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Who doesn't love seeing all of the amazing innovation happening in Canada's Startup world? We connect with Canada's best startups to learn about their business and the amazing people behind it. Follow along and hear some of the most interesting ideas and top elevator pitches from across Canada!
00:01.12
mike_flywheel
What's up everybody. It's Mike we're back here on the pitch please podcast and today we are going to be talking to Tim about not the app that helps you get into a relationship but about how technology and an application are going to help you stay in a happy relationship I added happy there I don't know if that's in your punchline too. But it feels necessary. And I'm looking forward to learning well with that I'm going to get you to talk a little bit. Tim, let us learn a little bit about you and then let's talk about your journey and about couplely let's get Roland.
00:27.91
Tim Johnson
Amazing Mike thanks so much for having me on I'm really excited to get into the conversation today.
00:36.29
mike_flywheel
So maybe let's um, let's start with like where you started. We'll talk about coupli more than enough today. But I'm always curious about the background of my guests because I find oftentimes that is what led them into where they are and what they've built. But where did you start out your career or your life journey. Were you an entrepreneur from birth what what does that look like.
00:56.72
Tim Johnson
For me things began I think when I was working at the red cross I was working at the red cross and working in charity is a great place to practice being in an entrepreneur. It's very interesting. You start working in the charity space really because of passions and then the longer that you're in it. All roads kind of start leading to fundraising. We did a successful program in the Uk they wanted me to go and talk to some fundraisers about it I remember meeting up with the fundraiser who went and drove to see some rich people in england think country house long drive salt burn style I went. Did a presentation on this project that we'd done and then sort of went and and sat in a different room while the fundraiser spoke to this person. A major gift was given to the red cross after that and I thought gosh that's interesting as my career continued in the red cross. It moved more into the fundraising area and here's some things I discovered. I was going for lunches and doing major gifs and I was speaking to these entrepreneurs that had already made such a huge difference and I was speaking to this one guy he had invented a technology that helped coat pipes for oil he was in his mid 60 s really focused on athletics and fixing up his car. He said look like well how much do you need for this for this thing. He's like is is 50 k good or do you need more and I said well we're seeking a ah hundred and fifty k would be like the total and he's like okay, cool. Let's just do that then I'll I'll do it all and then you can get focused and go and raise money on.
02:30.64
Tim Johnson
On other things and I I asked him like when did you build this company and he's like how old are you and at that time I was 29. He's said yeah I was I was your age and it just struck me at that point. Holy shit what the fuck am I doing I should be speaking is that of speaking to these people that have done all these things. Should be doing it myself and I really didn't know what to do but I had a passion and my passion was creative writing and I was sharing and not my novel at that time on a platform called Wapad and I'd just been put into something called the wappad stars which is sort of like their author influences. So.
02:53.36
mike_flywheel
Okay.
03:07.73
Tim Johnson
Have a creative writing passion I'm an author I've hit 800000 reads on this book of mine and what pad were inviting me to see their office when I go and see this office. This is all happening around the same time I go and see their office. It is like Google for writers Disney just for writers. And I knew at that point that this was something that I wanted to work for this is something this is a startup a company that ah I really wanted to invest in.
03:32.30
mike_flywheel
Yeah, yeah, because they were there were so there's still I mean technically a startup a much bigger and more established 1 but based on the timelines you're saying they would have been a a startup at that time.
03:41.35
Tim Johnson
There was still a startup at that time I started throwing my hat in the ring for jobs started to just reach out to more people there try and ingratiate myself into that into that company and eventually I got a shot I had to go from. Ah, director level of fundraising all the way down to cold calls to make a transition into tech but it worked and within six years I was director of brand partnerships for what had for us Canada u k incredible journey um a six year journey at at what had changed my life completely. While I was working out. Watpad here are some things that happened.
