How to do Medical Device Market Research in Australia

How Do Medical Device Companies Research Clinician and Buyer Decisions?

Medical device market research works out who really influences a device purchase and what each of them needs to see before saying yes. Unlike most consumer products, the person who uses a device is rarely the person who buys it: a clinician may use it, a hospital committee or procurement team approves it, and a patient lives with the outcome. Good research maps that chain, finds where the evidence a clinician finds persuasive differs from what a budget holder needs, and tells your marketing team which message belongs in front of which person. We call this the three-seat decision: user, gatekeeper and patient. Research that only talks to one seat gives you a confident answer to the wrong question.

Why is researching medical device customers different from researching consumers? Three things change the moment the product is a medical device:

1. There’s more than one decision-maker – The person using the device, the person approving the spend and the person on the receiving end are often three different people with three different priorities.
2. Your participants are experts with very little spare time. A clinician will give you a short, focused slot between other commitments, not an hour of wandering conversation.
3. What you can say is tightly governed and regulated. Marketing claims for therapeutic goods are regulated in Australia, so research has to explore understanding and preference without drifting into performance or safety claims.None of that makes the research less valuable. It just means a generic customer survey, designed for people who buy for themselves, will tell you very little

 

Who actually influences a medical device purchase decision?

It varies by device and setting, but most decisions involve some combination of these seats at the table:

1. The User: the clinician or technician who uses the device day to day. They care about reliability, workflow fit, how much training it takes, and whether it makes their work easier or harder.
2. The Gatekeeper: the procurement team, finance lead or clinical committee who approve the purchase. They weigh cost, supplier risk, compatibility with existing equipment and the strength of the evidence.
3. The patient: the person who has the device used on them or lives with it. They rarely choose the device, but their comfort, confidence and understanding shape what clinicians recommend and what gets reported back.
4. Sometimes, a fourth seat: the champion. A respected senior clinician whose opinion carries weight with everyone else.

A public hospital, a private clinic and a home-use setting will each distribute influence differently. That’s why we map the chain for each device rather than assuming it.

 

What research methods work best with time-poor clinicians?

Short and specific over long and thorough.

1. Focused interviews of around 30 minutes, scheduled around clinical commitments and often run by phone or video at the clinician’s convenience
2. Specialist recruitment, so you’re talking to the right role and setting rather than whoever is easiest to reach
3. A moderator who can follow clinical vocabulary without needing every term explained, which respects participants’ time and gets to the substance faster
4. Fair, clearly stated compensation, because expert time is genuinely valuable
5. A small, well-chosen sample for each distinct role, enough to hear the same themes come up repeatedly, followed by a short survey if you need to measure how widely a view is held

For the gatekeeper seat, a conversation about how the last decision actually unfolded is usually more revealing than asking what they’d hypothetically want.

How do you research a device without making clinical claims?

Keep the research on perception and decision-making, not performance. We test whether participants understand a message, find it credible, and know what they’d want to see next. We don’t test whether the device works, and we don’t report findings as if they validate it.

In practice, that means:

Any claims in test material come from the client’s approved materials, reviewed by their regulatory team
Clinical or safety comments raised by participants are noted and passed to the client’s medical team through a process agreed up front
Reports describe what participants thought and said, never what is clinically true

Ruby Cha Cha’s take: map the decision chain before you test the message

Most teams start with the message. They’ve got three positioning options, they want to know which one wins, so they test them. It’s a sensible instinct and it often goes wrong, because a message can win with the people you spoke to and still never reach the person who signs off.

So, we start one step earlier, and ask three questions of every seat in the decision:

1. What does this person need to believe before they’ll back the device?
2. What proof would they accept as evidence of that?
3. Who do they trust to tell them?

The answers frequently differ sharply between seats. A clinician may be won over by a peer’s hands-on experience. A procurement lead needs a total-cost argument they can defend in a budget meeting. A patient needs to feel they understand what’s happening to them. Three seats, three different answers, and one brand story that has to work for all of them. Once you can see that, the messaging brief practically writes itself.

How does market research improve medical device marketing decisions?

It stops you spending on the wrong audience. When you know who really influences the decision, what each seat needs to see, and where your current story falls short, you can prioritise the evidence, training and communication that moves purchase decisions, rather than polishing materials for someone who was never the bottleneck.

FAQ

How is medical device research different from pharmaceutical research? Pharma research often centres on a prescriber’s choice, while devices frequently involve users, procurement teams and committees as well. Device research therefore spends more time mapping who actually decides and what each person needs to see.

How many clinicians do you need to interview? Enough in each distinct role to hear the same themes come up repeatedly, which is usually a modest number per role in qualitative work. If you need to measure how widespread a view is, a short follow-up survey adds the numbers.

Can you research a device that hasn’t launched yet?  Yes. Pre-launch research uses descriptions, prototypes or early materials to understand how each seat reacts and what evidence they’d want, so you can shape launch communication before it’s locked in. It tests understanding and preference, not clinical performance.

Does commercial market research need ethics approval?  Commercial research follows the industry’s code of conduct on consent, privacy and confidentiality and this is also covered by The Research Society Code of Conduct.  Research involving patients can need extra safeguards, which we scope at the start of the project.