How Exact Sciences’ out-of-the-box thinking convinced Americans to try Cologuard’s colorectal cancer screening test

What do an an­i­mat­ed card­board box, a fa­mous­ly re­lat­able celebri­ty jour­nal­ist and the PGA Tour have in com­mon? They’re all part of Ex­act Sci­ences’ mar­ket­ing strat­e­gy for its col­orec­tal screen­ing test Co­lo­guard.

The well-en­trenched colonoscopy test is the “gold stan­dard” of col­orec­tal can­cer screen­ing, and ex­ec­u­tives at Ex­act Sci­ences knew from the be­gin­ning that they would have to break the mar­ket­ing mold to gain trac­tion in the mar­ket. Co­lo­guard is not as in­va­sive as a colonoscopy, but its very dif­fer­ent modal­i­ty — col­lect­ing and send­ing a stool sam­ple through the mail — called for a new way of think­ing.

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