A Case Study in Setting New Engagement Standards
“The journey of a thousand miles, begins with a single step” – Lao Tzu
To realize our bold aspiration of improving America’s healthspan, earlier this year we took our first step of launching our initial new-member enrollment period. After months of meticulous planning and preparation, this was a pivotal event. Improving access to high-quality primary care is at the core of our mission, but we couldn’t be certain how fully employers and members would embrace the new benefit. It is not uncommon for new benefits to launch with great fanfare, only to achieve low single digit levels of engagement. We have worked to incorporate a wide range of industry best practices for engaging members, but how would these play out in areal-world setting?
Our first launch was with a self-insured employer, with a few thousand plan members – a public company in the healthcare industry. Just two weeks after the Aligned Marketplace launch, it was clear that it was a success, by a variety of metrics.
First, 31% of eligible members chose to enroll in the first few weeks, nearly half of them dependents.
The reasons these new members gave for joining Aligned, and their expectations for advanced primary care, were also encouraging. In order to gauge sentiment, we asked some new members what specific changes they were hoping to see, compared with their previous primary care experience. Their responses included:
- “having meaningful conversations with my PCP about my specific needs”
- “not feeling rushed during visits”
- “having my PCP help me coordinate care with specialists will be invaluable”
Members who had previously enrolled in a High Deductible Health Plan were especially excited about cost savings, explaining that they expected lower out-of-pocket expenses in accessing high-quality primary care.
One concern many patients voiced about their past healthcare experiences was difficulty selecting a primary care provider group. For many, the process includes checking insurance websites to see which providers are in-network, then turning to friends, family members, and online reviews to gauge quality, then calling the office—only to find that the provider is no longer accepting new patients.
By contrast, the Aligned Marketplace onboarding process is designed to bring all relevant provider information into one place, including reviews, bios, locations, hours, and availability. As a result, the median time that new members reported spending to select a provider group was just seven minutes. Moreover, nearly every new member who was asked indicated that they were impressed by the range of advanced primary care choices: more than three-quarters had six or more provider group options in less than a 30-minute drive of home; nearly all had at least three.
We have now signed up and gone live with multiple employers and are taking in valuable information on how to improve the new member sign-up and onboarding experience. It’s also set high expectations for upcoming enrollment periods with additional employers. And of course, we’ll continue monitoring the experiences of newly enrolled members, gathering feedback from providers and employers, and gathering data on health outcomes and cost savings.
These are exciting times for primary care in the US, given its vast potential for reducing overall costs while increasing the healthspan of members. To track our progress, and that of our new members, please follow Aligned Marketplace on LinkedIn, or any members of the founding team.