04:18.78
mike_flywheel
Yeah, cause I like I definitely want to hear this because you basically are like I'm a creative writer I started creative writing I had a whole bunch of traction through watpad. But then I also wanted to work at watpad and I wanted to be in a startup because I just met this other guy that started his business at 29 and then I got into wapad and I grew.
04:27.70
Tim Johnson
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yes.
04:38.20
mike_flywheel
Now I'm curious like it feels like you got exactly almost where you wanted to go and.
04:43.57
Tim Johnson
Absolutely change my it was. It was incredible. Um, and being on that ride being on a ship that has product market Fit you. It is such an incredible experience. Um and being with whatpad on that journey to Whatpad getting acquired was. Most incredible journey at that time as well. Some things are happening in my personal life I was in a long term relationship I was married for 3 years and that ended in Divorce and I'm negotiating these personal things. So while my professional life is taking off Wap Pad's taking off.
05:05.68
mike_flywheel
Okay.
05:19.90
Tim Johnson
I'm getting promotion off the promotion. Everything is great. My personal life is like on the inverse and when I started using dating apps. So fast forward I'm divorced I'm single takes it took six months to just kind of work on myself aka hit the gym and then. I'm using dating apps for the first time ever because I've never encountered this problem I've been in a relationship right? And now I'm getting to experience what technology has done for dating and coming from my generation we had to go and walk to someone in person. The dating apps are freaking amazing. I know a lot of people I know they get a lot of hate and all of this kind of thing but trust me if you missed this if you missed that approach where you're walking with a beer and you're walking up to a group of girls to go and say hi and try and get them to talk to you and your buddies you do not miss it dating apps are way way way way way better than getting shot down in public. Crawling back to your friends with your tail in between your legs and I was very impressed with the problems that the way that dating apps had solved this problem I thought was amazing but it made me think where was the app to help me when me and my partner were having problems. My ex was very smart person. She was a lawyer. I was working in tech we both have master's degrees with good communicators. We should have been able to have productive conversations and figure things out, but we couldn't it was beyond us. We ended up getting divorced that idea struck me really hard. Um, and as i.
06:52.71
Tim Johnson
Use the dating apps to find my person. Thank you Plenty of fit. Thank you Plenty of fish I realized like maybe maybe this idea has some potential I started looking to see if there was maybe an an app that could help us get on the same page. I'd read some really great books in this sort of growth phase and it shocked me that there wasn't anything that was bringing this to life and that's when the idea for coupleie was born.
07:18.83
mike_flywheel
That that's really interesting and what stood out to you I Want to talk about like because there's obviously a a moment of you went through something but it was a ah little bit after that moment that you were then like.
07:29.59
Tim Johnson
Um.
07:34.39
mike_flywheel
Extremely excited about the new approach to dating um and then you sort of reflected back to what you'd just gone through I mean like that. But there still seems to be a gap here. What was it that stood out and I've never used a dating App. So I'm like of the I'm I'm married happily married been married for a while been dating the same. Person who I married to now since like 2011 So like it was just before the cusp of dating Apps. So I've never used one So I'm curious like what stood out to you as someone that's had the the a and B experience that sort of like came and maybe is making its way into couply.
07:55.69
Tim Johnson
Yeah.
08:10.28
Tim Johnson
I Think just what impressed me so much was how how well they solved the problem you can be on a dating app and I guess maybe it's the intention you're coming to it with I didn't grow up with them. So Maybe it was this just so different I didn't. Such a different experience. But basically you can meet someone they look interesting. Maybe they've got some interesting things on their bio and it with a swipe and a few messages you can be sitting across and having a cup of tea with that person having a cocktail and getting to meet them and. And seeing and seeing what they're like and most people I met with very lovely. It was ah a wonderful.. It was a wonderful experience 10 out of 10 I really felt shocked and surprised at how well dating apps solved that problem.
08:57.64
mike_flywheel
And then in that same moment you were shocked and surprised that there wasn't something that felt this easy to work through the challenges that you had just gone through that it ended in divorce and maybe it didn't have to.
