Startup Mantra: Helping teens manage their emotions
Pune-based mental wellness startup ThatMate promotes creative narratives and out-of-the-box learning
Adolescence brings with it a myriad of challenges that can shape the trajectory of one’s life. The tumultuous journey from childhood to adulthood is fraught with emotional highs and lows, making it imperative for adolescents to be equipped with the tools to navigate this terrain with resilience and self-awareness. Madhavi Jadhav and Nishant Neeraj founded a mental wellness startup ‘ThatMate,’ which provides a Social-Emotional Learning (SEL) platform for students focussing on mental well-being through engaging content and counselling services.
In the beginning…
An IIT Kharagpur graduate and B Tech Mechanical engineer, Neeraj faced social anxiety as a kid. Jadhav too faced self-esteem issues which affected her personal life a lot as a teenager. Born and raised in Bhilai, Chattisgarh, Jadhav got relocated to Satara, her ancestral town for her secondary education. After completing Petroleum Engineering from MIT, Pune, she did job for 9 years with multinational companies.
Recollecting her early days, Jadhav said, “I used to read a lot of comic books but my mother did not like it. So, I used to buy new books and sell them at half price afterwards and in a way get funds to buy other new books. That was the only entrepreneurial experience or sales and marketing experience I had till my teenage. Neeraj too came from a government-job family and being a techie, he too never had any business experience. We became friends in 2015 and thereafter I used to discuss the mental wellness issues with him. Since Neeraj also suffered social anxiety, he also thought that we should embark on a mission to address these concerns of teenagers.”
First step
Jadhav said, “The trigger event to start something on counselling teenagers and extending a helping hand to them started with my niece approaching me in 2017. She had anxiety, stress and relationship-related issues and shared her feelings with me. I listened to her patiently and since I had myself gone through similar experiences, I did counsel her to overcome it. I got associated with several corporates and their CSR activities through which I got to work in Maharashtra, Goa, and Karnataka. This was a typical NGO approach through which we reached nearly 8,000 students from 80 schools. Also, while doing this work, I realised that the students do not have accessibility and there is a social stigma associated with such issues.”
“Once while discussing these issues with Neeraj, we thought of altering the NGO-style approach to a tech-based or tech-enabled platform. Also, while doing our primary research based on the workshop findings, we realised that several students had questions which were seldomly answered properly. So we decided to start with an interactive chatbot ‘Bolo’ first. Also, to impart knowledge on sensitive topics, we came up with comic books and with a dominantly graphical approach, made these books interesting and readable,” Jadhav added.
Learnings
ThatMate was incorporated in 2019 as a tech company, but before that, it was a non-government organisation working on sexual and mental wellness awareness creation among teenagers.
Jadhav said, “As an NGO, we had assessed 8,000 boys and girls from tier 2 and tier 3 cities like Satara, Sangli, Kolhapur from Maharashtra and some from Goa and Karnataka. However, being a non-profit organisation heavily dependent on corporate social responsibility mandates and funding, we could always work where we wanted to and we felt there were restrictions on us. Also, as an NGO, raising funds is difficult. We could have taken 10 years to reach the stage where we are present.”
“While working with teenagers, we used to gather feedback about what kind of content they liked, which part of content and messaging should be improvised, and we also captured the reactions of these users. Some users also suggested topics and how to present those topics,” stated Jadhav.
Further adding, “We were surprised with some of the insights we got during our initial days. One such example was about imparting knowledge and information about menstrual cycles and hygiene and we found out that boys are equally interested in knowing about this topic as girls were. Also, users from rural areas were quite resilient. However, they witnessed or watched domestic violence happening around them and did not value education much. So, we decided to provide personalised content for rural and urban location-based students.”
Prototype
The prototype platform of ThatMate was ready in 2020. The first version of the app was launched with basic features and it was relaunched soon.
Neeraj said, “We had the school-connect in place and with some tie-ups, we got 10 thousand boys and girls in just 3 months to start using our platform. This was a B2C approach and later we realised that the government sector should not be neglected. So, we decided to focus on the B2G model. Mental health startups are usually not supported. But we raised funds under the central government’s TIDE scheme and some angel investors and Villgro. Participation in accelerator programs helped us create a business model and revenue model and a lot of people supported us in our journey.”
Market Fit
Jadhav said, “We started with a B2C approach and today we have 2 lakh users with us. However, platform monetisation was a bigger issue for us. We had received grants from some big corporates. While working with the government, we collaborated with more than 1000 schools in key districts like Nanded, Raipur, etc. This led us to believe that the B2G model can work. This was the product-market fit we were looking for and we got it.”
“We have received approval on our proposals from district collectors from Maharashtra, Chattisgarh and Jharkhand. We are looking for more tie-ups and our target for this year is to cover 20 districts,” she added.
Pilot projects
ThatMate is running pilot projects in Thane and Nashik districts. Jadhav informs, “ThatMate collaborates with private as well as government schools. We pitch our proposal and programme to the district collector or zilla parishad chief executive officer (CEO) and make them understand our programme. Later we conduct orientation programs for teachers and students. Students download our app and undergo an assessment. We provide input to them every week about the lesson plan and support them. We have 40 weeks of content ready for consumption by students. If the users feel their problems are still unaddressed, then ThatMate also provides counselling support to the children.”
Next move
Jadhav and Neeraj share a vision of covering more than 100 districts next year including the states of Sikkim, Jharkhand, Chattisgarh and Maharashtra. “Although we started with sex education and awareness, it was a part of mental wellness and hence we will continue to position ourselves as mental health and wellness startup. So far, as the findings show us, issues like time management, anger and social anxiety are the topmost concerns in adolescents. We are planning to share our insights with counsellors and psychiatrists deputed under the district mental health program in each district. We will provide the data to them about users who are more anxious and they can provide counselling to children. Another interesting trend we have observed is that students are demanding counselling for themselves but ask us to not inform their parents. We do take consent of parents if the children are below a certain age-limit.”