Product-Market Fit in Digital Health: Partial success isn't good enough

If your dashboard isn't yet firing on all cylinders, you're not there yet.

It's easy to hope that early traction with true product-market fit. Here's how to tell the difference—and why it matters for your next funding round.

Real healthcare PMF requires evidence across multiple stakeholder groups, not just one enthusiastic customer segment. You need employer adoption (not just pilot interest), health plan coverage decisions (not just meetings), health system integration (not just trials), consumer utilization (not just sign-ups), successful reimbursement collection (not just claims submitted), sustained patient engagement (not just initial usage), measurable patient outcomes (not just satisfaction scores), and actuarially-based ROI evidence (not just theoretical models).

The warning signs of "fake" PMF are everywhere: pilots that never convert to full contracts, positive user feedback that doesn't translate to retention, clinical outcomes that look good but don't move cost metrics, or reimbursement "pathways" that exist on paper but fail in practice.

Here's what missing PMF looks like in practice: We worked with a chronic care solution that had fantastic patient engagement scores, solid clinical outcomes, and enthusiastic pilot customers. But sales had stalled for 18 months.

The problem? Their complicated reimbursement story made benefit managers' eyes glaze over. Despite strong clinical evidence, the value proposition was too complex for buyers to sell internally. They had patient PMF but lacked payer and employer PMF.

Here's what real PMF looks like: We simplified their value proposition and pricing model, making both sales and administration more efficient. Same product, same clinical outcomes, but now with alignment across all stakeholder groups. Result: 300% increase in sales over two years. But even that didn't last once a nimble competitor introduced a new story that knocked them back on defense again. It's a constant battle of rethinking and repositioning.

The difference wasn't the product—it was systematic validation across all four critical pillars: Product (measurable clinical outcomes), Go-to-Market (multiple buyer types actually purchase), Operations (profitable delivery across care settings), and Payment (multiple payer types reimburse successfully).

PMF also shifts as you evolve. A solution with PMF for self-insured employers might completely lack PMF with Medicare Advantage plans. Different channels require different evidence packages, different outcome measures, different integration capabilities.

The companies that achieve sustainable growth systematically validate PMF across all relevant stakeholders before scaling. Before you raise your next round, before you expand to new markets—make sure your PMF evidence will hold up under the scrutiny of institutional buyers, payers, and investors who've seen dozens of promising solutions fail at scale.

Where are you going to stumble on your path to your next growth milestone? The answer starts with honest PMF assessment across all four pillars, backed by evidence that matters to the stakeholders who control your growth.