09:08.27
Tim Johnson
Here's the thing is that exactly 43% of marriages end in Divorce but 65% of second marriages end in Divorce and I really didn't want to be part of that statistic and when I started to look at that and think about that. I thought okay, what is the way that I can guarantee that I don't end up in that statistic I knew from the books that I read that there are behaviors that you can do that are pretty much going to guarantee that your relationship is going to work. There has been a ton of relationship science all around this. And it's it's in books which is great but when you go through a practice using a product or a therapist is really really really powerful but you might not be at the point where you want to go to a couples therapist and if that's the case but you do want to guarantee your relationship is going to work. You do want to have the best practices to build the best relationship that you can that is exactly the void that couplely fills.
10:09.88
mike_flywheel
Interesting. So maybe and we'll we'll really dive into the the meat of exactly what cupli is but talk to me about this space a little bit so you know you noticed that there was a gap and you mentioned therapist. Maybe that's all there is but.
10:15.23
Tim Johnson
Yeah.
10:22.55
Tim Johnson
Yeah, yeah.
10:28.12
mike_flywheel
What what did you discover in your exploration of is there a better way to equally make sure that once you're matched to someone that you stay matched with them and you work through that. Um, that experience. Yeah.
10:40.64
Tim Johnson
When you when you first start out a relationship. Everyone talks about the new relationship energy right? New relationship energy. This is a thing this is when your hormones are maxed up. This is when all of your neurons are firing. You're a light It's very similar to being on drugs in you and your partner feel so connected and there's some really powerful evolutionary stuff. This is designed to get you to leave the cave with a complete stranger leave your family and go and build a hut somewhere else. And the words and immediately start knocking out babies and procreating it is so powerful but we live in a society now where we have repeat monogamy over and over again and so we are now outlasting this first period big time but people are so shocked. When their hormones start to come back down to normal takes between six months two years honeymoon phases over normal hormones fade neurotransmitters fade and then we have to start working on our relationship so this is where we start to see a gap this is when people start to discover things about their partner that. Might not be might not be things that they like they start to discover things about themselves where they're not maybe being as responsive to their partner before they're not doing the bids of connection that their partner asked for their attachment stars are starting to show up and this is when the cracks and relationships begin to happen. There's a few more periods in your life as well or seasons.
12:11.15
Tim Johnson
Where you're more likely to get divorced and break up but this is the the first one where we start to come in and and and start to help. Yeah, yeah, that's exactly it.
12:15.79
mike_flywheel
But to first season somewhere between the six month to 3 years in a relationship is is a moment where whether people realize it or not is that like a thing is that like hey so because you have a podcast too right? Actually let's let's talk about what that is because I want to.
12:31.78
Tim Johnson
Yeah, yep, yeah, we have I host the couplely relationship advice podcast where we speak to relationship leading relationship experts from all around the world. Mike it's been amazing. Honestly, it's been such a treat to get.
12:33.92
mike_flywheel
Tie it into this but you have a podcast as well, right? so.
12:50.87
Tim Johnson
To spend so much time with leaders in the couples and relationship industry and especially to get so much of their learning and I think half of my guests have Ph Ds So They're really really deep in the space and it's It's been amazing. Amazing too. Get to connect with them and interview them.
13:12.56
mike_flywheel
And that's super cool. Well we'll link that but tying that back into here now you know you said the six months to 3 years is when the the hormones and the energies the light bulb starts to dim. Um through.
13:18.37
Tim Johnson
A.
13:27.70
mike_flywheel
The podcast or maybe some of your research did you find that that is either like a very overt known moment or it sometimes gets like buried and and that's where you equally fit in as like because yeah, you know we talked a little bit and we're going to talk a bit more about this like app versus therapist. And a therapist is like o like it's broken and I need additional intervention. But I think what you're saying is maybe somewhere before that there's a moment where you maybe haven't even fully realized it your or you're like bottling it up that you need to be thinking about these these things and that start starts to be where you play in at the first.
