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Highlights
From First Customer to Fortune 500: Inside Gradient Health’s Unconventional Go-to-Market Journey
“Starting early, right. So just like the way we got started was we took orders first and then went and found the data later,” explains Joshua Miller in a recent episode of Category Visionaries. As founder of Gradient Health, a company that provides medical imaging data for AI development, his perspective challenges conventional startup wisdom about product readiness.
For founders caught in endless development cycles, Joshua’s three-month timeline from idea to first sale offers a provocative counterpoint: “If you’re considering starting a startup right now and you can’t reach a sellable MVP in three months, you probably need to pare down your vision a little bit more.”
This aggressive timeline emerged from an unexpected source – his co-founder repeatedly falling down to generate training data for their initial fall-detection product idea. But rather than perfect that solution, they recognized a larger opportunity in the medical data access problem itself.
The key to landing their first enterprise customer wasn’t a polished product – it was leveraging relationships. An angel investor from Venture South connected them with Cone Health, giving them the critical first reference customer. “That’s kind of how it works for healthcare startups,” Joshua notes. “You find one institution that’s willing to take a chance on you, and then you kind of build up that momentum.”
Today, Gradient Health’s go-to-market motion looks radically different. “Almost 50% of our go to market is inbound leads,” Joshua reveals. “We have Fortune 500 companies sending us emails. Gradient is a 15 person company. It’s kind of unheard of in the startup world.”
This inbound success stems from two factors. First, they’re solving what Joshua calls “an acute problem” – when companies desperately need medical imaging data for AI development, they actively search for solutions. Second, they’ve invested heavily in LinkedIn marketing and strategic announcements.
The other 50% comes from targeted outbound, watching for regulatory filings that signal companies need training data for their AI models. But Joshua emphasizes that competition isn’t their biggest challenge: “Startups are very rarely competing against their competitors, and they’re more so competing against their own politics and outside forces, like their market.”
Recently, Gradient Health launched a self-service platform, gaining over 130 users in just 30 days. While self-service isn’t common in healthcare, Joshua acknowledges a practical reality: “The way our venture capital market kind of functions is most folks are going to expect you to have a SaaS product where people are signing up and they’re paying a monthly fee.”
For founders mapping their own go-to-market strategy, Joshua advocates for flexibility within a clear long-term vision: “I think you should have a seven year vision, but be flexible in its execution, meaning you should have a long term vision, but you should always expect that something unexpected will come when you’re starting a company.”
His vision for Gradient Health? “For anyone who is trying to do something good for humanity with medical AI gets the data they need within 24 hours for reasonable.” It’s a vision that’s already attracting Fortune 500 attention – not bad for a company that started with someone deliberately falling down.
Actionable
Takeaways
Embrace the Emotional Journey:
Josh’s candid discussion about the need for therapy for founders highlights the often-overlooked emotional roller coaster of entrepreneurship. Founders should prioritize mental health and seek support networks or professional help to navigate the stresses of startup life.
Leverage Cross-Industry Insights:
Josh’s transition from agricultural tech to medical imaging underscores the value of applying solutions from one industry to solve problems in another. Founders should stay open to cross-pollinating ideas across different fields to uncover unique solutions.
Prepare for Post-Acquisition Changes:
The shift from a startup to being part of a large corporation can be drastic. Founders should anticipate and plan for cultural and operational adjustments post-acquisition, maintaining flexibility and openness to new ways of working.
Validate the Market Early:
Josh emphasizes the importance of starting with the problem and seeking early validation. Before fully building out a product, founders should engage potential customers to confirm the demand, potentially adjusting their vision based on feedback.
Validate the Market Early:
Josh emphasizes the importance of starting with the problem and seeking early validation. Before fully building out a product, founders should engage potential customers to confirm the demand, potentially adjusting their vision based on feedback.
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