• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
25 Years

Health Connective

  • About
  • Services
    • Custom Marcom Tools
    • Digital Surgery Online Portal
    • Streamline Your Product Ordering
  • Our Work
    • Surgical Case Review Portals
    • Online Product Catalog
    • Field-Based Program Tracking System
    • Account Management Dashboard
    • Surgical Device Certification System
    • Internal Resources Website for Marketing Division
    • Co-Branding Dashboard
    • Physician Locators
  • Resources
    • Marcom Insights
    • Development Insights
    • The Health Connective Show
  • Get Started
    • Schedule a Call with Health Connective
    • Our Capabilities
    • Security & Compliance

How Medtech Marketing Teams Can Improve Analytics Tracking

by Michael Roberts and Ashley Hohensee

Often, medtech companies have a good idea of what success looks like, but measuring success and what contributes to it is often a different story.

Analytics tools can help you track key metrics, but it’s easy to get bogged down in all of the things that you can track, even when you don’t need all of that data.

This is where analytics planning can be really helpful in improving what and how you are tracking key metrics. A recent guest on The Health Connective Show, Kyle Akerman of Akerman Analytics, walks his clients through analytics planning and setup. He shared some of his process with us.

How to Start Planning for Better Analytics Tracking

Kyle starts the process of analytics planning by reviewing a couple of key things:

Determine what tools are already being used.

Your tech stack and current marketing tools can help to determine what type of analytics tracking setup may be needed.

What tracking do you already have set up?

If you are already using an analytics tool, whether Google Analytics or a paid tool, it may make sense to continue using it if it meets your current needs. If you have any custom tracking set up, like event tracking, you will want to evaluate if it still meets your current needs.

From there, you’ll want to look at your customer journey. What actions do you ultimately want them to take on your website, and what steps might they take to get there? It’s important to outline the customer journey, as it helps to identify the metrics that you will most want to track.

Common Metrics to Track

Now that you’ve gathered all of the baseline information, it’s time to figure out what metrics you need to track.

Still not sure where to start? These are some of the most common metrics that Kyle says a medtech company might want to track from their website:

How do people get to your site?

Are they finding you through search engines? Do they have the direct link? This metric helps you understand which channel brings in the most traffic.

How do people navigate through your site?

Are they taking the pathways you expected? If not, this may indicate that some changes are needed.

What content are they looking at?

There are probably certain pages on your website that might be higher value or closer to the conversion point. Understanding how often people look at those pages can help inform your strategy going forward.

What actions do they complete on your website?

There are probably certain pages on your website that might be higher value or closer to the conversion point. Understanding how often people look at those pages can help inform your strategy going forward.

The goal is to track enough data points that you can clearly understand whether or not you are hitting your goals, and if not, where breakdowns may be occurring. You don’t, however, want to be overwhelmed with a dashboard full of data points that may not all be relevant.

Avoiding Data Overload

It’s easy to become overwhelmed with all of the things you could track. After all, most analytics tools can do a lot! However, you’ll find it much more useful in the long term to narrow it down to just what you need.

Kyle recommends starting out by focusing on the top 3-5 metrics that drive the business. If you find you need to track more down the road, you can always go back and do more.

Remember that just because your analytics tool is tracking the data, doesn’t mean it’s necessarily useful for your business goals.

What About Product Analytics?

For the most part, we’ve been looking at analytics planning from the lens of a commercial website. However, if you have a login area or dashboard for current customers, you might want to track that too. That process—the product analytics side of your company—looks a bit different than commercial analytics.

For example, there are reasons that a potential customer might visit your commercial website more than once, but you generally aren’t looking at repeated use. In contrast, on the product analytics side, the goal is to have users regularly logging in and using the product.

Another potential difference is the analytics tools that you use. If your product dashboard is behind a login (as most are), the standard Google Analytics may not be the best tool. There are more product-focused analytics tools Matomo, Mixpanel, Heap, and Amplitude that may give you better insights.

One benefit of a product analytics tool is the ability to segment user groups in various ways. You might have different user types that use your product for different reasons. A product analytics tool would allow you to segment and filter to different user types so that you can analyze behaviors within that context, which may be more helpful than lumping all of the data together.

