You will lose someone you can’t live without, and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad news is that you never completely get over the loss of your beloved. But this is also the good news. They live forever in your broken heart that doesn’t seal back up. And you come through. It’s like having a broken leg that never heals perfectly—that still hurts when the weather gets cold, but you learn to dance with the limp.

― Anne Lamott 

Learning to appreciate the absence of some people or things in life that once we were so used to is definitely a heart-wrenching thing. The closer you were to that object, the more the pain when it’s taken away from you.

Sometimes when grief strikes, all we need is someone to just lend their shoulders for us to let the held back tears flow so that the burden of the heart, if not lessened, atleast stops us from flinching at a least expected moment. And SharingDard.com is providing just that- a shoulder to cry on, a handkerchief to wipe the tears, a rock when drowning in a sea of sorrow and a silver lining on a cloudy day!

Startoholics’ Team caught up with the team of SharingDard.com to know more about their brilliant concept and more.

SharingDard.com – Window to a Brighter World

We have been in that situation when we have something at the back of our minds, some confusing thoughts, some painful incidents, some bad memories which silently suffocate us from within. The only respite is to find someone who will listen to us without judging us and without knowing our identity. SharingDard is an online space for anyone and everyone to disclose their most confusing, personal and painful feelings, and to help others if you have already coped with a similar situation. All the while you may remain anonymous!

Fuel beneath the Fire

The idea was conceived when the team members were at IIM Lucknow. Although they did not right away start planning for it, once out of college, they became busy with their respective jobs, and they themselves started feeling that they needed that one listener who would just hear them out without judging them based on any perception or image. And even though they had a strong family and friends circle, they ended up not having anyone to share their problems/worries/confusions fearing that the others wouldn’t understand or plainly because they were not available. That is how SharingDard was born.

Tailor-made to Fit Well

Essentially anyone who needs a listening ear or space to vent out is their target audience. More specifically, people with access to internet and located in tier1 and tier 2 cities in India have been focussed upon by the team.

They intend to target the Indian subcontinent as of now and later expand to the entire world.

The Journey of a Thousand Steps

The site was launched in late May 2013, and within two months their Alexa rank had catapulted from a mere 9 lakh global ranking to 3.12 lakh and from >1 lakh Indian ranking to 22,000.

This growth was much more than what they had anticipated according to them. SharingDard received mixed feedbacks from across all age groups of people. A lot of feedback is positive and in the form of praise for providing people with a much needed service, while some others criticize on the user acceptance of the website.

Fundraising

They plan to seek Seedfund or angel investments in the coming future. Currently, their energies are focussed towards getting maximum user traction on SharingDard and establishing SharingDard’s offline tele-counselling model for adolescents called Your Candid Friend.

Monetizing

Monetizing is primarily done through online and offline counselling as well as through advertisements. They also work on a commission basis with psychologists and counsellors.

‘Setbacks and Coping with them’ by the Pioneers of that Field

Although it cannot be called a failure, but around two months back they had a revelation that their strategies needed to be revised if they wanted their business to run the way they foresaw it. This revelation came from a third person and was pretty shocking for them to accept at first but was a wake-up call that they desperately needed. After that they made it a point to get feedback from as many people as possible and not dismiss anyone’s suggestions without due diligence.

After all one never knows where the next big idea can come from!

The biggest hurdle that they still face is the fact that people still have a stigma attached to acknowledge that they need to share their burdens to make their hearts lighter. This inadvertently affects their conversion rates.

Marching Forward

Their main focus would be promotion through online channels.  They intend to use the other offline channels later to generate more awareness.

A lot has been planned to be included within SharingDard’s spectrum of services such as –

Ø  Tele-Counselling (currently started for adolescents),

Ø  Online/Web Counselling by psychologists

Ø  Integrated e-commerce portal.

Ø  An Intelligence System that can sense the users’ current mood/situation and provide them with comforting and apposite messages/services/solutions.

Importance of Social Media for success of any Start-up

According to SharingDard Team, the role of the social media will greatly depend on the industry of start-up and also on the customers and the consumers of the product or service that is being offered.

For example social media will play a more direct role in bringing customers and/or consumers if the service is provided online, where as a start-up providing a very high-end component part of an automobile will not benefit in bringing in new customers through. But invariable to the industry or the product, for a start-up social media definitely is crucial in creating an identity, spreading awareness, and making yourself noticed be it among the people or among investors.

Why SharingDard.com?

The calm that passes over you after letting out your most troubling thoughts to a patient ear– help someone feel it, be the shoulder to cry on and feel it for yourself too, find that empathizing listener at SharingDard.com.

Let’s do our bit in making the human race happier.

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