American Well: Internet-Based Healthcare Platform - Term Paper Example

Running Head: AMERICAN WELL American Well: The Doctor Will E-See You Now Online health care is a popular phenomenon in United States of America (USA) nowadays. This popularity owes its origin to the fact that over time the number of doctors in USA has declined but their demand has always experienced a rise. Apart from that the growing number of internet users also led to conceptualization of the idea of promoting doctor’s check up through the Internet. At this scenario the two brothers, Dr. Roy Schoenberg and Dr. Ido Schoenberg, from the healthcare delivery system came forward and established American Well in 2006 (American Well, 2008, pp.1-3). Practically, American Well is an internet based healthcare platform that enables the patients and health care providers to communicate with each other using video chat, text chat, or phone. It assists the patients to get in touch with the respective doctors at any point of time, without any delay in case of an emergency. The business is based on the belief that technology could be leveraged to bring traditional healthcare to people’s home and workplaces. In this setup the patient can fix an appointment as per his/her convenience with healthcare professionals of their choice. Here the data related to medical analysis and medical claim gets immediately integrated into the system. The medical history of the patient’s visit remains in the system and this enables other healthcare providers to continue the follow up, if necessary (Ofek and Laufer, 2010, p.1). 1. The central strategic marketing issues and decisions needed to be made at the organizational, business unit, or product level Positioning & identifying target market The concept “the doctor will see you now” has been well integrated with appropriate technology, which finally gave shape to American Well (American Well may make America well…online! 2009). The target clients for the organization are primarily the ones who cannot get in touch physically with the primary health care providers. This might be due to geographical distance, time, work schedule or any other constraints. The organization is also quite beneficial in case of emergencies, as they have the facility to directly communicate by phone and video chat. As mentioned earlier, another reason for the initial success of this organization is the declining availability of the primary healthcare providers. As estimated from a recent survey, by the end of 2025, the United States of America will face a lack of nearly 44000 general physicians. If this figure comes out to be true, this situation will largely assist the growth of online health care systems. Again data shows that regular interaction with the primary care physicians rather than occasional visits to specialist can reduce the mortality rates. This can also potentially save adequate money (American Well, 2012, p. 3). The products available The unique selling proposition (USP) and the service of American Well lie in the easy accessibility of online health care. This is the main feature that lures the attention of the patients, especially when they are satisfied with the services provided by American Well. The notable products available in the company include the facilities of video chatting, texting, and online communications with the respective doctors. It maintains a database of the patients for future reciprocations. American Well has also made the health care facility available to the common people at low cost. It provides optimum satisfaction in the context of “anytime and anywhere”, which implies a patient can get access to their doctors irrespective of time and place. It also facilitates the provision of comprehensive clinical care programs on their website. Also there is a provision where teams from various disciplines join together to assist in case of a patient, and communicate amongst themselves efficiently as and when needed. Together with all these facilities, online care provides the feel of home as the patient is interacting from the comfort of his or her own home or workplace. For the physician also it is lucrative as they get compensated for all the time they devote to the patients (American Well, 2008, p.3). Promotional activities The company promotes itself via messages and emails to their existing and the potential customers. The organization also has tie ups with three major insurance companies in the US, as disclosed in 2009. The founders of American Well acknowledged the fact that the organization has projected a notable growth in the financial year 2011. This growth comprised of essential enhancements in the company’s online health care systems, and its expansion into previously unexplored markets. The expansion was so significant that online care facility is currently available to more than half the population in the US (American Well, 2012). Collaboration has been an integral part of expansion and promotion in the context of the organization. Major collaborations Collaboration with Joslin diabetes center American Well has made an essential collaboration with Joslin diabetes centre to enhance the quality of health care services that they provide. The goal is to spread the online health care system effectively throughout the United States of America (Americanwell, 2012). Collaboration with patient advocates to bring American Well to Maine The organization has also formed collaboration with Patient advocates LLC, in order to achieve its expansion goals in Maine. Patient advocates is a company of repute, that has a proven track record of providing guidance to its clients regarding the health care system (Americanwell, 2011).The cost saving yet highest quality of health care services that Patient Advocates have expertise has made it the first choice of the employers while opting for an organization to look after the health of their employees. Collaboration with Numera American Well has also made significant collaborations with “Numera”. This collaboration is marked with an innovative approach that has enabled the doctors and the patients to indulge in direct online conversation with each other regarding health monitoring and other related information. This collaboration along with this innovative approach has paved a mutually beneficial relation between these two health care providing firms. (Americanwell, 2011) Pricing the services Spending in online health care of American Well is essentially beneficial, from both of the view points of doctors and patients. The doctors are paid subsequently well for the number of calls, and video conferences they attend during a day. Whilst the patients also benefit as the charges for the online health care facility is quiet nominal. Besides everything is done online, hence it saves in form of travelling expenditure and time that a patient would have to incur if he/she has visited the doctor’s chamber physically. 