Estimated reading time: 8 Min
Benigno Pérez is the head of operations at Sofía, a private app: it's health insurance for which the most important metric is not how much you earn, but how much the health of its members improves.
An approach to her business model confirms that Sofía truly believes that health comes first: the app is designed so that you can pre-emptively consult and avoid incurring major health problems that end up being very strong economic shocks for people. Sofía pursues a symbiotic relationship that is rare in the insurance world: your health is your profitability, and that's why she doesn't squeeze her users out of unnecessary medical treatments, as is often the case in the industry.
In addition, for Sofía, keeping its partners - that's what she calls users - healthy means keeping the business running efficiently. It's a win-win. But you're probably wondering: And what does Cubbo have to do with a health insurance app? Well, Sofía is also exceptional in the way she relates to her partners and Cubbo has become her main ally in carrying out her philosophy and message. This is her story!
How was Sofia born?
Benign: I'm not one of the founders of Sofia but I can tell you a little bit about the story as I know it: they are three founders: Arturo, Manuel and Sebastian. They know each other from the University where they studied applied mathematics and after that each one went to different places to study master's degrees in statistics.
They are very technical people. Arturo worked in a private equity fund called Index Ventures, then Sebastián worked at Google for several years working on the product on the technical side and Manuel went to work at Patreon, there he spent several years and that's where he learned the subject of coding.
Arturo, among the companies he saw at work, realized that there was a great opportunity in the world of health in Mexico, because here the health industry is quite broken and the quality of services is less than excellent. So it was that Arturo invited Manuel and Sebastian to join the project and that's how Sofía was born.
At the company level, how could we understand Sofia?
Benign: Sofía seeks to have a real positive impact on the health of Mexicans and does so through an insurance format. Here, the issue of how the healthcare industry aligns its incentives is key. In Mexico, the health industry has the incentive to treat you a lot, to charge you a lot. This means that there are often treatments that are not necessary.
As insurance, we have the incentives aligned with the patient: if the patient is better and receives the treatments he really needs, the company also executes the medical actions and the costs that are truly necessary.
This is Sofia's great achievement at the concept level: Our interests as a company and the interests of our customers, of patients, are the same. I don't want you to have a thousand different treatments to keep making money, as sometimes a private clinic would. We want things to be done right the first time. Sofía was born out of the need to improve the way people take care of their health.
Also read: Cherish, discreet, on-time and perfect deliveries
At the product level, is Sofia an application?
Benign: It's an app, yes. That's how you use your health services. But technically it's a healthcare company. We are a digital insurance startup, but the health part is more important to us.
How is that?
Benign: Our approach is not the issue of insurance, that is the instrument: if you have a health problem, insurance will help you to avoid that becoming an economic problem as well. But it's more important for us to be involved with you in your daily health journey. If you have a flu, we want to be there with you in that flu. We want to avoid, prevent and always keep you at your best and in good health. And it's logical, because I repeat, our incentives are aligned with yours: you want to have good health and a good quality of life and we want you to have it because that also makes our business profitable and viable. It's a symbiotic relationship.
We focus a lot, for example, on prevention and timely detection issues. This, again, is also what professionals constantly recommend at a health level: to be attentive to our state of health and to address problems before they become problems.
Do you operate only in Mexico?
Benign: Yes. To operate with Sofia, we had to obtain an insurance license. This is a complex procedure that, on the one hand, is an obstacle for many things, including being able to sell outside of Mexico, because in each country you have to do the equivalent procedure again.
But it is also a barrier to entry that helps us, because not everyone can undertake or work in this industry and to a certain extent, it is very logical that there is this requirement for safety and quality issues within the same industry. In the future, we want to be certified in other countries in the region and continue to expand.
And how has the reception of the Mexican market been?
Benign: Well, look, working on the subject of health and insurance in Mexico is complex for several reasons, first of all, it's a country where people tend to self-medicate a lot, to go to the pharmacy doctor, to ignore their health problems until it's too late, to use all the home remedies you want, so we've had a hard time giving that message of “use Sofía, because it's much better to have a professional, a real doctor, on your phone”.
