From Pilot to Purchase: How a Rehabilitation Robotics Manufacturer Used IDIs and Usage Analytics to Understand Why Successful Clinical Pilots Were Not Converting to Paid Adoption
Executive Snapshot
Client
Situation/Challenge
Objective
Constancy Researchers Solution
Impact
Client Outcome
The Situation / Challenge
Clinical pilot programmes are a standard go-to-market mechanism in rehabilitation robotics, allowing a clinic to trial a device before committing capital. The assumption underlying most pilot design is straightforward: if therapists and patients respond well, conversion should follow naturally. The client’s experience was steadily undermining that assumption, and nobody internally could explain why.
The client’s devices performed well clinically and were well received by therapists day to day — pilot feedback surveys consistently showed high satisfaction. Yet less than a third of pilot sites converted to a paid arrangement, a rate the commercial team considered unsustainable. Internal speculation focused on price sensitivity, but neither explanation had been tested with the people actually involved in each site’s decision.
The deeper risk was that the company was optimising its pilot programme for therapist satisfaction — a metric it could measure easily — while the actual conversion decision was made by people and factors the programme had not been designed to address at all.
Key Challenges
- No structured, direct comparison of converting versus non-converting pilot sites to identify what actually distinguished the two groups
- No clarity on who within each clinic actually held purchase decision authority, and whether the pilot programme was engaging that person at all
- No usage analytics examining whether device utilisation patterns during the pilot differed meaningfully between converting and non-converting sites
- An internal assumption that high therapist satisfaction should predict conversion, never tested against the conversion data the company already possessed
- Pilot programme design focused almost entirely on clinical and therapist experience, with no structured procurement engagement built in
- Commercial leadership pressure to improve conversion rates without a clear diagnosis of where in the process conversion was actually being lost
Clinical pilot programmes frequently measure the wrong proxy for purchase likelihood. Therapist satisfaction reflects clinical experience, but the purchase decision runs through procurement stakeholders whose priorities are rarely addressed by a pilot designed around clinical experience alone.
Constancy Researchers Solution
Constancy Researchers structured the engagement around a direct comparison: speaking with people at both converting and non-converting sites, and analysing usage data the company already had but had never examined through that lens.
In-Depth Interviews (IDIs) with Physical Therapists at Converting and Non-Converting Sites
- Conducted 14 IDIs with physical therapists across both site types, exploring their clinical experience, their role in the purchase decision, and their understanding of why the pilot did or did not convert.
- Found that therapist satisfaction was consistently high at both converting and non-converting sites, confirming satisfaction alone had no predictive relationship with conversion.
In-Depth Interviews (IDIs) with Clinic Administrators & Procurement Decision-Makers
- Conducted 16 IDIs with clinic administrators and procurement decision-makers, including several uninvolved in the day-to-day pilot, to understand how the purchase decision was actually made.
- Identified that procurement decision-makers, not therapists, controlled the actual purchase decision at most sites, and that the pilot’s near-exclusive focus on therapist experience left procurement under-informed until the pilot was ending.
In-Depth Interviews (IDIs) with Non-Converting Site Decision-Makers
- Conducted 8 additional IDIs with decision-makers at non-converting sites, focused on the specific reasons for declining and what evidence would have changed the outcome.
- Non-converting decision-makers consistently cited the absence of a clear utilisation case to justify the purchase internally, not dissatisfaction with the device itself.
Data Analytics: Pilot Period Utilisation Pattern Comparison
- Analysed device utilisation data from all pilot sites, comparing session frequency, patient throughput, and therapist engagement week by week between converting and non-converting sites.
- Identified that converting sites consistently showed a utilisation acceleration pattern in weeks three through six, while non-converting sites showed flat or declining utilisation over the same period.
Pilot Programme Redesign & Procurement Engagement Strategy
- Translated findings into a redesigned pilot structure, building in procurement engagement from week one and a utilisation reporting mechanism aligned to the weeks three through six pattern.
- Delivered a board-ready implementation plan with a defined intervention point during weeks three through six for the commercial team to support sites showing the non-conversion pattern.
The engagement replaced an assumption the company had never tested with a direct, comparative understanding of what actually separated successful pilots from unsuccessful ones.
Impact
- Therapist IDIs confirmed satisfaction had no predictive relationship with conversion, disproving the metric the programme had been optimised around
- Administrator IDIs identified procurement decision-makers, not therapists, as the actual purchase authority the pilot had been under-engaging
- Non-converting site IDIs revealed the absence of a usable justification case, not device dissatisfaction, as the primary reason for declining
- Analytics identified a weeks three through six utilisation acceleration pattern that distinguished converting from non-converting sites
- The redesigned pilot introduced procurement engagement from week one rather than only at the pilot’s conclusion
- A structured utilisation reporting mechanism was built around the analytics-identified weeks three through six pattern
- Conversion rates among the first two redesigned cohorts increased substantially relative to the prior baseline
- The commercial team gained a specific, data-backed intervention point rather than waiting until conversion had already been lost
Client Outcome
Conversion Improvement
Conversion rates among the first two redesigned cohorts increased substantially relative to the prior baseline.
Diagnosis Correction
Therapist satisfaction was confirmed as a poor predictor of conversion, redirecting design toward the actual decision-makers.
Procurement Engagement
Procurement and administrative stakeholders are now engaged from week one, addressing the gap IDIs identified as central.
Early Intervention Capability
The weeks three through six pattern gives the commercial team a specific point to intervene before conversion is lost.
Evidence Generation
Structured reporting now gives procurement decision-makers the justification case non-converting sites had previously lacked.
Commercial Efficiency
Pilot resources are now directed toward the stakeholders and time windows that actually determine conversion.
Customer Understanding
The company gained a precise, evidence-based understanding of how the purchase decision is actually made.
Pilot Programme Redesign
The pilot structure was rebuilt around procurement engagement and utilisation monitoring rather than therapist experience alone.
Market Positioning
The manufacturer was repositioned as a disciplined organisation whose go-to-market process is grounded in direct customer evidence.
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