Figur8’s B2B Sales Evolution: How They Went from Founder-Led Sales to Scale

“If you don’t have to be in a sales call, you have a company.” This mentor’s advice became a crucial milestone for Figur8 founder Nan-Wei Gong. In a recent episode of Category Visionaries, she revealed how her company made the challenging transition from founder-led sales to a scalable commercial operation.

Starting With Detective Work

Before building a sales team, Nan-Wei took an unusual first step: she paid to observe a physical therapy clinic’s operations. “I just went to a physical therapy clinic that is friendly and said that, can I pay you whatever you make for 3 hours and just watch how money flow,” she explains.

This “detective work” revealed crucial insights about their market’s complexity: “I learned that there are different types of payers, I learned at different types of patients and I learned their frustration of not knowing how much they will get paid, the frustration of not being able to tell the patient what’s happening, the frustration of faxing the data to the payers.”

Understanding the Real Buyers

This research challenged a fundamental assumption many tech founders make. “It’s very easy for a technology founder like myself to think that the doctors are the buyers and they are just not,” Nan-Wei shares. This insight proved crucial for building their commercial strategy.

The company identified three key stakeholders – payers, providers, and patients – each requiring different approaches. “Everyone needs something different,” Nan-Wei notes. “And how do we align incentive and really understand how information flows and how money flows, where we stand within those three parties so that we reduce as much friction as possible.”

Building the Commercial Team

With this understanding, Figur8 began building their commercial team, starting with finding the right commercial lead. Their approach was methodical: “We hired a commercial lead, Scott Sexton through really is a LinkedIn outreach and started pitching the business.”

The key wasn’t just finding someone with sales experience – it was finding someone who deeply understood the industry’s problems. As Nan-Wei explains, “When you build a product and then you find someone that is a sales leader in an industry for like 30 years, when they are willing to quit their jobs and join your company, that means you’re solving a big problem for their industry.”

Reducing Market Friction

Instead of focusing solely on product features, Figur8’s commercial team concentrated on reducing friction in the healthcare system. “We take a lot of these education to the providers and for their payers insurance companies to our own hands,” Nan-Wei shares. This comprehensive approach helped them overcome the healthcare industry’s traditional resistance to new technology.

The strategy worked because they understood a crucial truth about healthcare sales: “The only technology in a clinic that you see is a fax machine. But we have been successful because first we have very strong, like the team knowledge about how healthcare works.”

Beyond Hardware Sales

A critical element of their success was moving beyond simple hardware sales. “We definitely did not stop at the hardware sales level,” Nan-Wei emphasizes. The company built a complete solution that addressed the entire workflow, from assessment to insurance communication.

Reaching the Milestone

Today, Figur8 operates in 15 states with multiple physical therapy clinics. But perhaps the most telling sign of their successful transition is that Nan-Wei is no longer involved in sales calls – the milestone her mentor identified as having “a real company.”

For B2B founders looking to make a similar transition, Figur8’s journey offers valuable lessons: understand your market’s complexities before building your sales team, focus on solving fundamental industry problems, and build a comprehensive solution that addresses all stakeholder needs.

The key isn’t just hiring salespeople – it’s building a commercial team that understands how to navigate your industry’s unique challenges and can turn that understanding into sustainable growth.