A partner channel, built from nothing
The operating cases below came from building business development and partnerships for a Nigerian telehealth company in Lagos.
What I built
Problems I was handed, what I did about them, and the systems that came out of it.
The Metric That Was Measuring the Wrong Thing
Three weeks into building a Nigerian telehealth company's field team, signed partners were not converting into paying customers. This is the account of finding out why the number everyone was tracking told them nothing, and rebuilding pay and targets around the one that did.
Calling the Partner Network We Already Had
A large network of partners at a Nigerian telehealth company had agreed to refer customers. Almost none had. This is the account of the day the field team stopped signing new businesses and started calling the ones it already had, and what that one shift produced against three weeks of acquisition.
The Banner That Didn't Fit the Shop
A single 27 by 40 inch banner was chosen as the standard way to make a telehealth partnership visible in a store. It didn't fit half the stores it was made for. This is the account of what a materials decision made before the field data existed cost, and the fix once the data arrived.
Turning a Partner's Yes Into Something a Customer Could Actually See
Several partners at a Nigerian telehealth company had agreed, in principle, to refer the service. Almost none of that agreement was visible in how staff or members actually behaved. This is the diagnosis of that gap, and the activation system built to close it.
What Nine Hundred Calls in a Day Actually Proves
A high-volume outreach sprint at a Nigerian telehealth company generated roughly 900 partner calls and 135 leads in a single day. The interesting part isn't the count. It's what has to exist before a number like that means anything.
Building the One Place Partnership Work Went to Be True
With partner activity spread across pharmacies, gyms, salons, estates and workplaces, information fragmented fast at a Nigerian telehealth company. This is the master CRM and reporting layer built to make the whole channel inspectable from one place, without flattening the differences between categories.
Testing a Partner Category Before Betting on It
Before committing real field resource to gyms as a distribution channel for a Nigerian telehealth company, the question was whether the category deserved it. Thirty-five calls answered a narrower question than 'is this a good market' — and that narrower question turned out to be the right one to ask.
Building a Partnerships Department That Did Not Yet Exist
When a Nigerian telehealth company needed a partnerships channel, there was no department to hand the job to. This is the operating system built from nothing: the funnel, the category logic, and the discipline that turned a growth expectation into a manageable commercial function.
How other companies do it
Nigerian health businesses read from the outside: what each one chose to own, and where that choice gets expensive.
What Reliance Health's 2025 Layoffs Reveal About Insurance Distribution
Reliance Health built one of Nigeria's most complete employer-led health insurance distribution systems, then cut over a hundred jobs chasing breakeven. An independent read of its public record asks what that trade-off says about the real cost of multi-country insurance distribution.
DrugStoc and the Cost of Turning Procurement Into Infrastructure
DrugStoc sells Nigerian pharmacies and hospitals a promise that procurement will stop being a source of anxiety. An independent read of its public record shows why that promise gets more expensive to keep as the company grows, not less.
Lifestores and the Limits of Owning the Pharmacy You Sell Software To
Lifestores Healthcare built a retail pharmacy chain before it built a marketplace for other pharmacies. An independent read of its public record asks whether owning the storefront was an advantage or a distraction from the software business it says it wants to be.
mPharma Bet That Owning Inventory Risk Was the Real Product
mPharma finances the stock on partner pharmacy shelves rather than just selling them software. An independent read of its expansion, acquisitions and 2025 leadership change asks whether that bet is now paying off or simply getting bigger.
Things you can use
The scorecards and checklists behind the work. Print them and take them in.
What to fix first when sales stall
Five things to work through in order when a business has real demand and the revenue still is not arriving.
What patient data you can share with a partner
Where the line falls between patient information and ordinary business data, under Nigerian law, with the safe way to ask for what you need.
Find where the money is going missing
Two days of tracing one customer journey end to end, until you can name the exact point where demand stops turning into cash.
A one-page sheet for running a field day
What a field officer checks before leaving, records at each location, and reconciles at the end of the day. Print it and hand it over.
Score a partner before you sign them
Ten weighted questions and a pass mark, to tell a real distribution channel from a logo on a slide before you commit money to it.
Design a pilot that gives you a real answer
One page that forces a bounded question, a number that would change your mind, and a date you agree to stop on.
The work
Decisions, as they were written
The department should be measured by activated locations, not just signed partners. A location should only count once it has produced its first verified order.
The problem is that partner referrals, follow-up, sales and tracking are not well connected. We're losing a lot of leads to poor handoff. Store partners don't use the accounts.
The question will no longer be: how many stores did you acquire? The question will be: how much business did your offline sales activities generate?
We got 135 potential customer contacts, including 65 direct partner referrals. The main learning is that our signed partners can actually help us generate real customer leads, not just remain as signed locations.
The offer works better when we first explain that the business does not need to buy stock, sell medicine, collect payment or handle the customer. [The company] does most of the work.
The N20,000 means more to them than it does to an actual business.
On the clinical side
Work on health products and medical writing, from the years the commercial job grew out of.
Deploy Check
Eight health-AI products pitched for clinics with unreliable power and no specialist on site. You make the call, then see what breaks.
Testing a general model on clinical safety
Drug dosing, red-flag symptoms, crisis response and vague-symptom triage, run against a general-purpose model and scored on a fixed rubric.
A supplement article, checked line by line
A published brand article reviewed for clinical accuracy. Three high-risk interaction omissions found, with corrected language written for each.
Training and appointments
- Best Student in Psychiatry
- Olabisi Onabanjo University, 2023
- Distinction in Obstetrics & Gynaecology
- Olabisi Onabanjo University, 2022
- Top 5, National Essay Award for Medical Students
- OCI Foundation x ASF, 2022
- Vice Regional Coordinator, West Africa
- Federation of African Medical Students' Associations, 2022–23
Say what you need
Writing, speaking, partnerships, or a question about something I published. I read everything that arrives here.
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