Work

Growing brand loyalty through online learning

Dechra, and their fluids product Vetivex®, found themselves competing in an ever more price-led market. Share and revenue were heading in the wrong direction. We devised a strategy that took the argument away from price and pitched Dechra as the company that gives vets added value.

A series of vet interviews revealed a real thirst for Continuing Professional Development (CPD). However, the off-site CPD courses available were expensive and time-consuming. Our suggestion was to offer vets free online CPD on Fluid Therapy, thereby positioning Dechra as experts in this field and providing real value in an otherwise commoditised market. Being online, vets could learn in their own time and, with a questionnaire and personalised certificates, could use the course to fulfil their annual CPD requirements. Following a press and DM launch campaign, over 4,500 signed up to the course – nearly a third of all UK vets.

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The Dechra Academy was built using DynamicWeb's Enterprise CMS. This gave us the flexibility and modular architecture required to deliver such a complex site. We utilised DynamicWeb's built-in language layer to localise the site for 10 European languages.

DynamicWeb's integration framework allowed us to quickly exchange data between our front-end application and existing internal Dechra CRM systems and to integrate with other online solutions, via single sign-on. The Dechra Academy has since grown to include six CPD modules, webinars from Key Opinion Leaders, archived webinars, podcasts, invites to CPD events and downloadable marketing literature for vet practices.

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Within the first two years, a remarkable 7,000+ vets registered for The Academy. This significantly outstrips the biggest vet portal, Vetsurgeon.org, which has 9,400 members. The Academy has also been launched in several other markets, including Germany, France and Holland, strengthening Dechra’s relationships in Europe.

The huge database created, segmented by interest areas, has enabled Dechra to regularly email their customers. (It wasn’t that long ago they relied on fax campaigns!). And the Dechra brand is now perceived as an intellectual partner in business, no longer just drugs in the cabinet. Dechra can now genuinely stand by their philosophy: ‘Putting you first’. If you’d like to discuss what online learning could bring to your business, please get in touch.

Read our ‘top 5 considerations for online learning’ to see what we’ve learnt so far.

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About The Foundry

The Foundry is a strategic communications agency, based in Manchester, delivering fully-integrated marketing campaigns for B2B, B2C, public sector and healthcare clients. Healthcare marketing services include qualitative and quantitative research, branding and packaging design, social media campaigns, educational websites, CPD programmes, online learning tools, in-clinic training materials, posters and patient literature.

For more information, call 0161 926 8444.

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About The Foundry

The Foundry is a strategic communications agency, based in Manchester, delivering fully-integrated marketing campaigns for B2B, B2C, public sector and healthcare clients. Compliance marketing services include qualitative and quantitative research, branding and packaging design, social media campaigns, educational websites, CPD programmes, online learning tools, in-clinic training materials, posters and patient literature.

For more information, please call 0161 926 8444.