You can also use product analytics to help inform marketing strategies because it helps you to understand which product features to highlight. In turn, marketing analytics can help to inform which product features your audience is most excited about.

Plan to Evolve Your Analytics Strategy Over Time

Remember that the analytics tracking that you plan out now doesn’t have to be how you approach things forever. Your business, marketing, and products will evolve over time, and it’s important to update your analytics tracking along with that.

We recommend reevaluating your strategy as your company grows and adds on new things to make sure your data still meets your needs. Include analytics planning as part of that process so that you are always tracking the data that corresponds with current business goals.

Michael Roberts
Michael Roberts

Michael spends a great deal of time with the healthcare industry both professionally and personally, which gives him the perspective of what stakeholders on either side of the care equation need.

He began coding in 2008 and subsequently shifted his attention entirely to online marketing. Michael completed his MBA in 2018, focusing on the intersection of healthcare and marketing.

  • Michael Roberts
    https://www.healthconnectivetech.com/insights/author/michaelrhealthconnectivetech-com/
    The Direct to Patient Marketing Trends That Are Making an Impact on the Industry
  • Michael Roberts
    https://www.healthconnectivetech.com/insights/author/michaelrhealthconnectivetech-com/
    What Does Telesurgery Mean for the Commercial Side of Medtech?
  • Michael Roberts
    https://www.healthconnectivetech.com/insights/author/michaelrhealthconnectivetech-com/
    A Shifting Approach to Relationship Building
  • Michael Roberts
    https://www.healthconnectivetech.com/insights/author/michaelrhealthconnectivetech-com/
    Adapting SEO & Social Media Strategies to New Customer Behaviors
Ashley Hohensee
Ashley Hohensee
Marketing Manager at Health Connective

As the marketing manager, Ashley ensures that our clients’ marketing strategies are put into action. This includes content writing, SEO, online advertising, analytics, and interfacing with the tools, systems, and team members needed to help our clients accomplish their marketing goals.

  • Ashley Hohensee
    https://www.healthconnectivetech.com/insights/author/ashleythealthconnectivetech-com/
    How Can Medtech Companies Determine the Return on Investment for Application Development?
  • Ashley Hohensee
    https://www.healthconnectivetech.com/insights/author/ashleythealthconnectivetech-com/
    Can Cybersecurity & Compliance Be a Selling Point for a Medtech Product?
  • Ashley Hohensee
    https://www.healthconnectivetech.com/insights/author/ashleythealthconnectivetech-com/
    The Direct to Patient Marketing Trends That Are Making an Impact on the Industry
  • Ashley Hohensee
    https://www.healthconnectivetech.com/insights/author/ashleythealthconnectivetech-com/
    What Does Telesurgery Mean for the Commercial Side of Medtech?

Filed Under: Marcom, Medtech Marketing Strategy

Primary Sidebar

Table of Contents

  • How to Start Planning for Better Analytics Tracking
  • Common Metrics to Track
  • Avoiding Data Overload
  • What About Product Analytics?
  • Plan to Evolve Your Analytics Strategy Over Time

Welcome!

Michael Roberts

In our marcom articles, we share tips from our work with marketing and communication teams at medtech companies, including how to evaluate whether or not you need a custom application, how to effectively communicate what you need to developers (whether in-house or third-party), and how to demonstrate value to the C-suite and your customers.

--Michael Roberts, Marketing Director

Marcom Resources

  • Glossary for Medical Device Marketers
  • Marcom Newsletter
  • Medtech Marketing Careers
  • Building an App for That: A 3-Step Planning Guide for Medtech Teams

Recent Marcom Posts

  • How Can Medtech Companies Determine the Return on Investment for Application Development?
  • Can Cybersecurity & Compliance Be a Selling Point for a Medtech Product?
  • The Direct to Patient Marketing Trends That Are Making an Impact on the Industry
  • About
  • Insights
  • Cookie Policy
  • Privacy Policy
  • Get Started
HIPAA Seal of Compliance
Health Connective

(504) 581-4636
LinkedIn