The Not-So-Secret ingredient to Business Success in the Medical Technology world

Segmentation plays a pivotal role in driving commercial success. Despite its significance, many companies in the medical technology sector have yet to implement a robust segmentation and targeting strategy, missing out on the immense benefits in efficiency it can bring.

Why segmentation matters more than you think

In the highly competitive medical devices industry, segmentation plays a pivotal role in driving commercial success. Despite its significance, many companies in this sector have yet to crack the code and implement a robust segmentation and targeting strategy, missing out on the immense benefits in efficiency it can bring.

Segmentation involves dividing the market into distinct groups based on various factors such as demographics, medical conditions, customer attitudinal and behavioral criteria or healthcare settings.

By understanding the unique needs and preferences of each segment, companies tailor their commercial strategies, creating targeted customer engagement programs that foster meaningful interactions and facilitate positive customer experiences. This approach leads to increased customer satisfaction, loyalty, and ultimately, a higher return on investment.

Whereas it can be a daunting process due to the complexity of the market and the type of data that exists, companies in the medical device sector that effectively segment their customer base and deploy tailored customer engagement programs experience higher customer retention rate compared to companies without segmentation strategies. This indicates that segmentation plays a crucial role in fostering customer loyalty.

Segmentation holds a unique significance in the medical technology: 3 key aspects

By leveraging segmentation effectively, medical technology companies can drive business growth, improve customer satisfaction, and make a meaningful impact in healthcare delivery. There are however 3 key aspects that make segmentation unique and challenging.

1. Complex and multiple buying processes: Purchasing decisions in the medical technology sector often involve multiple stakeholders, intricate procurement processes, and regulatory considerations. Segmentation helps companies navigate these complexities by customizing their marketing and sales approaches to meet the specific requirements of each segment.
   
   
2. Varied and multiple decision makers: One of the significant challenges in the context of segmentation in the medical technology sector is the presence of multiple decision makers. In this industry, purchasing decisions are often complex and involve various stakeholders, each with their own interests, priorities, and decision-making authority.
   
   
3. Account-level versus product platform level: one notable challenge is deciding whether to adopt an account-level approach or a product-level approach.
   
   This challenge arises from the need to determine whether to focus on segmenting customers based on the organization as a whole (account-level) or on individual products or product lines (product-level).
   
   
   1. Account-Level approach benefits and challenges:
      This approach allows companies to understand the holistic needs, priorities, and preferences of the account. It enables them to develop tailored solutions and engagement strategies that address the organization’s specific challenges and objectives.
      
      However, implementing an account-level approach requires access to comprehensive data about the account, including its size, structure, patient demographics, and strategic goals. Gathering and analyzing this data can be resource-intensive, especially for large and complex accounts.
      
      Additionally, the account-level approach may overlook variations in needs and preferences within the healthcare institution’s different departments or decision-making units.
      
      
   2. Product-Level benefits and challenges:
      This approach allows companies to align their segmentation strategies with the unique features, applications, and benefits of their products. It enables them to develop targeted messaging and marketing strategies that highlight the value proposition of each product and address the specific needs of different customer segments.
      
      Implementing a product-level approach requires in-depth knowledge of each product’s market and customer base. Companies need to gather data on customer preferences, usage patterns, and product feedback.
      
      Furthermore, focusing solely on products may overlook the broader organizational context and miss opportunities to provide integrated solutions that cater to the organization’s overall needs.
      

As the industry continues to evolve and new technologies emerge, it is essential for companies to prioritize segmentation and leverage its power to inform their commercial strategies. By doing so, they can build stronger customer relationships, drive innovation, and achieve long-term success in the highly competitive medical devices market.

Redefining quality through the lens of value-based healthcare

Outcomes is a way of talking about quality. However, quality has been a word that has created more issues than solutions in the healthcare world, as its definition has often been incorrectly used. In Steve Jobs words “quality is more important than quantity. One home run is much better than two doubles”.

Getting clarity on the definition of quality and how it gets delivered, should therefore be one of the main goals of medical technology companies. Focussing on that goal implies to be able to rethink the way they are organized to deliver care that maximizes value, as well as, developing the tools to be able to measure whether they deliver that value or not.

While true value-based healthcare remains in its infancy stages of practical implementation, many companies in the life science industries are showing great improvements in adopting value-based approaches. They focus on delivery models that follows the goal to provide the best possible outcomes for patients in relation to the costs related to the episode of care. They emphasize on providing high-quality care that are increasingly getting more effective, efficient, and patient-centred.

As a result, delivering true “Quality” through value-based healthcare is an incredibly important initiative which will have an increasing impact within the healthcare world going forward.

