When we started Shim, our goal was to use the combination of psychology and technology to find a scalable way to improve mental well-being. We launched Shim in Sweden, got 450+ five star ratings in the App Store, published a scientific paper that showed the efficacy of it, and learned a lot about how to best use a conversational interface for mental health purposes.
Today we’re announcing that we are entering our next phase. We are bringing on a new co-founder and launching a new product called Enjo, which provides instant emotional support for parents.
For the last few months, we have been on a journey. We met Björn Jeffery, the former CEO of Toca Boca (the world-leading kids app maker), and he brought a new perspective on how to best utilize our expertise and learnings from Shim. From Björn’s work with Toca Boca — and his own personal experience as a father of two — he had identified a clearly underserved need: non-judgmental emotional support for parents. A report showed that 76% of millennial moms search for parenting support & advice on their phones on a monthly basis and 53% on a weekly basis. More importantly, parents tend to look for support but end up with advice. They can both be important, but they are not the same. This is where we would like to help.
We concluded that our platform was a great foundation to address this need. During the autumn we have interviewed parents all over the US, developed new content, and gradually shifted Shim towards this demographic. We have brought the learnings from Shim on how to help users make positive reflections — and started to develop a new method to make use of these positive reflections to give personalized support at any time.
Now we’ve reached the point where we are ready to sunset Shim and focus all our attention on Enjo and its mission: to provide instant emotional support for parents.
The best thing about this new change? Enjo can really help parents. One of our testers, a mom in Oakland, California, told us:
The app showed me a positive reflection I had written before, that I had totally forgotten about. It really helped me shift my perspective! I felt that there’s actually a lot of good things going on in my life.
This is the type of feedback that makes us both happy and excited about the future. It also sets the direction for the company going forward.
While Enjo supports parents, we have developed a platform that can be used for any demographic. We believe everyone should have access to emotional support at any time. And we think we’ve found a new way to do just this. This is not a quick fix to all of the world’s mental health issues, but it can be a part of the solution. And a concrete way to contribute to the UN Global Goal of promoting mental health.
Enjo is launching on December 6th 2018. Sign up on getenjo.com to be the first to know. If you are an existing Shim user, you can transition your account to Enjo. Read more about it here.
Hoa Ly, CEO