Innovative Telemedicine for Pets: VetForCall
Baltic Sandbox is delighted to introduce VetForCall that brings innovative telemedicine solutions for pets! Online vet consultations become the real day-savers when your pet unexpectedly gets sick. We face mobility and social distancing issues.
With VetForCall, it’s easy to book an appointment and get the necessary online consultation from a vet, wherever you are!
We had a chance to talk to team members of VetForCall: Dr. Sina Zare, the founder & CEO, and Nafiseh Soleymani Ashtiani, the Co-founder & COO. Nafiseh and Sina shared their personal stories of the VetForCall concept creating. Also, they talked about the main struggles they face in the Lithuanian market.
What Is VetForCall?
VetForCall is a telemedicine platform allowing pet owners to have professional vet consultancies entirely online. In VetForCall, pet owners can book an appointment, digitize their pet health history and have video consultations. Also, customers receive an electronic prescription or recommendation from a vet, all in one place.
Inspiring Story of Concept Creation
In the 2019 startup camp, we started thinking about the better accessibility of healthcare to society, so we came up with a telemedicine idea.
During the brainstorming session, one of the startup’s members, who came along with her lovely dog, suddenly met an accident in the forest in such a way that her dog started bleeding badly. Of course, we were far from veterinarians and clinics. We had a massive need for a veterinarian to help her dog at that particular time.
We thought if there were a platform to connect the harmed pet owner and vet immediately, it would help find the right solution for her dog to stop suffering from the pain.
From this story, we got an inspiration to start creating a concept of Vet For Call. We decided to create a platform where pet owners can immediately connect to the veterinarian.
The Need of VetForCall Solution
During the COVID pandemic, 35% of pet owners have stopped visiting veterinarian clinics because of the high risk of spreading the virus between pet owners, pets, and clinics. People started to google the possible health problems of their pets. It’s risky since Google search algorithms usually show the disease or symptoms with the highest SEO rate, not the real health problems and treatment solutions.
A Brief View of the Industry You Work In
The growing need for digitalization of the healthcare industry is inevitable. Taking a day off, caging the pet, driving in traffic, and waiting in lines at the vet clinic not only increases the pet’s stress hormones but also costs time and money for the pet owner. Our platform helps to create fast and straightforward access to veterinarians at the length of your fingertips.
The Competitive Advantages of VetForCall
The concept of telemedicine is yet to be fully operational globally. Despite the huge demand and market gap, healthcare and digitalization are not at full strength, however. We hope to eliminate the gap between pet owners and vets through our platform. No pet should suffer access to healthcare professionals because of inaccessibility.
Finally, pet owners can get the all-in-one service, including digitized pet health history, consultations with local and international vets, prescriptions, and recommendations.
From the veterinarians’ perspective, VetForcall helps doctors expand their consultation reach and acquire new customers at national and international levels, increase their revenue channels, offer video consultations to their existing customers, enhance customer satisfaction, and monetize free consultations.
Biggest struggles you have faced while running VetForCall service
So far, the biggest challenge for us is a language barrier. In this case, it is Lithuanian language barrier, which slows down our communication with new customers and partners in Lithuania. We can communicate in English but many of our customers prefer the local language. However, we’ve been able to acquire the help of sales representatives who’d help us in this aspect.
Introducing the Team of VetForCall
Both of VeForCall founders are healthcare experts. Dr. Sina, the CEO at VetForCall, holds a doctorate in pharmacy degree and a master’s in business management. Sina has experience training the sales force, holding national conferences and seminars providing continuous medical education to physicians and healthcare professionals.
Nafiseh, the COO at VetForCall, holds a master of business management & international business. Nafiseh also has a biochemistry background, with years of commercial and marketing experience in the pharma sector.
Both Sina and Nafiseh have long-year expertise in pharmaceutical sales and marketing on both national and international levels.
They came to Lithuania about two years ago, and we fell in love with the country and decided to stay and help our lovely little friends. As true animal lovers, they want to work on our passion and mission to help as many animals as possible.
What about the remote working environment & its challenges?
We have never had any problems with remote work since our business is entirely online. For this reason, we didn’t have any struggles when the world faced the mobility and social distancing issues caused by the pandemic.
Another case is that our team is small now, so there is no need to move to the office working environment. Perhaps, once our team expands, we might consider moving offline.
You future goals & ambitions
Their primary vision is to cover the Baltics, Germany, and Canada within the next five years. We’ll expand our market through direct pitching to veterinarians by sales representatives, attending seminars, webinars, conferences, and digital marketing approaches for attracting pet owners to the platform.
The help of local sales representatives is crucial in our international expansion. Online consultations for veterinarians don’t have any border limitations. Access to healthcare for pet owners will be ever so easy by using VetForCall. Later in the future, VetForCall plans to expand its services by offering exceptional pet food and health products. They also plan to add nutritionists’ and dog walkers’ services to make VetForCall heaven for pet owners.
Thank you for the interview, Nafiseh and Sina!
Get to know more about VetForCall
Interviewer: Kristina Kirkliauskaite, the Communication Manager at Baltic Sandbox.
