"The investor pitch that iF created was instrumental in helping us to meet our initial fundraise targets." –Johan Bjorklund, Co-Founder
Screening for and identifying behavioral health issues is a process burdened by strained resources and limited reliable insights. Despite strides in research and clinical practice, the screening process for behavioral illness is often riddled with inconsistent signals and can be vulnerable to unconscious biases. The COVID-19 pandemic compounded these strains: cases of depression and anxiety rose drastically while clinicians were forced to adapt to new norms and challenges to deliver care. Enter aiberry: a mental health screening platform based on over 15 years of research that delivers evidence-based insights virtually (in telehealth scenarios) and at the point of care, offering unique outreach and scale opportunities. The result is a more equitable mental health screening, leveraging the power of AI to combat unconscious biases and stigmas to improve the screening process for all patients, while increasing the capacity of health providers to do their job.
Despite their vision, technological innovation, and potential impact, aiberry recognized they needed to communicate their complex product in a crisp and compelling story, and determine their best target audience: were their main clients medical professionals and clinics, or every-day consumers looking to have better access to more accurate mental health screenings? They still weren’t sure, but suspected the implications could be significant for their messaging. As a relatively new company, they knew the next few years would be critical to establishing their story and their market. That’s when they contacted iF-- past collaboration had attracted them to our UX work, our expertise in product strategy and design, our unique approach to market landscaping, and our storytelling.
As we saw it, aiberry didn’t have an innovation problem, or an impact problem: they had a storytelling problem-- how to translate details about highly technical and complex AI platform into a consistent and tangible narrative. We wanted to help aiberry think critically not just about the technology they had built, but to reflect on the kind of future they wanted to build, and their beliefs and values around mental health. The tech was impressive, but as we got further into the process, we realized AI was just a means to an end, and the real story was really about helping connect people with the resources they need, regardless of identity.
To help aiberry establish themselves an emerging leader in the AI healthcare space and gather the resources necessary to achieve their goals, we created a set of assets for them that would make it easy for the aiberry team to share their product with their audiences, and communicate their unique value proposition to Investors and potential customers alike while also maintaining a consistent brand image across platforms. While the tangible, end-deliverable was important, the journey was just as valuable to the aiberry team, as we provided them with the resources, the guidance, and the space to sharpen their purpose and clarify their brand.
In developing the pitch, the iF team and aiberry considered key components of the platform's value proposition: audience, need, offering, differentiation, and promise. To get crisp on an image and story that was both unique and true to aiberry, we followed a tried-and-true iF process:
By the end of our process, the aiberry team was equipped with the resources and framework necessary to engage the market, tell their story and launch consistent visual branding. Throughout this process we focused on communicating the aiberry product with integrity and clarity, while emphasizing their central story of increasing access to unbiased mental wellbeing for the people who really need it.
Like so many great start-ups, aiberry’s mission of transforming behavioral healthcare will only be realized with the assistance of investors and thought partnership. Through our presentation and thought collaboration, the team at aiberry was able to orient their product and goals to a consistent and actionable message that could be communicated via multiple platforms. The aiberry team left their partnership with iF prepared to reach their investment goal designated for research, infrastructure, SG&A and product R&D. Assets from our collaboration are being used on aiberry’s website and as pitch materials for investors. Not only is our work highlighting the innovative and groundbreaking work aiberry is doing in the mental well-being space, but there are positive impacts from the process alone of research/clinical trials (ASU, Georgetown) that will stand to benefit those suffering from depression and anxiety for years to come. aiberry plans to use the investments they raise primarily to fund depression clinical trials, develop their platform, and build out their team-- we’re excited and humbled that our work is being used to advance the future of mental wellbeing and making it available and equitable for all. We took aiberry’s messaging from a complicated, tech-heavy narrative to a people-centered story about supporting everyone in their journey to mental health and wellness.
