CNPR Territory Management 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: A pharmaceutical sales rep notices that a high-prescribing cardiologist in their territory has not placed any orders in three months. What is the BEST first step?
- Remove the physician from the target list
- Schedule a visit to understand the physician's concerns and prescribing barriers (Correct answer)
- Escalate immediately to the district manager
- Reduce call frequency to avoid alienating the physician
Correct answer: Schedule a visit to understand the physician's concerns and prescribing barriers
Identifying prescribing barriers through direct conversation allows the rep to address concerns and re-engage the physician effectively.
Question 2: Which metric is MOST useful for evaluating the effectiveness of a pharmaceutical sales rep's territory routing plan?
- Total number of samples distributed
- Average drive time between calls per day (Correct answer)
- Number of new physicians added to the call list
- Total prescriptions written by all physicians in the territory
Correct answer: Average drive time between calls per day
Minimizing average drive time between calls increases the number of productive physician interactions per day.
Question 3: When building a territory business plan, what does a SWOT analysis help a pharmaceutical rep identify?
- Sales quotas set by the district manager
- Internal strengths/weaknesses and external opportunities/threats relevant to the territory (Correct answer)
- The FDA approval status of promoted products
- Reimbursement tiers for each payer in the territory
Correct answer: Internal strengths/weaknesses and external opportunities/threats relevant to the territory
A SWOT analysis helps reps assess their competitive position and develop strategies tailored to their territory's unique landscape.
Question 4: A rep's territory includes several rural physicians who are difficult to reach in person. Which strategy BEST addresses this challenge?
- Deprioritize rural physicians and focus only on urban high-decile targets
- Use a mix of in-person visits, phone follow-ups, and digital outreach to maintain relationships (Correct answer)
- Assign rural physicians to a colleague's territory
- Send product samples by mail without any personal contact
Correct answer: Use a mix of in-person visits, phone follow-ups, and digital outreach to maintain relationships
A multichannel approach ensures consistent engagement with hard-to-reach prescribers while respecting their time constraints.
Question 5: In pharmaceutical territory management, what is 'call planning'?
- Scheduling internal team conference calls
- Strategically determining which physicians to visit, in what order, and with what messages on a given day (Correct answer)
- Logging all physician calls in the CRM after the fact
- Setting monthly revenue targets with the district manager
Correct answer: Strategically determining which physicians to visit, in what order, and with what messages on a given day
Call planning ensures each day's visits are prioritized by physician potential, geography, and sales cycle timing to maximize ROI.
Question 6: A rep is assigned a new territory and discovers that a competitor's rep has strong relationships with the top three prescribers. What is the recommended approach?
- Focus exclusively on lower-decile physicians where competition is less intense
- Develop a long-term relationship-building strategy while differentiating through product knowledge and service (Correct answer)
- Report the competitor's tactics to the district manager
- Offer physicians extra samples to win them over quickly
Correct answer: Develop a long-term relationship-building strategy while differentiating through product knowledge and service
Building trust through consistent value delivery and superior product knowledge is the most sustainable way to gain prescribing share from entrenched competitors.
Question 7: Which of the following BEST describes the purpose of decile ranking in pharmaceutical territory management?
- Ranking physicians by their years of medical education
- Categorizing prescribers by their prescription volume to prioritize sales call frequency (Correct answer)
- Sorting territories by geographic size for routing purposes
- Classifying drugs by their controlled substance schedule
Correct answer: Categorizing prescribers by their prescription volume to prioritize sales call frequency
Decile ranking segments physicians into ten groups based on prescribing volume, helping reps allocate their time to the highest-potential targets.
CNPR Territory Management 2
A pharmaceutical sales rep notices that a high-prescribing cardiologist in their territory has not placed any orders in three months.
What is the BEST first step?