Sanofi Case Study

The challenge

Sanofi realized they had a “burning platform.” It was mission-critical to upskill the marketing team in key areas of digital transformation. The global pharmaceutical company had undertaken several digital initiatives (such as the opening of their Framingham digitally enabled manufacturing facility in the US, and their Darwin real-world data platform) but digital need to be the new mantra of every Sanofi department to attain digital transformation.

The Solution

“Having worked in the industry, I recognized Circus Street [now a part of QA] is amongst the very best to partner with. Their program is exceptional, their content is fantastic, and it really drives greater knowledge and confidence in all aspects of digital,” said Jo Earl, Head of Global Marketing Excellence. “It also helps marketers to better apply the thinking in their day job.”

Sanofi approached us in August, and had an impressively rapid-start: they launched their learning programme globably in November. Their key objectives were first, to increase people’s confidence and competences within the whole arena of digital transformation. Second, they wanted better dialogue both internally within marketing teams, and cross-functionally, and also with agency partners. And third, they wanted to foster a “test and learn” culture.

Several techniques encouraged the staff marketers to engage with the marketing upskilling programme. Firstly, they ran cross-functional workshops to help people understand the burning platform within the business, and the importance that QA (formerly Circus Street) would play. They had leads that would help drive the program within the marketing communities. They also leveraged a network of 150 champions to ensure people engaged with the learning content—which landed and drove engagement with people’s day jobs.

The results

Approximately 3000 people signed up to the program, with over 30% engaging with the content in the first few weeks alone. In addition, they saw a 45% uplift in knowledge. Sanofi achieved these impressive results within 8 short weeks since launch. All this contributed to the bigger picture: Sanofi accelerated their ecommerce business and made year-over-year improvements in sales during their continued partnership with QA.