2. SWOT analysis on American Well Albert Humphrey is the creator of “SWOT” analysis in the field of strategic management. The SWOT analysis is an abbreviation for, Strength, Weakness, Opportunity, and Stress. “SWOT” helps in analyzing the existing and present situations, and assists in enhancing the companies’ situation in the future. “S”- STRENGTH The main strength of American Well is the increasing demands of physicians and the presence of supply constraint for the same. This is one of the prime reasons of the popularity of online health care systems in USA. The company has provided the patients the facility of choosing their own personal doctors and that has narrated into more patients. As mentioned earlier, online health care system is cost saving both in terms of money and time than the conventional health care system and that has contributed to the strength of the company. It has provided access of doctors to the patients irrespective of time, place or even natural hazards. The increasing number of recent collaborations of American Well with other stalwarts of the health care industry has helped its rapid spread among almost half the US population (Ofek and Laufer, 2010, p.1). This portrays the presence of an already matured market for American Well that has the potential to expand even further in the long run. “W”- WEAKNESS The American Well delayed a bit in setting their tie ups with insurance companies and that is one of their weaknesses. Only three tie ups with the insurance companies till November, 2009 illustrate the aforesaid fact. A noteworthy problem of American Well is that unlike their competitors they lack a proper brand image. Most of their competitors like that of Medfusion and Teladoc have a proper brand image that helps them in cementing their place in the market. Again, providing proper health treatment online has natural barriers. There is always a constraint that major and serious health issues will demand the physical presence of the patient in front of a doctor. In such cases meeting a doctor online over chat or even through a cam will never suffice to solve the problem. Moreover it also deserves significant notice that surgeries or tests cannot be conducted via internet (Ofek and Laufer, 2010, pp. 4-5). Considering the above facts conventional health care system cannot be absolutely replaced through online health care system. Any wrong diagnosis and treatment through online health care system will definitely go against the “American Well”. “O” – OPPORTUNITIES The main opportunity in front of the company is to exploit the rising demand across America for online health care systems. It has also been observed that day by day increasing number of patients and doctors are becoming comfortable communicating with one another over the internet. Over the time the world is becoming busier, this fact is specifically true for capitalist western countries like USA. As mentioned earlier streamlining the online health care system will definitely help in saving extra bit of time that might has to be spend visiting a doctor physically under a conventional health care system. This will definitely translate into future opportunity for online health care system as the busy person will opt for the same rather than conventional health care system. Again, since the barriers to medical licensing have lessened, the opportunities for American Well have increased and will follow the same trajectory in long run if this trend in medical licensing remains the same (Ofek and Laufer, 2010). “T” – THREAT American Well due to its weakness of brand imaging faces severe threats from the following companies: Relay Health – The Company was initiated in 1999, and is renowned for enhancing communication between patients and physicians. Medfusion – Medfusion was started in the year 1996. It enhanced communication between patients and doctors via its virtual office suit. It has facilitated the patients by providing an online platform through internet through, which they could communicate with their doctors. Teladoc – Teladoc came to the market in 2002. This company provided patients with telephonic assistance with doctors irrespective of time and place. Cisco TelePresence – This Company has facilitated the patients with the mode of video conferencing with doctors. This has taken it a step ahead from the other companies by generating live conversation opportunities between the concerned patient and the physician (Ofek and Laufer, 2010, pp.4-5). This particular edge comes from the fact that audio-visual conversation is much more appealing to the patients than the only audio option. Again doctors too are better equipped with the visual assistance that it offers, as it helps to diagnose and monitor more accurately. Again the presence of all the above companies points to the fact that the market is competitive and American Well is subject to significant threat that might arise at any moment from any of these competitors. The inherent risk of online health care system cannot also be ignored. Such risk generates from the fact that the doctor is not physically checking the patient and that might leave some important diagnostic signs beyond notice. A single miss diagnosis or treatment will immediately result in bad reputation and patients might stop considering American Well as a viable option for online health care. Following the same the population can altogether turn its face from entire online health care system as well. 3. Viable alternatives within the marketing decision process and their respective consequences Proper implementations of strategic marketing decisions are of foremost importance nowadays for all the organizations that are willing to court the relentless present market competition and challenges. Proper decision making and clearly defined company strategies are essential to fulfill the goals of the organization and enhancement of the growth process (OUP, n.d., p.2). There can be a number of viable alternatives through strategic marketing decisions that might be able to boost the growth of the company. Positioning: The Company should mainly focus on time and cost savings, as those are the main positives for the company. Better and quick service than its competitors will always help American Well to keep up its novelty and attract more number of patients. The organization might also consider positioning itself as the best payment provider to its doctors. This will also help to bring in more efficient and able doctors that eventually will translate into better customer (patient) satisfaction. Market opportunities: There is significant space of improvement in setting up more ties with insurance agencies. This will strengthen the fall back position of American Well and will also attract more patients owing to the easy availability of insurance facilities. To broaden the use of its facilities, American Well might also start considering some innovative approach of utilizing its already present facilities. For example, a hospital can use the facilities of American Well in their outdoor or emergency rooms. This way waiting patients might utilize