13:46.30
Tim Johnson
Um, yeah, yeah.
14:03.77
mike_flywheel
Moment and we'll talk about the other moments as well.
14:04.46
Tim Johnson
Totally being in a relationship would be like boarding and building a ship with someone that you're gonna spend the rest of your life on and if you're going to do that and you're gonna sail off into the into the seven s wouldn't you like to take a course on how to. Navigate the stars or how to survive on a boat but instead what we do is we get on this ship. We build it together pretty Fast. We take off and then once water starts coming aboard and then a storm hits. We go to a therapist therapist and be like hey can you try and fix this half Sunk boat. Both of us really kind of want to get off and we're sick of trying to bail water out the bottom. This is the this is the difference like this is definitely the analogy that I think really speaks to this. We got such a cool opportunity here to to to help people in in that area. Um.
14:54.54
mike_flywheel
So then yeah, like talk to me then a little bit about exactly what couplely is so you saw this gap. We'll talk about where it fits against like a therapist but you started to to tackle this gap and so what was your solution. So.
15:03.47
Tim Johnson
Yes. So for us. It really comes down to a few things number number 1 getting people to communicate better people communicate the best when they deeply understand the person across from them John Gottman has something called bits of connection. And it's got popular here on Tiktok with great Tiktok that says look at this bird and if you say to your partner hey look at this cool bird. The idea is that your partner is showing interest in the things that you're interested in. It's a bid for connection and these are what are really important in relationships. You can respond to bids in a few different ways you can respond to them positively neutrally or push back and when you push back this starts to degrade your relationship think about that ship this is the hole in the hull letting water in what coupleli does is we help you understand to see your partner's bids of connection. Through personality assessments. So here are the 3 things number 1 daily questions this helps you understand the stories of your partner's life. This helps you understand their map of existence and what they believe and hey like some of these questions are fun. Some of them are deep some of them are sexy.
16:22.23
Tim Johnson
Helps couples communicate in a new way and gives you some interesting prompts to answer I think we've all seen now the couples cards that you can have at at dinner time or some of these card games that have deep questions. We've got those in a product. That's the first thing the second thing. Is personality Assessments I love these I'm not sure if you've taken them if you've heard of love languages attachment styles mys briggs a neogram ocean there are some really incredible things about your personality. That you might not have even discovered yet and you might not know about your partner so we bring those 2 things together and then this is where it gets cool is that couplely can then give you customized relationship advice and date ideas. Are based on your partner's personality. So the thing that your partner actually wants and desires so you can understand the way that your partner is going to communicate when they're stressed or when they're at peace you can understand some of the reactions that you might be having if it's an attachment thing if you have an anxious and avoidant. Dynamic you are going to be able to understand so much more about the dynamics of your relationship. It is not a replacement for couples therapy but it might mean that you won't ever need to go.
17:45.89
mike_flywheel
That's interesting, but it supersedes the the card idea or the date idea because you're actually contextualizing it. Um because you're understanding, not just 1 person both people and then you're helping figure out the common ground or the ways to connect them better. Um, through your app which is really cool and so talk about that bit. You said there where you know you said doesn't replace couples therapy but hopefully helps you never have to use that who's your like ideal customer profile is it before that.
18:11.39
Tim Johnson
Are.
18:21.17
mike_flywheel
You know the waves. Let's keep down the ship analogy but before the waves ever start crossing over the bow of my ship or you know breaching through the hull and is this a proactive thing that you do like would it feel weird to use couplely proactively or is it when you feel like something's missing. Let's use this as a first step.
18:23.49
Tim Johnson
I mean. Yeah.