But once they try it and see the convenience it offers, the immediate convenience of having the doctor there in the palm of your hand, they love it. And that's where we have the most volume of use, in simple things such as a video consultation that the person does with their internal doctors in Sofia.
And then when more complex things such as hospitalizations are coming, we have had exceptional feedback from our partners, that's what we users in Sofia call it, because we really believe that we are partners and work as a team, so the reception has been very good.
How can an insurer be linked to a fulfillment company? How do you get to Cubbo and what is the link?
Benign: One of the things we want to do very differently is to change the way you relate to your insurance. Insurance is usually a purchase you make and if you don't use it, that's good news. It exists, but it's there in the back of your head.
We don't want that. What we want is to be close to you, in your mind constantly so that, whenever you need us, you look for us. And this also allows us to be closer to you in a more proactive way and to be able to help you identify risk factors for your health and recommend options that can help you prevent.
To do this, to generate that link, we believe that a fundamental thing is to send you a welcome kit. Let you see from the start that this is a different relationship, that we are partners and that we are a team to improve your health. Not just something you turn to in an emergency.
Is that welcome kit something that defines them?
Benign: Yes. We don't want to be put in the same lot as traditional insurers. That's why the welcome kit is so important, because it means showing our proactivity right from the start and starting to build that relationship of trust with the partner, so that they can see that this is different.
In addition, this welcome kit brings you immediate satisfaction, it shows you value from the start. And it's not that you're going to find band-aids or aspirin in the welcome kit, no, what we send you is material to welcome you, so that you understand Sofia's philosophy and so that you can get the most out of our services; bring a step tracker, a mask, stickers and other materials designed to make you feel that you are entering a service that matters to you and that wants to be close to you.
We arrived at Cubbo because we had another parcel service and the truth was, it wasn't working, then the number of shipments started to exceed them and one important thing for us was that the shipment worked alone, that we sent the order and we didn't have to do anything else; this didn't happen with the previous parcel company.
So we started looking for alternatives and they recommended Cubbo and another alternative to me. The topic of the recommendation came from my wife who is very involved in the world of startups. And honestly Cubbo seemed exceptional to me because I am an engineer and I am operationally minded, what interested me most was to have an operation that flowed, that worked well and in order, that would be easy for us to integrate.
How was the integration with Cubbo?
Benign: In the first call I had with Cubbo, I came out with the link to test the API, with an account made and the instructions for doing the integration, which was super simple. From that moment on, we began to send them orders, they began to be supplied and everything began to arrive without problems at their destination. That's what we wanted.
In addition, I remember that they opened a channel in Slack with someone from engineering to help me with questions and that made everything very easy.
What would you say is Sofia's big advantage?
Benign: Honestly, we are concerned, first of all, about people's health. In my opinion, large insurers have lost that touch with people's reality. They worry more about “what do I finance you?” than for health. And in Sofia, from the beginning, everything has been done with doctors because the objective here, our metric, is the health of Mexicans. That for me is the most important thing.
Are you looking for an ally that enhances your delivery process, compliance and customer satisfaction? Do not hesitate to contact us, we are the best Fulfillment center for ecommerce in Mexico, Colombia and Brazil, just click Here.
During 2021 in Cubbo:
* Our customers registered savings of 21% in operating costs
* 97.1% of the products received, were processed and were ready to sell In 24 hours.
* We had a 99.7% shipping compliance
* We registered a precision in order preparation of 99.9875%, that is, 1 error for every 8,000 shipments.
* 60% of our deliveries in CDMX were made The same day
* We carry out nationwide deliveries in 1.3 days Average
Just as Sofía found a key ally in logistics to be closer to its customers, your e-commerce can also grow by relying on fulfillment in Mexico City, with fast operations, integrated technology and same-day shipping that enhance the shopping experience.
