Katie Jacobs Stanton & Wendy McKennon
CMO at Color. Previously at Twitter, The White House, Google & Yahoo. Head of Product and Design.
Discussion
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Katie Jacobs Stanton
@katies
Hi Product Hunt! – I’m Katie Jacobs Stanton, Chief Marketing Officer at Color Genomics, and I’m also joined by Wendy McKennon, our Head of Product and Design.
It’s been a great year at Color. We expanded our Color Test to cover eight of the most common hereditary cancers for both men and women, and we made the test available in more than 150 countries.
This fall, we secured $45M in new funding, and we continue to partner with top cancer research teams and clinics across the country on breakthrough genetic studies. We’re growing fast and making incredible additions to our team and board of directors.
Thanks for joining us!
Katie & Wendy
@KatieS @wendywowie
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Jared Volpe
@plainspace · founder - Niko https://www.getniko.com/
Hi Katie, thanks for doing this Chat! Going back to your Google Moderator days, it sounds like your experience really took your career in an awesome direction. I worked at companies that used Moderator for employee engagement and the effect of making people feel safe, like they belong, and like their voices are heard is pretty remarkable. When Moderator shut down, there was a minor disturbance in the force (in Silicon Valley at least 😉.)
I was inspired by Moderator, so I built a web/Slack app called Niko (https://www.getniko.com/) that makes it easy for employees to share what is on their mind by letting them submit, vote on, and respond to questions, ideas, and suggestions.
Will you share some insights from building Moderator? I’m particularly interested in getting buy-in from leaders and managers, keeping people engaged day-to-day, and scaling.
Thanks again!
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Katie Jacobs Stanton
@katies
@plainspace Hi Jared! Thanks for the note on Google Moderator. It was such a fun product to build. I think the main way we got buy-in from our exec team was that they used the product internally for years. We built Moderator (internally known as Dory) to help prioritize questions at TGIF. It was a useful tool for Googlers and we wanted to make it more widely available to our customers. Niko sounds great - I will definitely check it out!
Austin Sandmeyer
@as_austin · Thinker/Student/Rockstar
Hey Katie! I'm super excited that you are doing a product hunt live discussion. I'd love to know how you see the shift in consumer perception towards more medical and health-based tech as well as where you see that go in the future. What are the largest barriers for consumers that you see in the marketplace for both these fields as well as for Color.
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Katie Jacobs Stanton
@katies
@as_austin This is such a great question. @Wendywowie and I were just discussing live. She has been at Color for 3 years (vs my 3 months) so I'm going to let her answer that!
@as_austin Hey Austin - Wendy here (sorry Katie ;))! Regarding shifts in perception in the medical and health fields, I think the biggest one is people understanding they have options. Historically, all things medical have been targeted only at providers and have been full of very technical language. They've also been prohibitively expensive.
Using Color as an example, the costs of sequencing are coming down so much that genetic testing should be more broadly available - not just limited to those with insurance that will cover it or who can afford to pay thousands of dollar out of pocket. It is also really important that consumers and providers without super-specific subject matter expertise can make informed decisions about using a product, and that they can understand the results and know what to do with them.
Callum Gibson Durr
@callum_gd · Account Manager, Bite
Hi Katie, Wendy!
My question is for @Wendy – what were some of the design considerations that went into creating the Color Test packaging and experience? Were there any unique/unforeseen challenges you encountered along the way?
Thanks!
Callum
@callum_gd @wendy Great question Callum! Our top priority is always providing an easy, clear experience for our clients and providers, from deciding to use the Color Test, to providing a saliva sample at home, to receiving and making use of your results. For packaging specifically, we needed to balance making the process of providing a sample fool-proof, while still true to our approachable, beautiful brand. Even small things make a difference, like the verbiage used on the packaging.
Sarim Haq
@sarim_haq · AI Whisperer @ caspy.com
Hey Katie, how would you get cash-strapped 20 somethings to pay $249 for a product that might not benefit them in the near future? Would you consider to offer something extra like the service offered by 23&me to incentivize millennials to convert?