18:39.87
Tim Johnson
We got we got 3 people that that use our app through types of people. We got new relationship energy people that are serious. They want their relationship to work I think typically they've been through. Ah, they've had a more serious relationship and it hasn't worked out. They might have a little bit of damage from that relationship and they think you know what this next relationship I'm going to do it consciously I'm going to think about it very carefully and'm gonna I'm going to go through this in a structured way and so couple can help people go through those relationships in a structured way I think the second one. Is a relationship that has stakes and so this is a relationship where people have kids or shed assets. They have a house an apartment a flat a dog and they've just got assets. They're not in their early twenty s where things don't work out and who cares. Um, they have. Assets and stakes connected to their relationship. Ah these users tend to be between the ages so of 30 4 30 to 45 um and then the the final the final bucket would be people that maybe have. Gone through a real rough patch maybe experience infidelity and are almost starting afresh and they're making a fresh start and they're using coupleli to start again in their relationship. Very very interesting different person very different profiles here. But these are off.
20:10.13
Tim Johnson
3 main groups of users.
20:12.10
mike_flywheel
That's interesting and so I guess both people need to use it talk talk to us about how couplely works so you talked about the components you talked about the key people that would use it. You shared a little bit about where and how there's definitely different than um, you know, traditional couples therapy and maybe we'll even dive into that more. But.
20:18.40
Tim Johnson
Yes.
20:27.10
Tim Johnson
Um, yeah.
20:30.80
mike_flywheel
How does it? How does the actual app start to work. Both people need to download it. It's on your phone talk talk to me through a day or a week or a year I don't know how often that this is used so.
20:33.85
Tim Johnson
Yeah, both? Yeah yeah, both you and your partner would download couplely and link up and the and with the app. So the app is then a private space for you and your partner each day you get a new question to answer so you'll you'll get 7 questions each week ah 3 quizzes and then some kind of fun couples games to sort of test and see who knows each other best each week you're taking through a new aspect of relationship science first week love languages second week attachment styles Third week your language of desire how you can spice things up in the bedroom. Fourth Week your myas-briggs fifth week Dr. Taylor Hartman's color we which is amazing your a neogram your communication style your conflict style each week over week if you're doing couplely. You're pretty much getting some pretty high level expertise in your and your partner's personality. Along with those weeks we'll have questions as well. Like I've said that you and your partner can answer every Tuesday you get a date idea that's customized to your relationship and with the new feature that we're building as well. We'll have twenty four seven relationship advice and date ideas available as well.
21:46.75
mike_flywheel
And so is it a linear journey like as you were describing. It is this something you use for a year because it's linear and then you'll have done hey I've used a coupleli as most as I as much as I can or is it sort of like it keeps spicing up what it throws at you so that it and and brings back.
21:58.18
Tim Johnson
Yeah, yeah.
22:05.68
mike_flywheel
Things after a period of time so they come back and you're not forgetting things because I imagine like repetition is important otherwise you like try it. Do it once? forget and so there's repetition on how does that work.
22:12.80
Tim Johnson
Exactly exactly. So for our content. What we have is continual new courses coming into the couplely verse. So for example, we just had Christmas a bunch of Christmas content was in now we're going up for valentine's day ah valentine's day courses are coming in and some of these are a little bit more light. It really just sparks the conversation I don't think um, what kind of Christmas person. You are ah might might not have as larger impact on your long-term relationship on your attachment cells. But. Still sparks the conversation around expectations around why you are or aren't a Christmas person and we have a whole bunch of these round different topics. We have a hundred in the app an additional hundred to put into the app and you know us being to a user the other day and she said oh like. My husband hik all the time. So I really enjoyed doing your hiking course and what I couldn't believe is it brought up a new story for us which was around why I actually like hiking and it was because this is something that I used to do with my dad all the time before he passed away and it was a whole big story. That had never even shared with my husband before so it's just helping uncover these stories that make up our past.
23:34.64
mike_flywheel
I That's that's super cool. What happens if ah, I'm just going through this in my head and I'm like we're talking about like oh why did you start hiking what happens if there's a question where you're like someone does. Maybe they forget like you know when you forget to do your duolingo for a day and it gets mad at you. Like what happens if someone doesn't answer the question or just doesn't feel comfortable answering the question because they're like obviously this gets deeper but it's like you know if you're afraid to answer that question or you know shaping how you answer that question knowing it gets back to the other person but like what what happens in those Scenarios. So.