Taking the plunge into value-based healthcare: 3 golden rules

Leading medical device companies in value-based healthcare don’t see the same challenges that their followers do, and they have success through delivering on the following three key points.

1. Organizing the value offer around the patient and the care givers
   Medical device companies in value-based healthcare manage to put the patient and care givers at the center of care emphasizing on the use of data and evidence-based practices to guide decision and improve care delivery.

This is driving a more human approach to healthcare. They encourage healthcare providers to measure and track outcomes, collect patient feedback, and continuously learn and improve their processes.

2. Leveraging the right technology to increase collaboration to decrease costs
   Leading value-based healthcare companies are making sure that they are exploiting technology in the best way possible to deliver better services. This can take different forms. For example, many medical device companies have started to use consumer technology to improve the quality of care. Digital health integration can both advance healthcare and address patient needs before, within and beyond the healthcare system walls such as mobile health (mHealth) apps, electronic health records (EHRs), electronic medical records (EMRs) as well as telehealth and telemedicine. Also, AI is having major impacts on the healthcare industry by improving efficiency, cutting costs, providing information management and clinical decision support. The industry is expected_¹ to hit $150 billion by 2026. 

3. Harnessing the power of data
   Data that are captured as part of normal operation processes often sits within the organization without being properly exploited for other purposes. Collecting and making use of actionable (smart) data is a key factor of success.
   
   Data allows for the measurement and evaluation of the outcomes, including health outcomes, patient satisfaction, quality of life, and functional status. By analyzing data, healthcare providers can assess the effectiveness of interventions and identify inefficiencies such as treatment approaches, resource utilization, and costs. By understanding these variations, healthcare organizations can standardize best practices, reduce waste, and optimize resource allocation while supporting evidence-based practice.
   
   Finally, data empowers patients to actively participate in their own care. Access to their health information, including test results, treatment options, and outcomes, enables patients to make informed decisions and engage in shared decision-making with their healthcare providers.
   
   The opportunity is huge. The evidence is showing that it is having an impact on the way healthcare is delivered however, we are still in the early stages of progressing value-based healthcare.

True Value-based healthcare remains in its initial stages of practical implementation

Even though the procurement frameworks have been evolving since the 2014 Most Economically Advantageous Tender (MEAT) framework of the EU procurement directives and guidelines (2014/24/EU), it must be noted that healthcare and payment systems aren’t yet synch up to value.

Implementing value-based healthcare can be challenging due to four main reasons:

1. Complexity of Healthcare and regulatory framework
   Coordinating and aligning the interests and incentives of numerous stakeholders (healthcare providers, payers, manufacturers, and patients) around value-based procurement can be difficult. Value-based procurement requires healthcare providers to adopt a more patient-centred approach, collaborate across disciplines, and embrace continuous quality improvement.
   
   Existing regulations and legal frameworks may not fully support or align with value-based procurement models. Addressing regulatory barriers, ensuring compliance, and adapting legal frameworks to facilitate innovation and collaboration can be time-consuming and complex.

2. Data and evidence-based practices
   Healthcare data is often fragmented. Standardizing data collection, sharing, and analysis is a significant hurdle. Also, measuring outcomes in healthcare is multifaceted and can be subjective.

3. Mitigating risks and uncertainties
   Value-based procurement introduces risk-sharing arrangements and alternative payment models. Calculating and allocating risks appropriately among stakeholders, such as insurers, providers, and patients, is challenging.

4. Transition from Fee-for-Service
   Many healthcare systems still operate under the traditional fee-for-service payment model, which rewards quantity over quality. Shifting to value-based procurement requires a fundamental change in reimbursement structures and financial incentives. This transition may face resistance and require substantial coordination among payers, providers, and policymakers.
   
   Overcoming these challenges requires strong leadership, collaboration among stakeholders, robust data infrastructure, appropriate incentives, and ongoing evaluation and refinement of value-based procurement models.

Quality is the result of high intention

Value-based procurement is growing in maturity and the days of price as the unique factor influencing the buying process lie in the past. Instead, it is moving its focus towards quality, services and solutions.

How well did the patient do relative to how much it costs the healthcare system to deliver those outcomes? If today you have improved outcomes without escalating any cost, you’ve succeeded! If you have delivered equally good outcomes more efficiently, you’ve succeeded! If you didn’t do one of those two things, you failed delivering “Quality”.

In William A. Foster’s words “Quality is never an accident; it is always the result of high intention, sincere effort, intelligent direction and skillful execution; it represents the wise choice of many alternatives”.

Innovation – the “raison d’être” in Business

It is the « raison d’être » of entrepreneurs, the mantra of companies, the mandate given to employees, a core corporate value with its own rights, promoted by politicians and presented with great fanfare in presidential speeches. Searching for the term «Innovation » on Google generates 1.65 billion results!

