Remedi.es is not just a clever name, but a much-needed service in eHealth, focused on Homeopathy. Here we interview their Steve Odom:
1. What is Remedi.es?
ANSWER: I am describing Remedi.es as a wikipedia for homeopathy.
Ultimately, its purpose is to help patients easily find information on homeopathy and its remedies. All information on the site is contributed and edited by homeopathic practitioners and patients. It is designed to be a starting point to find the right homeopathic remedies for a patient's particular symptoms.
As an example, if someone has a cough, users have built this page that will help point the person to the right homeopathic remedy for their cough:
http://www.remedi.es/symptoms/94-cough
2. Explain the unique URL?
The .es is the top level domain for Spain. Remedies.com was already taken by a squatter so it forced me to be creative!
3. When did you launch, what was the impetus to launch Remedi.es, and who is behind it?
From a technical standpoint, Remedi.es is a one-man shop. Me. I am building Remedi.es because I was not happy with existing online homeopathic resources. I wanted something to help me better treat my son for the simple ailments, like the colds and earaches, he brings home.
The impetus was my dog was diagnosed with non-curable cancer several years ago. She was given 4-6 weeks to live and there were no conventional treatment options. I was not prepared to not try something, so we went to a homeopath. While homeopathy did not cure her cancer, it did extend her life (to 5 months) and it made her more comfortable. I saw definite changes in her and responses to the different remedies given. I became a believer.
Homeopathy is nuanced. You do not treat the specific symptoms, but rather the entirety of symptoms and personality quirks. To find the right remedy takes some research. In this way, homeopathy lends itself for web 2.0. Pull contributions from many different sources and users. Provide ranking tools to help the good information rise to the top. Allow users to interact with others for information (and socially). Out of the mix, you get a organic, dynamic generated homeopathic resource with users sharing and organizing information.
4. How is the traffic to date, and what plans do you have going forward?
Your previous question asked about the launch date. "Launch" implies more than simply putting the site out there and telling a few people, which is all that I have done. I posted an announcement in a couple of homeopathic news groups in mid-January. Traffic is minimal. I have focused letting the expert homeopaths know about it, rather than the general population, so the experts can add more content to the site.
We have over 1,000 symptoms and 60 or so remedies thus far. It has all the most popular, most-often used remedies, but we still have a ways to go on adding all the remedies.
5. How will you monetize the property?
I built the site to satisfy a problem that I had: easily getting quality homeopathic information to treat my son. I am very pleased with how that has turned out. To that end, it is already a success.
I am running the site entirely on Amazon Web Services, so at this level of traffic, it is not costing me much to run the site. I do not depend on the site for living expenses, either, so monetization is not a near-term goal or requirement.
My goal is to listen to what people what from the site and then quickly iterate. Then listen and iterate again. Being a one-person shop I can do that easily, while at the same time being constrained from doing too much where I get away from the simple stuff. I am confident that if I do that over and over, monetization opportunities will present themselves.
6. Do you seek partners? If so, what type?
Not really, but am open to ideas.
Online Health/PHR/EMR companies in our wiki; the entire list is here. Should we be covering your company? Email us at mattc [@] marketintellnow.com.
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