While COVID-19 might be in the rear-view mirror, the lasting effects of the pandemic continue to ripple across the healthcare industry. The medical supply chain, in particular, was severely disrupted. This prompted suppliers and manufacturers to devise new strategies to navigate a shifting—and increasingly more competitive—landscape.
In this changing industry, healthcare commercial intelligence is key to staying ahead of the trends and growing your business. Many of our medical supply clients use Definitive Healthcare’s data to improve their targeting strategies and sales tactics.
Below are some of the most common data points and trends medical supply companies are searching for to better understand the shifting needs of their clients and prospects.
IDN and GPO affiliations
Affiliations are the most common data search by medical supply companies. Supply companies use HospitalView to search for hospitals that are part of an integrated delivery network (IDN) or group purchasing organization (GPO).
Accessing this information allows medical supply companies to identify stronger sales opportunities. If a prospect is part of an IDN, suppliers might be able to distribute their product throughout the network.
GPO members are also valuable prospects. Healthcare facilities become GPO members to access discounted pricing on medical supplies. Many healthcare facilities are members of more than one GPO.
Supply companies who contract with a GPO can sell their products to any of the member facilities. Searching for GPO member hospitals allows supply companies to expand their client base.
Supply companies can search for IDN & GPO affiliations at other facility types, as well. These facility types include:
Quality metrics
Some of our clients use our solutions to search for quality performance metrics. The most useful quality metrics for medical supply companies include:
Facilities with poor quality scores could likely benefit from new or different medical supplies.
For example, a disinfectant supplier might search for hospitals that have high HAI transmission rates. The spread of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), an HAI that spreads when providers don’t sanitize their hands between patients, can be prevented with disinfect products.
Medical supply companies can leverage this information to engage new prospects and potentially close more deals.
Clinical metrics
Medical supply companies can also search for clinical metrics at healthcare facilities. Clinical metrics can include information about patient demographics, diagnoses, or discharges. But they also include a wide variety of different facility measures, including:
- Number of staffed beds
- Number of operating rooms
- Total facility square footage
- Average age of facility
These unique facility metrics offer insight into a hospital’s purchasing behaviors and help medical supply companies gauge opportunities and customize messaging. For example, hospitals with 500 or more staffed beds will have a greater demand for bed linens, bed rails, or bed pans, or facility supplies like cleaning agents and toilet paper.
Financial metrics
Our comprehensive facility profiles also provide insights into a healthcare facility’s financial performance. Metrics like net patient revenue, operating budget, and cost centers offer a general look at a facility’s financial wellbeing. Medical supply companies can also search for more specific data points, such as inpatient and outpatient charges for medical supplies and durable medical equipment.
These insights (and others) offer medical supply companies a sense of what a hospital or other facility pays for their portfolio of products each year. A company could use this information to properly segment its sales territories and guide its engagement strategy for a specific account.
Requests for proposals (RFPs)
Within our HospitalView product, users can search for RFPs as another way to identify facilities in need of surgical equipment or medical supplies. It’s useful for anticipating which hospitals might need your specific solution, as RFPs are generated when a hospital needs to solicit labor, services, or supplies.
Requests for proposals cover a wide range of different supply requests. For instance, hospitals might submit a request for nitrile exam gloves or more specialized items like insulin pumps or surgical implants.
Other types of RFPs can be helpful for medical supply companies as well. Construction requests reveal when a hospital is expanding or renovating its facility. If a hospital expands its surgical wing, it might need operating tables, surgical lights, anesthesia machines, and other instruments.
Procedure volume by provider
Medical supply companies often use medical claims data to deepen their understanding of the market and identify valuable prospects to engage with. The Atlas All-Payor Claims dataset delivers accurate intelligence into diagnosis, procedure, and prescriber activity, all of which can help medical supply companies develop better go-to-market and sales strategies.
Thanks to the powerful search capabilities in our solutions, supply companies can quickly look for high-volume hospitals and physicians that may need the products our clients offer. They can also filter their results by state or region, allowing for easier and more granular territory planning.
Procedure volumes are particularly useful for medical supply companies, as they indicate the providers performing high (or low) volumes of a given procedure. For example, a company that manufactures tendon grafts might search for providers performing surgeries like tendon repair procedures.
Executive contacts
Whether it’s finding a physician to champion your product or a decision-maker with purchasing power, executive contact data is essential. Medical supply clients use our solutions to target the right people across every corner of the market.
Contact info found within our solutions includes the person’s title, department, position, phone, email, and social media profiles.
Supply companies can access contact information for executives at any of the following facility types:
- Hospitals
- Physician groups
- Accountable care organizations (ACOs)
- Ambulatory surgery centers
- Imaging centers
- Skilled nursing facilities (SNFs)
- Home health agencies (HHAs)
- Assisted living facilities (ALFs)
Accessing this information allows medical supply companies to identify key contacts like key opinion leaders (KOLs), lead physicians, or C-level executives with precision and get sales conversations started faster.
Learn more
Interested in learning more about how Definitive Healthcare can strengthen your medical supplies sales strategy? Want to know how to find and engage with key prospects or stay up to date on the latest trends? Start a free trial with Definitive Healthcare today.
You might also be interested in...
