Medtech PPC Agency: What It Should Do, What It Costs and How to Judge One

A medtech PPC agency should run your paid search and paid social campaigns so that surgeons, hospital purchasing teams and other device buyers see ads that stay within your device's cleared claims, and it should report results as sales conversations, not clicks. In practice that is four jobs: keywords built around how clinical and hospital buyers search, a claims review on every ad before it goes live, landing pages written for those buyers, and tracking that follows each lead into your CRM. You pay the ad spend to the platform and a separate management fee to the agency. To judge an agency, ask which device accounts it runs today, who reviews ad copy for claims, and what its monthly report measures. I run Buzzbox Media, a marketing agency that works only with medtech companies and healthcare associations, and I manage Google Ads for device companies.

What a medtech PPC agency should actually do

A good medtech PPC agency does six things for you every month.

1. Builds keyword lists by buyer. A surgeon, a hospital purchasing manager and a biomedical engineer search for the same device with different words. The keyword plan should say which buyer each keyword group is for.
2. Keeps patient and student searches out. Device keywords attract patients, students and researchers who will never buy. A negative keyword list that blocks those searches protects your budget.
3. Reviews every ad for claims before it goes live. Each headline and description is checked against your device's cleared or approved indication, and your regulatory team signs off.
4. Sends clicks to pages written for the buyer. A surgeon who clicks an ad about a procedure should land on a page about that procedure, not on your homepage.
5. Tracks leads into your CRM. The report should show which campaigns produced demo requests, quote requests and sales meetings, not only clicks and form fills.
6. Plans around your sales calendar. Budgets can rise before the conferences your buyers attend and around your sales team's account plans.

Which ad platforms matter for medical devices

• Google Ads search campaigns reach people who are already searching for your device category, a competitor, or a clinical problem your device addresses.
• Microsoft Ads runs the same kind of search ads on Bing, and many campaigns can be copied over from Google with small changes.
• LinkedIn Ads lets you target by job title, employer and seniority, which is useful when you know the hospital systems or roles you need to reach.
• Display and retargeting show ads to people who already visited your product pages, which helps during buying cycles that last months.

The order I usually recommend is Google search on your highest-value product line first, then LinkedIn for named accounts once search has shown it produces sales conversations.

What a device ad can and cannot say

Paid ads are short, which makes them easy to overstate. Two federal rules shape what a device ad can say.

• Your ads are evidence of what your device is for. FDA's regulation on intended use says intent can be shown by "labeling claims, advertising matter, or oral or written statements" from the company (21 CFR 801.4). An ad that names a use your device is not cleared for can count as evidence of that use.
• A 510(k) is not an FDA approval. FDA's regulation says a 510(k) clearance "does not in any way denote official approval of the device," and that implying official approval is misbranding (21 CFR 807.97). "FDA cleared" is the accurate term for a 510(k) device.

A full walkthrough of the rules is in my guide to FDA compliant medical device advertising. This page is information, not regulatory advice; your regulatory team decides what your ads say.

What medtech PPC costs

A medtech PPC program has two costs, and it helps to keep them separate when you compare proposals.

• Ad spend is what you pay Google, Microsoft or LinkedIn for clicks. My PPC service page puts the minimum for device campaigns at $3,000 to $5,000 a month in ad spend, because below that a campaign rarely produces enough data to judge which keywords lead to sales conversations.
• The management fee is what you pay the agency to build, run and report on the campaigns. Agencies charge it either as a percentage of ad spend or as a flat monthly fee. Ask which, and ask what happens to the fee when your ad spend goes up.

When PPC is one part of a larger program that also covers SEO, content and conference marketing, Buzzbox Media retainers run $5,000 to $15,000 a month. For how to split a budget across Google, LinkedIn and YouTube, see the medical device PPC budget allocation guide.

How I run PPC for device companies

Buzzbox Media manages Google Ads for INFAB's radiation protection product line, a client since 2014, with the campaigns connected to INFAB's online store so each sale can be traced back to the ad click. On every account I build the keyword plan by buyer, write the ads, run them past the client's regulatory reviewer before they go live, and report monthly on leads and sales conversations rather than clicks alone. I am not regulatory counsel, so the final claims decision stays with your own regulatory or legal team.

How to judge a medtech PPC agency: six questions

Ask every agency on your shortlist these six questions and compare the answers side by side.

1. How many of your current accounts are medical device companies, and can you name one? A named client gives you something you can check.
2. Who reviews ad copy for claims before it goes live? Ask how ads get to your regulatory team and how long review usually takes.
3. How do you keep patient and student searches out of the account? Ask to see a sample negative keyword list for a device account.
4. What does your monthly report measure? It should go past clicks and cost per click to leads, qualified leads and sales meetings.
5. How is your fee calculated, and is ad spend billed separately? Get the fee model, the minimum term and the ad spend handling in writing.
6. Who owns the ad account? The account should be in your company's name, so your data stays with you if you change agencies.

For a side-by-side look, see the best medical device PPC agencies in 2026, four firms scored on what their own websites show.