Not offering 'buy now, pay later' is a critically missed opportunity in SaaS and Tech companies. Many customers want your product but can’t pay upfront.
Founded in February 2019 by Joe Brown, DearDoc emerged from a personal challenge to improve his grandfather's dermatology practice. Initially a one-man venture with no paying customers, it has grown into a robust team of over 150 employees. Today, DearDoc serves around 4,500 doctor's offices and engages with approximately 55,000 patients daily.
The journey began in early 2018, driven by the need for a HIPAA-compliant AI chat solution for healthcare. Joe's innovative AI chatbot, created to automate patient inquiries and integrate seamlessly with medical records, revolutionized patient engagement, scheduling numerous appointments even during off-hours.
From its inception as a simple AI chat product, DearDoc has evolved into a comprehensive practice growth platform, empowering thousands of doctors to enhance patient conversions, improve retention, and streamline practice efficiency.
As a technology company based in New York, DearDoc initially funded its growth by requiring customers to pay annually upfront. Driven by its zeal to make extraordinary efforts to achieve extraordinary results, the team challenged the status quo and hypothesized that offering a monthly payment option while still requiring an annual commitment might improve customer acquisition and retention.
To test this theory, two sales representatives offered the monthly payment option over a few months. The results were significant—both reps increased their new ARR by over 200% simply by allowing customers to pay monthly. The results highlighted that forcing annual upfront payments was potentially limiting DearDoc's growth.
However, as a company, DearDoc couldn't immediately shift the entire sales team to this model without ensuring sufficient capital to sustain the transition. Moreover, during the testing, the team discovered that some customers might not complete their payments due to various unforeseen issues.
These findings compelled DearDoc to explore different solutions, allowing them to offer flexible payment options while maintaining financial stability.
Integration of a BNPL solution translates to growth only if the team behind it is exceptional. Of all the options we considered, Ratio was the quickest, sharpest, and most effective in solving challenges.
In its quest to find a payment solution that could balance customer flexibility with upfront capital needs, DearDoc stumbled upon Ratio’s website and discovered Ratio Boost—a robust B2B BNPL (Buy Now, Pay Later) solution specifically built for SaaS and technology companies–exactly what DearDoc was looking for.
After the profound discovery, DearDoc began integrating Ratio Boost. Thanks to the dedicated support from the Ratio team, the integration of Ratio Boost at DearDoc was a seamless process. Despite the challenge of changing established workflows for a large sales team of 50 reps, Ratio Boost was smoothly integrated into DearDoc’s existing systems, including their Salesforce CRM.
Besides facilitating BNPL, Ratio Boost also addressed the risk of customer defaults on monthly payments for annual contracts. Its AI-driven underwriting evaluates customer viability. If a customer isn’t approved, DearDoc’s sales team reassesses the deal and often secures upfront annual payment, mitigating risk and ensuring commitment.
Overall, Ratio Boost’s integration laid the foundation for measurable improvements across various sales metrics at DearDoc.
Integrating Ratio Boost has significantly transformed DearDoc's operations, driving notable growth in sales, improving sales efficiency, and uplifting team morale.
The introduction of flexible monthly payment options has resulted in:
The sales cycle has also been drastically shortened, with calls that previously took several days now averaging just 30 to 45 minutes. This newfound efficiency has allowed the sales team to focus on closing more deals and booking additional meetings.
An unexpected advantage of Ratio Boost has been the consolidation of multiple processes—such as proposal creation, agreement management, payment collection, and contract signing—into a single platform. Previously, DearDoc relied on a cumbersome, multi-step process involving Stripe, Braintree, PandaDoc, DocuSign, and other tools. This fragmented approach often caused friction, delayed deal closures, and led to lost opportunities. Ratio Boost has replaced all these tools, allowing reps to share a single payment link via email or Zoom chat, enabling customers to comfortably enter their credit card information and sign the agreement on the spot.
Over six months of using Ratio Boost, DearDoc has not lost a single deal because of the fragmented sales process. In fact, the streamlined process has led to a 10% increase in closed deals.
Ratio Boost has proven to be more than just a sales tool; it has reduced sales cycles, increased deal velocity, and streamlined the entire sales process, positioning DearDoc for sustained growth—and 3x sales this year alone.
Ratio Boost is not just a BNPL solution; it's a complete game-changer for our sales process. The impact has been extraordinary, and we're just getting started.
As DearDoc continues to experience the benefits of Ratio Boost, the future looks even more promising with the upcoming innovations.
Ratio is set to introduce Ratio Copilot, an AI-driven tool designed to optimize pricing and packaging recommendations based on historical data and customer demographics. Sales reps can use these data-driven recommendations to create compelling offers and ensure that each customer receives the best package for their needs. The ability to match customers with suitable offerings will boost conversions and strengthen customer relationships, leading to long-term growth for SaaS and technology companies.
It enables businesses to offer flexible payment options to their customers while receiving the full contract value upfront. The platform seamlessly integrates with existing CRM systems, providing an all-in-one solution for managing proposals, payments, and agreements. This reduces friction in the sales process and accelerates business growth.
Led by experienced tech entrepreneurs and experts in SaaS and finance, Ratio enables SaaS and technology companies to leverage recurring revenues for new financing without diluting equity or losing control by offering two products:
With a $400 million credit facility, Ratio redefines the global subscription economy.