23:53.62
Tim Johnson
Yeah.
24:07.50
Tim Johnson
You can we We send a few reminders to to get people to to do it. Um, if you don't want to answer a question you can just skip it. However, most of the questions are pretty are pretty friendly. There's not too many gotchas.
24:25.28
Tim Johnson
They're really more supportive and around building that narrative together I think um this there's some products that we've tested where they have really quite scary questions that you think of as a bit of a tricky 1 either way either way answering this could get you in a bit of hot water.
24:43.88
Tim Johnson
Deliberately tried to move away from that that kind of content and have things that are more building up that story together.
24:51.53
mike_flywheel
That makes sense. Um, So how long would the average user use couplely. This is like an indefinite thing like you subscribe to it like a gym membership because it's part of your health like your relationship Health. Or is it like a periodic thing. Do you pay monthly. How to how does that work.
25:06.27
Tim Johnson
Yeah, so we have 2 options so we're a freemium app to premium subscription so have yearly monthly you can still use couplely for free and get a ton out of it if you love it and you want to unlock everything and squeeze the most juice then that's when you can. Upgrade and we see our users staying with us for years. We've seen them staying with us for years I've got to know a bunch of our users. They've become friends and they test our new features which has been awesome I think what the way that they think about it is they think look It's very very similar to investing. You invest in your relationship you invest in your stocks and shares and the more that you invest the greater the payout will be. You wouldn't leave something untouched that was important to you so I continue to invest my relationship. That's that's really how our users have thought about it. So yeah, people. People stay on it I'd say the first year is when people do the most and then the second year people stay in touch and then year three we've seen people come back and redo everything again.
26:11.60
mike_flywheel
It interesting because they saw the value definitely in the in the first run So now years and years. Um, how long has couplely been live and how many of you are using this. It sounds like it's quite large.
26:20.59
Tim Johnson
Yeah, yeah, we have been our earliest our earliest and most terrible Mvp came out in 2019 and and that was when we were really really testing it. We we took a year to just continue.
26:30.80
mike_flywheel
Okay.
26:39.42
Tim Johnson
Test and revised and we launched at collision in 2021 and we won collision pitch which was incredible first and then so I'd say 2021 is our our true launch. We went full time in 2022 so this is our third birthday. Um.
26:46.44
mike_flywheel
Congrats.
26:58.54
Tim Johnson
Coming up on on Valentine's day that's the that's when we that's exactly exactly.
26:59.73
mike_flywheel
For is that that is sort of like your your launch moment that's sort of the date you use. That's cool. So how many people is it downloads you track or you active users were how but how big is couplely so far How Okay yeah.
27:12.38
Tim Johnson
For now for now we're still tracking downloads. We've had over 400000 people download couplely across 137 different countries so only available in english for now. But it's really cool to think about.
27:19.61
mike_flywheel
Wow wow.
27:30.25
Tim Johnson
The impact that we had on those people around the world especially given that we're so early in our journey still.
27:37.25
mike_flywheel
Before we move on I want to talk about you brought up the collision and that you won the pitch competition. Um I want to talk about that for a second like what what was that like. What was the pitch being a participant in the pitch competition like what do you feel helped you win it was it just like the logicalness of what you're building was there something that you know you got as advice that really got you to the front the line and in terms of winning that pitch competition for.
28:03.44
Tim Johnson
The experience was absolutely incredible. Being part of collision absolute highlight movement in my life. Amazing. Um I think what got us to win.
28:18.50
Tim Johnson
Judges just really like the idea you'd be surprised how many people that are very high net worth individuals really struggle with their relationships. The reason for that is because so many things that make you successful in business if apply directly 1 to one with to your relationships. Won't necessarily work. In fact, they're more likely to backfire and so I think that this idea just really resonated with them and at that point they hadn't really seen anything like it very very very cool experience. Um.