Value Propositions through the lens of the Job To Be Done

“We need to sell more stuff!!!”

I remember sitting at our global townhall meeting listening carefully to our COO commenting about the quarterly results of our Medical Technology company. Results of new product launches were pretty good. Our COO all of a sudden stood up and said “we need to sell more stuff!”. The message was simple, clear, unfiltered, and spontaneously sparked enthusiasm, and laughter, among employees. Hurray! And off we went to sell more stuff!

A PUSH strategy is certainly still of relevance in many businesses however, this example of what happened less than 10 years ago, shows how this traditional view of the business has blinders.

The fact is that, every year, companies in Life Sciences spend billions in budgets to develop and PUSH new products in the market. However, statistics show that many of them fail or largely underperform. One of the explanations why this is the case is that, they don´t target the “Jobs” that customers are trying to get done.

Having worked in the Medical Device and Pharmaceutical industries for 20 years, here are some takeaways for you to consider to successfully identify and drive adoption of innovative technologies in Life Sciences.

Know your Customers´ “Jobs To Be Done”

The concept of “Jobs To Be Done” (JTBD) was presented by Clayton M. Christensen, a Harvard Business School Professor who labeled JTBD as a theory, in his excellent book, Competing Against Luck (2016). It suggests that “products and technology come and go, but “Jobs” persist over time. As a result, companies integrated around a “Job” can achieve greater market differentiation and success.”

Knowing the “Jobs” a customer is trying to get done allows companies to sell more and improve their products over time in ways that are relevant to their customers.

Bottom-line understanding the Jobs To Be Done brings much more clarity and dynamic to the understanding of why people will and won’t buy your products.

Avoid a “solutions in search of problems” mindset

Medical Technology and Pharmaceutical industries tend to be blinded by new gleaming scientific or technological breakthroughs, but they often have little to do with the actual Jobs To Be Done by Health Care Practitioners along the way from R&D to the Patient. This may lead to a “solutions in search of problems” mindset i.e. creating a proposal that is intended to solve a problem which does not really exist.

Crucially, and as mentioned in myrecent article (Customer-centricity in Life Sciences: 3 golden rules), life science companies have to shift from being mesmerized by “product features” and re-focus on “customer benefits” and their Value Proposition.

Developing a Value Proposition in a co-creative and multi-disciplinary way, helps to bring the customer back to the table.

Make sure your customer has a seat at the table

The Value Proposition helps to ensure your products and services are positioned around what your prospects and customer base actually needs and values. After rigorously defining your Value Proposition, you can generally tell consumers “What´s in it for them”, i.e. why they should buy your products and services rather those of your competitors, and makes the benefits of your offering crystal clear.

But here is the nub! The “Value” is in the hands of the Beholder. As a result, the Value Proposition definition can often turn into an inward-oriented exercise. It is pointless to start a discussion about Value Propositions without starting with the customer.

In this context, the Jobs To Be Done offers a dynamic and “future-proof” approach that elevates the reasoning on focussing on what your customers broadly hope to accomplish “over time” in their daily lives (at a functional, social and emotional level).

Contact us for more information about immersion workshops for Value Proposition and Target Audience/Personas definition.

Gain fundamental insights of your customers

Understanding the Jobs To Be Done brings much more clarity to the understanding of why people will and won’t buy your products. Your market insights should gather qualitative observations and specifically identify the core “Job” and its desired outcomes, not just at a functional level but also at an emotional level.

A deep understanding of the customer is essential to designing effective marketing communications. This is why every project should starts with an audit phase tackling and why UP has an integrated full service marketing research function.

Contact us for more information about integrated services in marketing research

Success is not final: Value propositions have a life cycle

Value Proposition and Jobs To Be Done are approaches that work in tandem.

Understanding the Jobs To Be Done brings however much more clarity to the understanding why people will and won´t buy your products. Furthermore, the Jobs To Be Done offers a dynamic approach that elevates your reasoning on focusing on what your customers broadly hope to accomplish “over time” in their daily lives.

Value propositions have a life cycle. So, don´t let your success of today lay into complacency for tomorrow. Customer buying cycles and the competitive landscape evolve over time. As a result, the definition of Value proposition and Jobs To Be Done should be seen as iterative processes that ultimately should become routinely integrated in business planning.

Searching for “customer centricity ” on Google generates 15.8 million results. So, it’s important, right? It is how an organization generates value, how it earns money. The concept of putting the customer at the heart of key organizational decisions is not difficult to understand. Everyone is subscribing to it. At the same time it’s a buzzword many of us have got tired with.