Annotations (9)
“Doximity's technology philosophy is 'good enough' rather than best-in-class for each individual tool. They don't need to be the number one telehealth provider or the number one transcriber. As long as doctors can get everything in one place and it's effective, that wins. The platform is the moat, not excellence in any single point solution. A point solution would need to be dramatically better to justify leaving the one-stop shop.”— Jim Jones
Strategy & Decision Making · Technology & Engineering · Business & Entrepreneurship
DUR_ENDURING
Convenience moat beats excellence fragmentation
“Doximity started as a LinkedIn for doctors in 2010, then evolved by adding workflow tools that doctors use daily: digital signing for HIPAA-compliant documents, secure messaging between doctors, telehealth with caller ID management, and CME credit earning through the newsfeed. They took household technologies like DocuSign, Zoom, and Slack and made physician-specific versions on one platform.”— Jim Jones
Business & Entrepreneurship · Strategy & Decision Making · Technology & Engineering
DUR_ENDURING
Platform beats point solutions through aggregation
“The doctor-centric philosophy is not just something Doximity says, it's something they do. They're unapologetically focused on the doctor first, maintaining their time and respecting their time. Products are targeted at increasing doctor productivity. They don't charge doctors because engagement is the number one KPI. The last thing they want is to give doctors a reason to leave the platform.”— Jim Jones
Strategy & Decision Making · Business & Entrepreneurship
DUR_ENDURING
User value proposition drives everything
“Digital advertising in healthcare is only 37% penetrated compared to 75% in most other parts of the economy. The gap exists because pharma has an army of salespeople visiting hospitals, a distribution model most industries abandoned. Doximity benefits from the secular shift, but the shift is slower because pharma can measure ROI on digital: they target specific doctors, then buy third-party prescription data to see who actually wrote the scripts.”— Jim Jones
Economics & Markets · Business & Entrepreneurship
DUR_CONTEXTUAL
Measurement capability drives channel shift
“Doximity operates at 90% gross margins and 55% EBITDA margins because they're just placing ads on their platform to existing eyeballs. As engagement grows, inventory grows, but there's minimal incremental expense to place another ad. The 55% margin structure means they can recycle substantial cash back into R&D without disrupting the margin profile. As top line grows and they take market share, the incremental margins are extremely high, which fuels further growth investment.”— Jim Jones
Business & Entrepreneurship · Economics & Markets
DUR_ENDURING
High margins fund reinvestment at scale
“Doximity's valuation approach focuses on cash flows, not price-to-sales multiples. Price-to-sales multiples were invented for companies with no earnings, just a way to get your arms around what could be. But this business already has cash flows. 1% of revenues go back into CapEx. With 90% gross margins and 55% EBITDA margins, you put a multiple on the cash flows based on the expected duration of growth. There's a long secular shift happening, and Doximity is taking share on top of that shift.”— Jim Jones
Business & Entrepreneurship · Economics & Markets
DUR_ENDURING
Cash flows trump revenue multiples
“Doximity shows one ad for every 11 news items in the feed. They use machine learning to filter thousands of daily healthcare articles down to what's relevant to each doctor's specific practice. A radiologist in Milwaukee gets different content than a cardiologist in Boston. This reduces information overload, what they call 'cutting the scut,' letting doctors get through updates quickly. The engagement on curated content is what creates the advertising inventory.”— Jim Jones
Technology & Engineering · Business & Entrepreneurship
DUR_ENDURING
Curation creates engagement and inventory
“Doximity runs an annual 36-hour meeting with a board of directors composed of practicing physicians. The entire session is brainstorming: what would be helpful to you, what would increase productivity, what's missing. They throw ideas against the wall and Doximity implements the winners. This physician design partner model keeps them ahead of what doctors want and need, which is the primary risk to engagement.”— Jim Jones
Leadership & Management · Business & Entrepreneurship · Creativity & Innovation
DUR_ENDURING
Annual physician council shapes roadmap
“There's a generational shift happening with doctors: increasingly they're 'no-see doctors' who don't want pharma reps bringing donuts and talking about drugs, or being taken to steak dinners. That's not how this generation prefers to be marketed to. COVID accelerated the trend because hospitals were shut down and reps couldn't visit. But the shift is deeper than pandemic necessity; it's about marketing preferences changing across cohorts.”— Jim Jones
Culture & Society · Economics & Markets
DUR_CONTEXTUAL
No-see doctors reject traditional marketing
Frameworks (2)
Professional Platform Aggregation Strategy
Building moats through workflow integration, not feature superiority
Start with a community foundation (social network for professionals), add workflow tools that solve daily pain points, keep access free to maximize engagement, then monetize through third parties who value access to that engaged audience. The platform wins not by being best-in-class at any single tool, but by being good enough at all of them in one place.