their time by consulting online doctors regarding their particular problems. This will help in utilization of time and resources provided by the American Well (Ofek and Laufer, 2010, p.14). On the other hand American Well will also add another dimension to market their existing facilities. Monitoring and controlling the activities: Monitoring and controlling the activities has a dual meaning. First, it refers to the close follow-up of the planned marketing strategies such as positioning, pricing and finding out newer marketing opportunities. Second, it might also refer to a close monitoring and control of the internal activities. Health care industry is a sensitive segment where apart from profit, health and life hazards are also associated. To avoid any sort of accident, proper control measures should be implemented to monitor the work of the company. Patient satisfaction is a very important issue for any health care company. If a patient is properly satisfied then the person will generate business for the organization in the future. Hence it is essential that the management of the American Well should monitor the activities and conversation between the patients and the physicians and make sure that everything is in the proper line. They might also lead surveys among patients regarding their satisfaction level, so that they can improve their performances by analyzing the feedback. 4. The most important strategic decision from my point of view Monitoring and controlling the activities In spite of formulating a good plan regarding strategic marketing, a company will not be able to grow to its potentials if they are not implemented properly. Positioning and figuring out proper marketing strategies might be appropriate yet unless they are realized in reality they are nothing but a mirage. Here monitoring and exercising control measures become specifically important and obviously outweighs the other alternative strategic management approaches. It is essential for a health care organization to ensure satisfaction and safety of their patients. In the case of American Well, it is necessary that they properly monitor whether the patients are adequately satisfied with the online conversation that they have with their respective physician. If the patient is satisfied, the possibility of coming back to American Well in any health care concerns is significantly high. With proper satisfaction, the respective patient can even refer the organization to his close ones, which would aid in promoting the organization without incurring the monetary cost of advertisement. The interactions of the physicians with their patients should be closely monitored and might even be recorded. This can be produced in case of any future dispute between the patient and the doctor as evidence. This will also act as third party monitoring and will put a check on any mal behavior on behalf of both the patients and the physicians. Also questionnaires can be formulated to conduct surveys among patients regarding their satisfaction and performance of the organization. In the context of American Well, surveying is an efficient technique as more than half of the United States is familiar with the services they provide and well versed in responding to surveys. The survey results should be thoroughly analyzed to understand the scenario regarding the performance of the organization. This understanding might effectively help the American Well management team to understand their present performance, the areas they are lagging behind, and the changing demands of the people. The organization can accordingly modify itself so that it can attract new patients while keeping its existing patient base intact. 5. Identifying the desired outcomes related to the recommendation and how they will be measured/evaluated/reconsidered at various stages of implementation Strict adherence to the above recommendation regarding monitoring and controlling measures would result into increased number of patients for the American Well. A carefully led survey among the patients has every potential to be an interesting measurement of the effects of implementing the recommendations. The implementation of monitoring and control will definitely result in less volume of incomplete information between doctors and patients. This will translate to higher level of patient satisfaction and patient-doctor harmony. Conducting patient interviews regarding their level of satisfaction at the various level of implementation of the stricter monitoring and controlling methods and the eventual analysis of the data obtained this way will definitely reveal the state reached at each stage. A positive result (reflected through higher number of patients and higher level of patient satisfaction.) will indicate that the management should stick to their efforts. On the other hand a negative result will show the need for further modifications to minimize the flaws and faults present so far. Since health care system is a patient based service hence any complaints lodged by the patient should be dealt without wasting time, so that they feel that they are given optimum respect. 6. Contingency Plan When healthcare operations are conducted online the first possibility of risk arises with respect to security of databases which might give way due to some virus attack or system failure. A back up for relevant data needs to be maintained and updated all the time in order to sustain the operations. Second risk might be with respect to communication failure owing to connectivity problem. This might happen during a doctor patient interaction and in such cases ample telephone connections need to be maintained in order to get in touch with the patients and keep the communication on. Third possible risk could be in cases of diagnosis which might not be always right since the doctor cannot really check the pulse and other details of a patient’s physical condition. So to prevent the chance of wrong diagnosis the doctors might advise patients to conduct some medical tests which could be provided at their doorsteps. This might be provided by the company or done through some third party alliance. Such measures might help in dealing with crisis situations. Conclusion American Well is gaining immense popularity in the USA due to their online health care facilities. With major tie ups and growing infrastructure it has surely been amongst the most successful organizations in the USA. However, with increasing market competition, American Well needs to get updated and implement essential strategic marketing decisions. The market has become increasingly tough with the ever growing demands of the patients regarding quality of patient care service, and the existence of a number of other internet health care organizations who are waiting to substitute American Well. At this background to keep up its trajectory of growth American Well should try to continue their service with quality patient care at a reasonable price. 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