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The Pharma Career Ladder · The medical rep · Step 1: Planning your territory · Lesson 5

A-list discipline

Protecting frequency on the accounts that carry your territory

By Ahmed El Menshawy · 20 years in pharma, from medical rep to country manager in the UAE. Founder of RepPharma. LinkedIn
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The first thing a busy month steals is your best doctors.

Every territory has a small group of doctors who carry most of the result. Everyone agrees with that. Then the month gets heavy, the easy doors open, and the A-list quietly slips from every cycle to every other cycle.

I ask reps to watch four things, and none of them needs a big report:

  • A-list frequency: calls per A-list doctor per cycle.
  • A-list coverage: how many of them you actually saw this cycle.
  • Back-to-back misses: who you missed two cycles in a row.
  • Where the calls went: how your calls split across A, B and C doctors.

Start with the back-to-back misses. A doctor you skipped twice has already filled that space with someone else.

Plan the A-list into the week first. Everything else fits around it.

An easy call is not a productive call.

“Your A-list is not a list. It is a promise of frequency.”
A-list discipline: Protecting frequency on the accounts that carry your territory

Lesson 5 of 12 in Step 1: Planning your territory, with the full guide and a checklist for this week. Discuss this lesson on LinkedIn.

More lessons in step 1: Planning your territory

Lesson 1Targeting is not a listHow to choose the twenty doctors that matterLesson 2Segmenting by potential, not politenessThe doctor who is nice is not always the doctor who writesLesson 3Coverage, frequency, qualityThree numbers that explain a flat monthLesson 4The cost of a missed cycleWhat happens when your frequency slipsLesson 6Building a real route planGeography, clinic hours and trafficLesson 7The weekly plan that survives MondayWeekly planning that copes with realityLesson 8Hospital vs retail mindsetTwo different games carried in one bagLesson 9Pharmacy is part of your territoryStock, substitution and the last mile of every prescriptionLesson 10Key account basicsMapping people, not just placesLesson 11Territory intelligenceWhat to notice that never makes it into the CRMLesson 12Working a new territoryWhat to do in your first thirty days

Planning your territory, in RepPharma

Grade doctors by potential

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Sell-out next to stock

Distributor stock and pharmacy sell-out are shown side by side, with short-expiry lots flagged up to 90 days ahead.

Start a new territory with real customers

A pre-loaded UAE directory of doctors, clinics and pharmacies, so a new rep starts with real customers instead of an empty list.

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