Components
- Build the community foundation
- Add workflow tools that save time
- Keep user access free
- Monetize through third-party access
Prerequisites
- Identifiable professional community with common pain points
- Third parties who would pay to reach that community
- Ability to fund user acquisition before monetization
Success Indicators
- 80%+ market penetration in target profession
- Daily active usage patterns
- Measurable ROI for third-party spenders
- High NPS from professional users
Failure Modes
- Charging users too early and killing engagement
- Adding tools that don't increase stickiness
- Competing on feature excellence instead of convenience
- Targeting too broad a professional audience
Design Partner Council Framework
Structured customer input for product roadmap generation
Run an annual intensive session (24-48 hours) with a board of directors composed of representative customers. Structure it as open-ended brainstorming focused on pain points, productivity needs, and feature requests. Extract actionable roadmap items and implement the highest-value ideas. Repeat annually to stay ahead of customer needs.
Components
- Select representative design partners
- Frame the session around pain and productivity
- Capture everything, prioritize later
- Implement and close the loop
Prerequisites
- Engaged customer base willing to invest time
- Internal buy-in to implement customer input
- Budget for travel and facilitation
Success Indicators
- 80%+ attendance at annual sessions
- Measurable increase in feature adoption from implemented ideas
- Qualitative feedback that customers feel heard
Failure Modes
- Selecting unrepresentative customers
- Treating it as a sales event instead of discovery
- Failing to implement anything and losing credibility
Mental Models (5)
Switching Costs and Lock-In
Strategic ThinkingOnce customers integrate a product into their daily workflow, the friction of switching to an altern
In Practice: Doximity's 'good enough' philosophy and platform aggregation strategy demonstrate switching costs in
Demonstrated by Leg-jj-001
Opportunity Cost
EconomicsThe true cost of any choice includes what you give up by not choosing the next-best alternative. Pharma's shift from sales reps to digital advertising is driven by opportunity cost.
In Practice: ROI-driven channel shift and capital allocation discussions
Demonstrated by Leg-jj-001
Network Effects
MathematicsA product or service becomes more valuable as more people use it. The value to e
In Practice: Platform growth dynamics and engagement-driven inventory expansion
Demonstrated by Leg-jj-001
Inversion
Decision MakingInstead of asking how to succeed, ask how you would fail, then avoid those things. In product development, invert the question from 'what features should we build?' to 'what would cause doctors to leave the platform?', then systematically address those risks. This shifts focus to preventing failure rather than optimizing for success.
In Practice: Doximity's focus on not giving doctors a reason to leave, rather than optimizing individual features
Demonstrated by Leg-jj-001
Generational Shifts
TimePreferences, behaviors, and norms change as new cohorts replace older ones. Thes
In Practice: No-see doctors representing generational shift away from traditional pharma sale
Demonstrated by Leg-jj-001
Connective Tissue (2)
Bloomberg Terminal for financial professionals
Doximity follows the Bloomberg Terminal model: create a platform that professionals use all day for workflows (market data, messaging, analytics for Bloomberg; CME credits, telehealth, document signing for Doximity), then monetize through third parties who need access to that audience. Bloomberg sells terminal subscriptions but also advertising and data; Doximity inverts it with free user access and advertiser revenue. Both recognize that being embedded in daily workflow creates the moat, not feature superiority in any individual tool.
Jim Jones explicitly compared Doximity to Bloomberg: 'To the investor, it would be like a Bloomberg or a FactSet that you're just on all the time'
Facebook's attention-to-advertiser model
Doximity parallels Facebook's core insight: if you know exactly who someone is (radiologist in Milwaukee vs. college student in Boston), advertisers will pay premium rates for targeted access. Facebook monetizes social identity; Doximity monetizes professional identity. Both platforms are free to users because engagement creates inventory value. The difference is precision: doctors explicitly declare specialty and location, eliminating the algorithmic guesswork Facebook requires. This makes ROI attribution cleaner and accelerates advertiser budget allocation.
Jim Jones stated: 'To the advertiser, it's more like a Facebook because doctors will tell you who they are. I'm a radiologist in Milwaukee. Then advertisers know exactly who they're targeting'
Key Figures (1)
Jeff Tangney
3 mentionsCEO and Co-founder of Doximity
Founded Doximity in 2010 after previously founding Epocrates.
- Founded Epocrates in late 1990s giving him deep domain expertise in physician workflows
Glossary (1)
scut
DOMAIN_JARGONMedical slang for tedious, menial tasks that consume time without adding significant value
“They call it cutting the scut, just sort of enables doctors to get through that stuff quickly.”
Concepts (4)
Platform business model
CL_STRATEGYA business that creates value by facilitating exchanges between two or more interdependent groups
Attribution
CL_STRATEGYProcess of determining which marketing actions led to a specific customer behavior
Switching costs
CL_ECONOMICSCosts a customer incurs when changing products, creating competitive advantage for incumbents
Price-to-sales multiple
CL_FINANCIALValuation ratio comparing stock price to revenue per share
Synthesis
Synthesis
Migrated from Scholia