilities can interweave. At many organizations there’s more leeway to work together.
The reason for this is simple: To more effectively and efficiently convey useful information to the HCP targets of an unbranded effort. Alas, too often organizations fall short of that goal. In my experience, there are three main scenarios, each with an increasing amount of collaboration (and decreasing amount of noise for HCPs).
Scenario 1: Silos remain intact. In many organizations, the lack of coordination between medical and commercial departments on unbranded educational efforts can result in undesirable overlap. When teams are unable (or unwilling) to come together and hash out a comprehensive strategy, the effect on unbranded efforts is all too predictable: Duplicated tasks, mismatched messaging and even inadvertent competition with each other. One of the most common outcomes is nonexistent or otherwise indifferent channel coordination.
Think two groups within one company working in the same tumor area with inconsistent messaging, with email campaigns that fire at conflicting intervals or even bidding against each other for paid search terms. Not only does this create confusion for the intended audiences, but it wastes valuable time and resources. Such issues emerge far more often than you’d think.
Scenario 2: Dividing and conquering. Clearly there is a need for better coordination between commercial and medical groups on unbranded campaigns, which requires concerted effort to achieve. Teams must first take a moment to sit down and agree to work together—which, as obvious as it seems, can sometimes be overlooked when both teams are moving full-steam-ahead. After that, they must plan and divvy up responsibilities well before the campaign’s intended launch date (six months will suffice, longer is even better). In theory, this ensures some degree of messaging alignment and eliminates potential turf clashes.
Companies might combat such clashes by dividing responsibilities by message type or channel. The goal isn’t separation for separation’s sake, but rather to ensure cohesion and clarity. If, say, one team decides to engage by building a dedicated website while the other focuses on third-party channels, the result should be a surround-sound airing of key messages.
While medical and commercial cannot direct each other’s activities, intentional collaboration can help them steer clear of obvious pitfalls. Does this represent a substitute for full-on collaboration? No, but it beats the helter-skelter alternative.
Scenario 3: A single, unified initiative. The final frontier for medical and commercial teams is genuine collaboration on a single, unified unbranded initiative. Compliance and regulatory departments at various companies may have different ideas about how this works in practice, but all are firmly behind compliantly maximizing impact and efficiency while minimizing noise for healthcare practitioners.
What separates the most effective unbranded campaigns from the rest isn’t just content—it’s orchestration. They start with clearly defined objectives, undergo rigorous planning and deploy in a synchronized manner across multiple touchpoints. This level of precision doesn’t happen by accident; it’s the result of intentional collaboration, early alignment and a shared commitment to delivering HCPs a seamless experience.
Looking ahead, I’m excited about further defining the terms of commercial/medical collaboration. I see a future in which the two groups come together to develop best practices for unbranded campaigns, share them across teams and rack up plenty of evidence to counter any remaining skepticism.
Most life sciences companies have the institutional experience to make this happen. With the right structure, mindset and shared purpose, we can turn good intentions into real-world impact.
What procedures has your organization put into place to ensure fruitful collaboration between medical and commercial teams on unbranded campaigns? Drop us a note at [email protected], join the conversation on X (@KinaraBio) and subscribe on the website to receive Kinara content.
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Tyler Redelico is Content Strategy and Omnichannel Lead for US Medical Affairs, Oncology, at AstraZeneca
