Next Best Action: Why It Matters for Pharma Engagement

January 11, 2026

Pharmaceutical companies have never had more channels, more content, or more customer data at their fingertips. But despite this investment, many health care professionals (HCPs) say their interaction with the industry is fragmented, generic and difficult to navigate.

They say pharmaceutical companies can’t add value to their work, don’t collaborate with them and they aren’t making a positive contribution to medicine and patient outcomes.

The reason is simple. Many pharmaceutical organisations operate with a campaign mindset in a world that demands something very different. HCPs want interactions that fit their workflow, respond to their needs and respect their time.

This is where Next Best Action (NBA) in pharmaceutical marketing becomes essential. It connects omni-channel, personalisation and customer experience into one cohesive strategy.

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The problem with multichannel marketing

For decades, pharma marketing has been all about cyclical planning, broad segmentation, and channel activation to drive brand objectives.

Here’s how it might look:

The marketing team sends an email campaign
Sales sends follow-up emails
Another team runs a webinar series
Medical sends clinical updates
Patient programs send alerts

All on different schedules, with different follow-ups and very little targeting of what the HCP actually wants and needs. The result is an increasingly complex ecosystem where pharma teams spend enormous effort creating assets that often fail to connect.

No wonder HCPs feel frustrated. An AusDoc survey of over 1000 Australian doctors presented at the October 2025 Next Summit found they rate pharma poorly.
72% would not recommend the pharmaceutical industry in Australia as making a positive contribution to medicine and patient outcomes. High on their list of concerns is a lack of collaboration, value and relevance.

This isn’t just an Australian problem. One McKinsey report found 81% of doctors are dissatisfied with their interactions with pharmaceutical companies and two-thirds say they’re bombarded with generic messages. An Accenture survey found 65% of doctors feel ‘spammed’ by pharma digital content.
Omni channel marketing and the Next Best Action model changes this. It moves pharma from “What should we push?” to “What does this HCP need right now?”

What is Next Best Action and omnichannel marketing?

Omni-channel marketing means all marketing channels work in sync, adapting to the doctor’s needs. Instead of sending whatever the marketing team planned months ago, it sends what the individual doctor needs next. It’s not about campaigns and or another email trigger.

Next Best Action recommends the optimal action for each individual HCP at any given moment. It connects the right person to their next best action, whatever it may be. How does it do it?
It uses a combination of real-time data, predictive AI models and decision logic. This may be through how they’ve previously interacted with campaigns or templated surveys to determine:

What are their clinical interest areas?
How do they prefer to engage with marketing?
What are their triggers for more information?
What do their patients need?
When do they need information and why?

By educating those audiences with iterative landing pages specialised to the demographic, speciality and knowledge level, it gives doctors what they need and when. By understanding how they want to connect, whether it’s WhatsApp, SMS, web chatbot or email, pharma companies can reach HCPs where they already are with personalised, compliant content.

From this, the system identifies one next step.

What Next Best Action actually means in practice

It’s all about personalisation and how that identifies what the doctor needs.

A Next Best Action model:

Allows the HCP to interact in a conversational way whenever they need.
Lets HCPs interact where they are, whether it’s online, over the phone or through SMS or WhatsApp
Uses a performance media approach to help those doctors find what they’re looking for.
Personalises future learning by understanding their preferred topics and personalising their education models
Aims to better understand them and help them take their next best action.
Instantly provides insights and follow up actions for reps and brand teams.

The evidence shows it works. Deloitte research found a top-10 biopharma company managed 14% higher sales in just 9 months after starting their best action program.

Their sales reps:

Reached previously unresponsive HCPs
Uncovered new opportunism with other HCPs
Discovered the right time and content on digital channels maximised engagement
When there are coherent touchpoints, pharma communications feel connected, relevant, and respectful of the HCP’s time.

The Next Best Action maturity problem in Pharma

Most pharma organisations in Australia aren’t yet operating at full Next Best Action maturity. Many organisations often work in siloes, with brand teams and medical teams not sharing meaningful data. It means marketing and field execution are disconnected and gives limited visibility into HCP preferences.

There’s also a concern with measurement. The Next Best Action model harder to measure and don’t necessarily provide the same level of reach that traditional pharma marketing campaigns can.
But it’s important to consider relevance before reach. By understanding what HCPs and their patients value, pharma companies can engage more effectively in a more meaningful way. The real measurement of success is whether HCPs come back and re-engage. If they’re proactively reaching out to pharmaceutical companies, it shows value is being added.
It’s about always considering what the HCP wants, not what the brand wants.

How RoseRx can improve your Next Best Action

More emails, more campaigns and more content don’t lead to better HCP engagement.
What the industry needs is better decisions that are aligned to what each HCP genuinely wants and respond with relevance, not volume.
The Next Best Action model enables that shift. It simplifies complexity, aligns teams, and delivers more meaningful interactions through every channel.

At RoseRx, we help pharmaceutical companies identify high-value audiences, surface behaviour-driven insights and deliver real-time recommendations that guide the next bex action across omnichannel journeys.

Frequently asked questions

What is Next Best Action in pharma?

Next Best Action (NBA) in pharma is an AI-driven approach that determines the most relevant and timely interaction to have with an HCP or patient at any given moment whether that's a rep call, a piece of content, a follow-up email, or a medical information response.
Rather than following a fixed outreach schedule, NBA uses real-time engagement data, questions asked, content viewed, channel preferences, and intent signals, to guide the right action, through the right channel, at the right time.
For RoseRx, this means every HCP interaction feeds intelligence back into the platform, so the next touchpoint is always informed by what the clinician actually needs, not a generic campaign calendar.

How does Next Best Action improve HCP engagement?

Next Best Action improves HCP engagement by replacing generic, schedule-driven outreach with interactions that are timely, relevant, and informed by real clinical intent. Instead of a rep calling on a fixed cycle or a campaign pushing the same content to every HCP, NBA ensures every touchpoint is triggered by actual signals a question asked, content consumed, or an objection raised.
For RoseRx, this means reps arrive at every interaction already knowing what the HCP cares about, what gaps exist, and what content to bring, making every conversation more valuable. Digitally, it means HCPs receive follow-ups and content that feel personally relevant rather than broadcast. The result is higher engagement rates, stronger rep credibility, and a shorter path from awareness to prescribing intent.

Is Next Best Action compliant with pharma regulations?

Yes, when built correctly. NBA in pharma must operate within MLR-approved content boundaries, ensuring that no matter how personalised the recommended action is, it never strays into off-label promotion or unapproved claims.
RoseRx ensures NBA compliance by anchoring every recommended action to pre-approved content and guardrails set at deployment. The AI personalizes the timing, channel, and relevance of each interaction but always within the approved content framework. This means brands can deploy NBA at scale with confidence, knowing every action the system recommends is both clinically relevant and regulatorily sound.

How is Next Best Action different from omnichannel marketing?

Omnichannel marketing ensures HCPs are reached consistently across multiple channels: email, SMS, rep visits, webinars, and portals. It's about presence and coordination across touchpoints. Next Best Action goes a step further, it uses real-time intelligence to determine not just where to engage, but what to do next and why.
For RoseRx, omnichannel is the delivery infrastructure; NBA is the intelligence layer on top of it. Omnichannel asks "are we everywhere?" NBA asks "what is the single most valuable thing we can do for this HCP right now?" Together, they ensure pharma brands are not just present across channels, but acting with precision and purpose at every touchpoint.