How much does it cost to build a healthcare marketplace like Zocdoc? What are the must- have features and functionalities to build an app like Zocdoc? Which technology is best suited for developing an appointment booking app like Zocdoc?
Recognized for our healthcare software development expertise in building Zocdoc like online appointment booking apps such as Lybrate, We often come across aforesaid interrogations from our prospects.
Since Zocdoc is a leading name in the domain across the United States, a number of startups aim to improve the healthcare system of their countries following a similar (and also tried-and-tested) care delivery approach.
Responding to this curiosity of our prospect customers and readers to know more about this billion-dollar healthcare marketplace, here we anatomize Zocdoc to figure out its selling points, business model, revenue streams, and technology behind the scenes.
Zocdoc is an online appointment booking portal that allows individuals to find doctor and book appointment, as early as in 24 hours. Founded in the year 2007, this digital health marketplace monthly facilitates 6 million users to book an appointment with doctors in 2000+ cities across the United States.
Just like the turbulent journey of any other startup, Zocdoc too experienced rise and fall in the attempt to reach the apex of its success. Here is a glimpse of Zocdoc's evolution over the years.
One of the consistent challenges in the U.S. healthcare system is the wait time for a patient-physician appointment. According to the Merritt Hawkins 2017 Survey of Physician Appointment Wait Times, the average wait time for a physician appointment is 24.1 days in the metro cities- a 30% increase from 18.5 days in 2014. The case is even worse in mid-sized metro cities where the average appointment booking time is 32 days- 32.8% higher than the average for metro cities.
Amongst the 15 metro and mid-sized metro cities that were surveyed, Boston and Yakima (Washington) were reported to have the highest patient-physician appointment wait time: 52.4 days and 48.8 days respectively.
Another study by Geisinger Health System shows that providers see greater no-show rates when patients wait longer. Thus, longer wait times to speciality appointments can lead to increased emergency department utilization.
The U.S. healthcare system is dominated by the Fee-for-Service (FFS) payment model for physicians and care providers.
“Under the FFS payment model, the providers and physicians are reimbursed by insurance companies and government agencies (third party payers), depending upon the number of services that they offer, the number of procedures that they have performed.”
Platforms like Zocdoc shifts the emphasis from Fee-for-Service model to Value-based-Care, which encourages the professionals to engage with patients, offer care that’s apposite for an individual, invest in technology, and incentivize providers for coordinated and effective care services.
ZocDoc responds to the critical pain point of patients and providers, by offering a platform that helps to reduce the patient-physician appointment booking wait time and also incentivize providers with value-based-care payment model. In short, Zocdoc creates a win-win for both patients and doctors.
Zocdoc operates a two-sided network that connects patients and doctors with one another. The company that has a valuation of over $2 billion took over nine years to build this digital health marketplace, sending teams to individual doctors’ offices across the country to sign them up for their booking tool. Today, ZocDoc is one of the leading platforms in the U.S. for patients to check near-term provider availability, keeping patient wait times lower than traditional booking methods.
With Zocdoc, patients can see doctors’ open appointment times and book them online, make informed choices with verified reviews, and stay on top of important check-ups with custom reminders.
Zocdoc makes doctors discoverable to patients. It reduces the number of no show-ups by filling last-minute openings in doctors’ calendar caused by cancellations and shifting schedules.
Zocdoc is a patient-centric model. Thus, booking an appointment using this online doctor-patient connecting portal is free.
The primary source of revenue for ZocDoc is the subscription fee that doctors pay for Zocdoc’s services. Doctors pay an annual fee of $3000 for which Zocdoc connects them with patients looking for their services, increase efficiency of their practices, and fill their last-minute cancellations.
Another source of revenue for Zocdoc is the ‘Sponsored Results’ service that allow doctors to stand out and get discovered by patients who are willing to book an appointment for their practices. When doctors opt for Sponsored Results service, the ads are shown only to the patients who are eligible to book with a doctor’s practice. For the ad, doctors are charged on the basis of various factors like patient reviews and ratings on Zocdoc, practice size, marketing and advertising budget, and bid rate for specialty and market.
Zocdoc uses technology and data science to connect patients with the right doctors and reduce the wait time. The digital health marketplace work across different practice management software (PMS) systems, which allows them partner with large health systems and small practices in the U.S. and serve patients across all 50 states. A few technologies that adds an edge to this doctor-patient connecting portal includes:
While these are some of the value-adding functionalities and technologies in Zocdoc, they are certainly the reason why Zocdoc stand out in the market competition. Primarily, the platform operates through an online web portal and mobile app (for Android and iOS) that helps to discover doctors online through Zocdoc’s proprietary sync technology.