Ovee Health
A sexual & reproductive health platform for people with vaginas
Role: Co-founder & CTO
Responsibilities: UX research, product design / development, platform development, business case creation, fundraising, and all of the in-between that comes with running a startup
Team: Ovee was built with Jane Mitchell and Maddy Siriouthay
Exhibitions & Awards: First Prize Entrepreneurship, Female Founders Pitch Finalist, Matter VC Accelerator, SXSW 2019 Startup Spotlight, Inbound Pitch Night, Johnson & Johnson CES Pitch Finalist, Forbes 30 Under 30, PR Science and Technology Research Trust Grant, Grace Hopper PitcHer Finalist
How it started
It all started with a UTI.
My co-founder and I were developing ideas for a healthcare incubator, when a painful UTI sent her all over Manhattan and the depths of the internet to find support.
Inspired by her traumatic experience, we wanted to build something so people would never have to experience anything similar.
Customer research
We knew we weren't alone. We conducted hundreds of interviews with women to better understand the pain points they were experiencing with their reproductive health.
Interviews ranged from 15 - 60 minutes and consisted of open ended questions like:
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"When you feel like something is off 'down there', what do you do first?"
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"Who do you turn to when you have a question about your sexual health?
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"What was your sex ed like in High School?"
We started to see clear patterns in the responses...
"I turn to 'Dr. Google' and spiral until I convince myself I'm either dying or pregnant."
"My friends have told me to just drink cranberry juice and hope the problem goes away."
"The only sex-ed I received in school was a pamphlet titled, 'Cinderella was worth waiting for.' "
Quantitative Survey
Target Audience
Key demographics
Age: 18 - 35
Gender: cisgender women or people assigned female at birth
Attributes
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In a transitionary period––e.g. starting school, having sex for the first time, moving to a new city
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Aren't satisfied with their reproductive healthcare
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Makes decisions based on anecdotal experience
Challenges
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Didn't receive adequate sex ed in school
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Overwhelming amount of information on the internet which makes it hard to distinguish whats true
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Friends are unreliable sources of health advice / information
Preferred channels
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Spends majority of time online on social media (Instagram and TikTok)
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Prefers chat based communication
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Avoids downloading apps
Ovee's target audience was established based on data gathered from a survey of 1,500 women and 300+ interviews.
Research revealed that the need for sexual health support did not always correspond with age. People who did not receive adequate sex ed in school, or were experiencing sort of transition in their lives were much more likely to be unsatisfied with their reproductive healthcare regardless of age.
The Product
Our solution was a central, web-based health platform designed to support people navigating their sexual & reproductive health including:
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Medically accurate content
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Anecdotal experiences from the community
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Marketplace with curated, medically vetted products
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Anonymous chat to talk with a professional, free of charge
Content
We realized that existing sexual / reproductive health content was either so clinical people had a hard time understanding it, OR was written in plain language by people not qualified to be giving medical advice (i.e. recommending a yogurt soaked tampon to cure yeast infections).
With Ovee's content, we wanted to bridge the gap. The platform featured medically vetted content written in accessible language––like a best friend's older sister who also happens to be a gynecologist.
Curated and medically vetted stories from the community were also featured so our users knew they were not alone in their experiences.
Content discovery channels
Newsletter
Social media
Search
Chat concierge
From our research, we knew that many people delay seeking care due to feelings of embarrassment and shame surrounding their sexual health.
The platform's chat concierge was designed to be an anonymous and safe space for subscribers to ask questions about their sexual health.
The chat was powered by a live person during business hours and conversational AI when a live agent was not available. The goal was not to provide users a diagnosis or answer questions, but connect them to resources they needed faster.
The shop & "Box Box"
Our subscribers were equally overwhelmed by the number of reproductive and sexual health physical products. It was challenging to determine what's safe to use and what would work for them.
The Ovee shop was a curated selection of menstrual, hygiene, and sexual wellness products vetted by medical professionals and tested by the Ovee team.
The "Box Box" (a.k.a. a box for your box) was designed for the user who wasn't sure where to even start. The boxes included a selection of products curated to specific healthcare needs which allowed users to try out all of their options to figure out what works for them.
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The Dashboard
The long term vision for the company was to build a central dashboard where subscribers could store and manage everything related to their sexual & reproductive healthcare.
Through the dashboard users would be able to store their reproductive health records, save content, access the search concierge, set reminders for preventative healthcare appointments and keep track of questions / products the subscriber found helpful.