Mindset Health put research backed hypnotherapy in your pocket

Last Updated: Wednesday, 11 September, 2024

When brothers Alex and Chris Naoumidis first applied Monash University’s accelerator program in 2017, The Generator, it was for an entirely different idea to what they’d become known for – digital hypnotherapy.

“We were actually the first application they received, and it was for a dress rental app called Covet,” Alex recalls.

While the program head wasn’t keen on the idea, he liked the brothers and thought they had potential. So he encouraged them to think of something else.

“Since we’d both studied psychology and were fascinated by behavioural science, we thought about how we could make technology work with health,” Alex says. It was then when they came across a hypnotherapy podcast. 

“It was backed by research, especially when it came to IBS, but not many people knew about hypnotherapy or considered it serious,” Alex recalls. “So I took it to Chris and we were like, could we do for hypnotherapy what meditation apps did for mindfulness, and bring a “woo woo” approach to the mainstream?”

With help of the Startmate accelerator program in 2017, they were able to focus on their idea fulltime and progress much faster than initially thought. Then, in mid-2019, the brothers were accepted into Y-Combinator (“it was our third application,” Alex says), the world’s biggest accelerator and birthplace of Airbnb, Reddit, Dropbox and more.

“It was during the three-month program that we decided to focus on digital therapeutics, and when we launched Nerva for IBS,” Alex recalls.

Knowing that an expert in the field was critical to the success and legitimacy of the app, the brothers partnered with Dr Simone Peters from Monash University to build a program that would fix the miscommunication between the gut and brain.

Based on Dr Peters’ research, Nerva has to date helped more than 150,000 people manage their debilitating symptoms.

Buoyed by the success of Nerva, Alex and Chris reached out to several other experts in the fields of menopause, anxiety and depression, smoking cessation and, most recently back pain.

Today, Mindset Health has more than 60,000 paid members, and has in total helped nearly 200,000 people tackle their health.

The company has also partnered with Dr Michael Yapko, an winning psychologist, author and clinical hypnosis expert; Dr Gary Elkins of Professor, Psychology and Neuroscience at Baylor University; and Clinical Health Psychologist Dr Jeffrey Feldman to address the other health conditions in their remit.

Getting the business right

But as any successful founder knows, getting the product or service right is half the battle. What keeps a business going – and growing – not only takes some serious planning and strategy, but also understanding the day-to-day running of a business.

So when Alex and Chris heard about LaunchVic’s 30X30 program, an initiative that provides HR, operations and finance start-up executives with the skills and exposure to common scaleup challenges and bottlenecks, they immediately put themselves, and their execs, through it.

“It was one of the best things we’ve done,” Alex says. “Having the opportunity to learn from the best-in-class mentors, such as Jodie Auster [Strategic Advisor to the Global CEO of Uber], along with our execs really levelled up our business.”

A key learning for Alex was understanding the challenges they are likely to face when starting as executives. “We’re in the process of hiring a head of finance, and being able to sit in that room and understand what that person will be doing has been invaluable. It’s also changed my interview process and the job description to reflect what’s possible in that role,” he adds.

The brothers are also using learnings from the program to find out what motivates their employees, and how to best communicate with them at a team and personal level.

“[Jodie] gave us advice about how to structure our meetings, information sharing and how to stay accountable to our goals,” Alex says.

“We’ve realised that it’s much easier aligning a team of six towards a common mission than a team of 40, so we’re working on making it easier for everyone to grow in the same direction.”