PESTLE analysis
Political environment: America has allowed the adoption of insurance cover for the citizens, for instance, the Medicaid is used for all American citizens (Dafny et al., 2015).
Economic environment: The economic recession of the United States led to the decreased purchasing power by the American citizens.
Social environment: The Americans have varied economic classes such that there are those who are poor and unemployed and there are those that are employed and rich thus they can afford private insurance covers (Ashwood et al., 2017).
Technological environment: The American Well technology has been adopted at homes and workplace with increased internet connectivity in America. As a result, instant messaging and use of videos can be used for communication between patients and specialists.
Legal environment: The American Well services are linked to HIPAA so that there can be enhanced security during communication by increased use of electric devices in transmitting personal health information.
Figure1: health insurance in the United States in 2012.
(https://sphweb.bumc.bu.edu/otlt/mph-modules/hpm/americanhealthcare_paying/americanhealthcare_paying_print.html)
Potential new entrants: For the short term, the potential for low entrants is low while it is high for the long term basis. For instance, the American Well initially invested approximately $70 million. This clearly indicates that in the long run, it is possible for a new company to enter this market and provide online health care services provided that they are ready to invest either the same or more amount of money in order to offer enhanced health online services between the physicians, specialists, and patients (Uscher-Pines et al., 2016).
The power of Suppliers: the power of suppliers is low in the online health services because there are a high number of competitors in the market. However, the power of suppliers becomes high when it is the niche of the market or when the supplies are limited. The limit of the supplier, in this case, is for instance, when there is only a certain supplier who can supply a given material in a certain or wide area.
5 forces analysis
The power of buyers: The buyers have low power because they are too many while the health care service providers are limited. In this case, the buyers fall into two main categories, one is the insurance companies, and two is the final customer (patients).
Availability of substitutes: There are a high number of substitutes to the online care health services in America. For instance, for those who are illiterate, they can opt for offline health services as substitutes.
Employers: The employers are in dire need of a platform which provides them with an opportunity to serve their clients to satisfaction. In this case, the employers do not prefer situations that cause absenteeism to their employees (Terry, 205).
Doctors: In America, the majority of the health personnel are the PCP while the specialists are very few. With many patients seeking specialized treatment while there are few specialists available, the doctors need a cost-effective way of providing care to most patients without having to struggle in excess.
There are several competitors in the United States in terms of online health care systems. It is also evident that the offline health service providers are more especially to the patients who are illiterate. Examples of competitors include Med fusion, Cisco, and Tealdoc telepresence and Rely on health.
Patients: the patients in the United States have varied health concerns such as acute, chronic and rehabilitative care. This means that it is their wish that they have physicians available to meet their needs at all times.
Figure 2: Adoption of American Well in the United States. (https://www.mhealthtalk.com/consumers-ready-for-telehealth-survey/)
The American Well provides an online and telephone platform via which the patients can get access to health services by getting in contact with the physicians and specialists. It also helps the patients and health care providers to reduce the time lost when attending consultations in offices by creating a link between excess time and service demand (Uscher-Pines et al., 2016). In most cases, the patients get an opportunity to make a choice as to the type of health care specialists to talk to with respect to their unique health needs.
- Offers telemedicine
- Physician licensing services
- Safe and transparent payment systems for services
- Catered for liability issues by obtaining a policy from insurers
The American Well online care company is focused on offering a digital platform in which it lowers the costs of seeking and providing health care to patients and health professionals respectively. Moreover, it generates revenue to the service providers and hence offers an efficient health services delivery system (Terry, 205). These are some of the strategies that need to be marketed to the health insurance companies for early adoption. The American Well company also needs to form a market share and brand awareness, especially to the competitors so that it can create market dominance. The Team Edition services should be marketed more to the insurance companies and patients because there are no much costs that are incurred and they provide enhanced connectivity between the patients, insurance companies, and healthcare givers. The capitalization on the Team Edition can, therefore, be used as a distinct feature that creates a unique difference between the American Wellness Company and its competitors. There are also plans to extend the online care services to the hospitals and retail clinics as a new business segment so that there will be online care kiosks. This plan will help the Company to spread its services to wide geographical locations, although it will require huge capital in terms of marketing and infrastructure. The segmentation of the pharmacy segments can be carried out by use of the existing infrastructure and hence would be economically favorable to the Company. The expansion of the American Well services to international markets requires a lot of capital because there is a need to offer solutions for every need of the local markets and structure the company in terms of service provision. Moreover, international marketing of the American Wellness services is still not advisable for the time being because it has not been fully established even in its own home country. Since there is a high level of proposals being made by physicians, insurance companies, and patients, there is a need to lay emphasis on remaining focused on the health care needs. Since the American Well services have been tested and adopted by several insurance companies, physicians, and patients, its marketing should be stressed more (Dafny et al., 2015). This is because it has proven to be a valuable platform since it offers benefits to the insurance companies and patients in terms of treatment costs and time. With this respect, the American Well services should be focus on market establishment while the Team Edition should be viewed as a value addition.
Figure 3: The cost of health care services in American Well (https://www.mhealthtalk.com/consumers-ready-for-telehealth-survey/)
References
Ashwood, J.S., Mehrotra, A., Cowling, D. and Uscher-Pines, L., 2017. Direct-To-Consumer Telehealth May Increase Access To Care But Does Not Decrease Spending. Health Affairs, 36(3), pp.485-491.
Dafny, L., Hendel, I. and Wilson, N., 2015. Narrow networks on the health insurance exchanges: What do they look like and how do they affect pricing? a case study of texas. The American Economic Review, 105(5), pp.110-114.
Terry, K., 2015. Physicians and telehealth: Is it time to embrace virtual visits?. Medical Economics. Available at https://medicaleconomics. modernmedicine. com/medical-economics/news/physicians-and-telehealth-it-time-embrace-virtualvisits.
Uscher-Pines, L., Fischer, S. and Chari, R., 2016. The Promise of Direct-to-Consumer Telehealth for Disaster Response and Recovery. Prehospital and disaster medicine, 31(04), pp.454-456.
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