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Katie Jacobs Stanton
@katies
@sarim_haq Hi Sarim, Awesome question. We have partnered with a number of companies that offer the Color Test to employees including millennial-epicenters such as Snap, Instacart and Medium. This program empowers employees to be proactive about their health and it puts employers at the forefront of benefits programs. In addition, Buzzfeed just produced a video showing a number of young adults who took the Color Test and why it was so beneficial. The participants talked about the importance of taking control of their health care.
Gregg Spiridellis
@gregg_spiridellis
Katie -- You have had such an incredible variety of professional experiences. What are the consistent themes you have seen across Yahoo, Google, Twitter and now Color?
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Katie Jacobs Stanton
@katies
@jibjabceo The consistent thread is the democratization of information. At Yahoo, we built Yahoo Finance to make it easier for all investors to have access to financial information. At Google, the mission was (and remains) organizing the world's information and making it universally accessible and useful. At Twitter, we empowered people with an easy ability to create and share ideas and information instantly. And at Color, it's making genetic testing more widely accessible to people so they can develop personalized health plans with their health care providers. Color offers the most affordable, clinical-grade genetic test so people can know their risk of developing hereditary cancer. The Color Test is $249 compared to thousands of dollars from other companies. There's nothing more important than our health and I'm really proud to work at a company to help more people live longer, healthier lives based on having access to more information!
Nick Spiridellis
@nspiridellis · CEO, RealPhoneValidation
@katies @jibjabceo Does the Color Test require a physicians prescription?
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Katie Jacobs Stanton
@katies
@jibjabceo I would also add that Yahoo, Google, Twitter help us organize and access information on the outside: stock quotes, search results, Tweets, maps, etc.. Color helps unlock the information *inside* of us which is the most important dataset of them all!
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Katie Jacobs Stanton
@katies
@nspiridellis Hi Nick! Great question. All Color Tests are ordered by a physician—either your own or an independent physician who will review your information and can order testing on your behalf.
Nick Spiridellis
@nspiridellis · CEO, RealPhoneValidation
@katies @jibjabceo Do you see a time when Color Test will be available at your local pharmacy, mail ordered or off your website?
Emily Hodgins
@ems_hodge · Community and Marketing, Product Hunt
Hi Katie and Wendy, thanks for joining us today! What have been some of the biggest challenges you've had to overcome with Color and how did you overcome them?
@ems_hodge Hey Emily - thanks for having us! Regarding challenges, I'd say the one of the biggest has been launching a product in a space that didn't exist. More specifically, genetic testing was clearly being done before Color came along. But no one was looking at it deeply from the individual consumer's perspective, and thinking about affordability, ease of use, and clarity of results.
The key to overcoming this has been in talking to many healthcare providers, patients, and advocates. Through this, we identified process improvements (beyond the huge price improvement we made) that make it easier for people to learn about and utilize genetic testing. If you can create a great experience and product that provides value, and then listen to the folks using your product and make adjustments as needed, creating something new is more surmountable.
Ben Tossell
@bentossell · Community Lead, Product Hunt
Quite the background!
From your journey, what are some of the most important lessons you have learnt?
Ben Tossell
@bentossell · Community Lead, Product Hunt
If you had to swap lives with a tech CEO for a week, who would it be and why?
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Katie Jacobs Stanton
@katies
@bentossell Hi Ben, There are 3 tech CEOs I really admire. Marc Benioff and Mark Zuckerberg have both done incredible work building high impact products and investing in science and medicine. I also have profound respect for Sukhinder Singh Cassidy, CEO of Joyus and the Boardlist. Sukhinder is one of the smartest executives I know and if swapping lives for a week also means I get to raid her stylish closet, that would be amazing. :)
Narendra Rocherolle
@narendra · CEO, Peck, Inc.
Do you have a favorite funny moment from working at Twitter?
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Katie Jacobs Stanton
@katies
@narendra Hi Narendra! One of the funniest moments was when we met Mayor Boris Johnson of London in his office. He asked us if there was going to be a movie about Twitter similar to the Social Network movie about Facebook. We said we didn't know but that would be fun and perhaps this meeting could be a scene. I asked him who would play him in the movie and he paused and said, "Brad Pitt of course". (Feel free to do an image search of Mayor Boris). :)