Marketing in the medtech space has changed dramatically. Where companies were once relegated to only focus groups and telephone surveys to understand their customers, they now have access to mountains of real-time data. Melissa Wildstein has been in the industry long enough to see this transformation up close, and she’s helping companies figure out how to use all that information without losing sight of what matters.
Tracking Medtech Marketing Evolution
Wildstein started working with medtech marketing teams in 2006. Back then, gathering data meant doing the work yourself. “Data and analytics at that time were really relegated to what you could do with one-on-one market research interviews,” she recalls. Companies would conduct focus groups, surveys, and telephone interviews to collect first-party data that would shape their campaigns. The contrast with today is stark. “If you fast forward to where we are now, in 2025, the amount of data that we have is insane.” Wildstein has watched this evolution unfold over two decades, giving her perspective on how the landscape has shifted and what it means for marketing teams trying to keep up.
The changes have been practical too. Teams used to spend significant time testing creative with individual consumers before launching anything. Now things move faster. “With A/B testing and real-time analytics, we’re able to quickly gather information directly from the consumers of our products,” Wildstein explains. Most of those consumers are healthcare professionals, procurement teams, nurses, and surgeons, and tracking their responses means teams can pivot quickly to optimize campaigns.
Leveraging Data for a Competitive Edge
Here’s something interesting. Wildstein works with Fortune 500 companies, but she also works with smaller medical device companies. The difference in how they use data is worth noting. Large organizations more often process website and analytics data at a corporate level and aren’t linking that to brand-specific revenue . “They’re not necessarily able to drill down into the very brand-level data that some of these smaller organizations are looking at,” she says. That more granular view can give smaller companies an advantage. They can be nimble, making quick shifts in their marketing mix, media channels and sales engagements based on what the data tells them.
The result? Smaller companies can compete with bigger budgets. “It allows them to level the playing field when they’re competing against much larger organizations that may have bigger advertising and marketing budgets.” There’s another factor at play too. “The big boys are more risk-averse,” Wildstein notes. Smaller companies can put forward cheekier advertising campaigns, and when they have data backing them up, they know it will move the marketplace.
Integrating Data Across Campaigns
Wildstein breaks down how to leverage data into three stages.
- Use It Early – Get in front of healthcare professionals to understand what drives their behavior and what they actually need. “That’s through market research,” she says. “Making sure that the product you’re bringing to market is aligned with a real need. Nothing beats real one:one dialogue and conversation”
- Test Your Creative – “Put together two to three different types of creative campaigns, put those into the market, do a small geo test and see what resonates.” Take the winning creative and scale it up. “Put your dollars against the winning campaign at that point and then see what happens on the national stage.”
- Keep Optimizing – Once a campaign goes live nationally, monitor performance and adjust your media channel mix based on what you’re seeing.
Navigating Compliance With AI Tools
The FDA launched a back-to-basics initiative in September, shifting the regulatory environment for direct-to-consumer advertising. This has put compliance at the top of the priority list. “Leveraging AI to constantly monitor campaigns and look at them from a compliance standpoint is something that I see as a real trend moving forward,” Wildstein says. Many companies are using AI to create derivative content, which speeds things up. But there’s a catch. “Left alone without any sort of compliance guardrails, we’re going to get into a lot of hot water in our industry.” That’s why Wildstein’s team is building AI guardrails to monitor campaigns from a compliance standpoint, not just to generate content faster. She jokes about having an AI watchdog monitor and AI content generators, but there’s a serious point underneath. “If you are leveraging AI to build out your social media posts, and then you’re also using AI to monitor social media and comment, then AI is just optimizing for AI.” Brands can’t let that happen. “Brands need to be authentic, transparent, and stand for something. And that really only comes from humans interacting with humans.”
Wildstein’s view on where things are headed is clear. “We can’t just optimize for clicks and conversions. We have to optimize for compliance and comprehension.” The smartest marketing campaigns will be those where analytics turn compliance from a checkbox exercise into something that gives companies an edge. For medtech marketers dealing with increased regulatory scrutiny, the challenge is balancing efficiency with authenticity while keeping humans at the center of the conversation.
Connect with Melissa Wildstein on LinkedIn to learn more about her approach to medtech marketing.
