Anyone in pharmaceutical sales?

S

stilez

New member
Or know a lot about it?





I was extremely fortunte enough to land a stellar contact through my business. He is a "high-up" at a leading pharmaceutical company and after hearing my career aspirations, thought I'd be a nice fit as an employee at his company.



Thus far, I have gone through two preliminary phone conversations, ultimately leading to one more, then a series of in-person interviews.



I know this industry is very tough to get in to. Being that I graduated with a B.S. in Business Management, it's a little tougher (no science background), but after hearing a couple success stories and seeing what this gentleman has made for himself, I am ready to jump in with both feet. Further, the qualifications and position outline parallel almost perfectly for what I've been looking for.



There is a TON of info on the net on breaking into this industry and what it's all about, but much of it requires payment.





-Does anyone know where good, solid, and gratis info is on this profession? Hopefully online:)?

-If you are in the industry, care to comment on: how you got in; what to focus on in the interviews; what to focus on when learning info; etc?





If we need to take this to the PMs, that is fine.





I appreciate any and all help.
 
I know that they can make bank.



My wife eventually wants to do this, but right now she loves her RN position.



I could ask her more, but FWIU, you need a fairly diverse knowledge of meds + people skills. Most of the reps in Memphis are smokin' hot 22-28 year old females who make a GRIP. They go in, talk to the Dr., leave samples, bring in lunch a few times a week, and collect the check.



I will ask my wife more details when I get home tonight.
 
I had a COMM professor who knew a lot about pharm. reps, as he studied health communication. The main thing he pointed out was that reps are VERY persuasive and they like to butter up their clients with fancy dinners, catered events, and beautiful women. I assume this is the same thing?



Seems like it could get old after a while,, probably lots of traveling required and quotas to meet.
 
Thanks for the help so far.





Joe: Excellent, that would be very helpful.





truzoom: In this position, you recieve a company car. I'm not sure about quotas, but I know the company in reference has two of the top drugs on the market right now, which I'm sure can't hurt for sales.
 
G35stilez ,



my wife is in the medical field and works with reps often , and has looked into this for herself. From what she says this job has alot of perks such as company car , paid vacations , trips for volume ,expense account ect. As for the requirments needed to get in a BA is all that is needed, and it doens't need to be medical or science specific, also this position won't make six figures atleast in our area , philly-nj. Something to keep in mind. Good luck hope it works out for you.
 
I know a couple reps that stop in my pharmacy ever now and then. There really nice and cool people. You really gotta have a geniune nice personality, and positive outlook on life; or else it will really show. I would think you'd be qualified for it Sean though considering your business background. I actually knew a kid who did it with no business background(no college degree) at all, he just worked at the local drug fair and I guess "knew" the right person. If you have a "connection" into your job then I would definitely take it. We all know how that is in the NE :(

You would need a basic 101 class in drugs, but I'm sure thats all covered under training. Once you start going out to physician's office and pharamacys you just need to know what your selling and be comfortable with it, which I'm sure goes for all sales.



My mother wanted me to do this with my experience from the pharmacy, but at the end of the day your still a salesman; plus I can't deal with all the traveling.
 
Sean, I can't help a ton but can say both my brother and sister in law are in pharmacutical sales; they work for TAP and sell Nexium; they both love their jobs and do very well. If I recally correctly my brother in law did not have his BS when he first started the job, but eventually needed to complete it to get to the level he is now. They both got their jobs like you; contacts.



Both of them are genuinley nice people and love their job; they love "schmoozing", dinners, lunches, talking on the phone, office visits and the like; they both have company cars and put *a lot* of miles on them. So while they are both very smart people, I think the general "spin" on the job is that you need to be a real people person.



Good luck. :)
 
My wife sees the drug reps often in her line of work. They do bring her free lunch every once in a while. I think she says that she sees certain reps a lot more often than others. I guess the ones that are pushing the drugs that are hot right now don't have to work as hard as the ones that aren't. As someone who has been around this industry for a little while now, I would say that the compnay that has the hot drug on the market can change very quickly, so I would be careful about basing a lot of my decision on that. But if it looks like a good fit and you will be happy, then I say at least try it. The one upside for us is that we now have enough pens, stress balls, and post-it notes with compnay logos on them to survive this lifetime.
 
This is aligning with all of the information I am finding from websites and other reps.





Thank you VERY MUCH for all the info thus far.





Keep it coming! :)







jnmttu: :lol
 
Hey Sean, what do you want to know? My wife is a Sales Incentive compensation Manager at GSK. Basically she helps come up with and implement the plans they use to pay the reps. Before that she was in IT designing the laptop system software used by reps. She has done several ride alongs with reps. Yes these guys make good money if they do a good job. My wife often thinks she would like to get into the field. The best way to get into this field is to check job postings in the internal Pharm web sites. They post jobs here before they post them outside the company. And ofcourse knowing someone on the inside always helps.
 
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