3. You’ve got a better message than ‘How It Works’.

Startup is a verb: 10 insights to get from product to market.

A few years ago, I was hired to work with a struggling startup. They were among the first companies to offer a working system for remote medical care in the U.S., and they weren’t getting traction. They’d been at it for 15 years, struggling to find customers among the big employers they needed to make it go. They were thinking about pulling out of the U.S. entirely. 

Advance Medical first got off the ground in Spain. They had figured out a way to dramatically improve healthcare, by helping each patient connect with the doctor who is most expert in that patient’s specific ailment. 

Before, any diagnosis of any health issue was dependent on the knowledge and experience of the doctor in the room with the patient. That might be fine for common healthcare problems, or in a big hospital with many experts who can be brought in to consult on something out of the ordinary. 

But, as physicians know all too well, our bodies can go wrong in many different ways. There are more than 10,000 diseases that go under the label ‘cancer’. Most people don’t have access to the leading experts in their particular problem. 

As the internet made it possible for medical records to be shared electronically and HIPAA regulations caught up with the technology, experts who were not in same the room as patients, or even in the same country, could now consult on diagnoses and treatment plans. Which meant the leading expert in any patient’s given condition could be made part of the healthcare team, if the connection could be made. 

Advance Medical solved exactly this problem. 

Building on their own medical knowledge and connections, their physicians and technologists created a network of medical experts on virtually any medical condition. Suddenly, it was possible for patients to connect directly with the physicians and specialists best able to diagnose and treat their specific condition, even if the patient and specialists were nowhere near each other. Advance Medical could save lives by matching patients with the specialists who were most expert in that exact condition. 

Patients benefitted by getting the most expert care. Specialists benefitted by applying their expertise where it is most useful. It seemed like this was what advanced healthcare should be. 

Except the company was floundering. After an encouraging early start, sales were sliding. Few of the HR directors targeted by Advance Medical were interested in adding this benefit. After years of trying and failing to get traction with big companies, the leadership of Advance Medical was thinking of pulling up stakes in the U.S.

What was wrong?