28:51.15
mike_flywheel
Yeah, it was like a punch in the gut like you were speaking. You know how they're always like imagine you you know you paint the imagined scenario and oftentimes you're painting the imagined snare that they aren't in but I guess in some regards you painted a snare that they're like oh shit I see it.
29:08.23
Tim Johnson
Ah.
29:09.18
mike_flywheel
Makes sense and it sounds like it could work and I love the approach at that stage had you launched? Okay, yeah, because you were saying you did Mvp and you launched it collision. So this is like a bit of a relaunch moment. So.
29:14.15
Tim Johnson
Yeah, we just we just relaunched. So I think we're on our third relaunch. Oh yeah, yes, it was a relaunch moment and it gave us this sort of deadline that we had to get all our new designs done and we wanted to get a bunch new content in the app. So that. As we spoke to people and our goal at collision was to try and get 200 people to download it. We were just going to network and talk to everyone and we just wanted that early user testing and because this was our first time ever paying for a conference ourselves out of our own money. We were like okay we're gonna go and do every single thing at this conference because we're paying for out of our own time.
29:52.92
mike_flywheel
Yeah, it's and it's not cheap. It's not a cheapd conferences hand lot of value lot of cool people there but it is. It's not. It's not not cheap, especially if you're paying for it out of couple's money which is just coming out of Mvp.
30:04.40
Tim Johnson
Which is just coming out of off as not far gets but it was great. Absolutely absolutely incredible experience. Definitely recommend folks to go.
30:15.61
mike_flywheel
So um, 400000 downloads is a lot It's cool that it's available in all those countries already. You mentioned a bit around language. Um, can you tell me a little bit or talk to us a little bit about. Anything cool related to the next year ahead your roadmap things people can expect to see coming out a couplely over the next year so
30:36.39
Tim Johnson
Um, yeah.
30:39.27
Tim Johnson
I think for us our real focus over this next year is growth we have started just in the last month partnering with some leading relationship experts. We're going platform by platform by platform. So we started on Tiktok. So we have some of the largest relationship experts on Tiktok being partnered with couplely in talks with us Dr Tara being a leading one she has two point one million followers on Tiktok Brittany ostorf is another. She has the laughing cuff couple podcast, 1000000 followers on Tiktok. And Mac and Murthy. Absolutely incredible evolutionary psychologist reached 160000 followers in Tiktok I think in eight months which is awesome and partnering with creators bringing them into your app ecosystem but really truly partnering with them I speak to these guys.
31:21.89
mike_flywheel
Wow.
31:34.95
Tim Johnson
All of the time they have so many amazing insights creators just understand people. They understand people's problems they're speaking to their users constantly every day almost and they've got brilliant ideas. They are go get it. They are go getters. I've been so grateful for the massive upswing and in energy that that working with these these people has brought us and as they start to start to speak about coupleli. They've also begun to open some pretty wonderful doors for us. So for example, next week Makin and I are going to l a and Austin Mac and has an appearance on the Lewis Howes podcast we're hosting a couplely dinner in l la then we're heading to Austin to go on Chris Williams modern wisdom podcast hosting a dinner in Austin and these couplely dinners also just. Bring together other relationship experts in more intimate ways really helps us get into the real zeitgeist of things that are happening and it's really exciting. So I think for us, it's growth. It's real life events and building our brand That's what I'm truly excited about that's unlike the gros side. Second thing I'm excited about is couplely ai oh I'm so excited for this. Oh my goodness we've been working on this for a while we've got all of this incredible data. All of this personality data and now we can use this and leverage this to give awesome advice based on.
33:08.55
Tim Johnson
You and your partners love languages attachment styles live twenty four seven through our new couplely ai which hopefully by the time this podcast is out will be launched. It's our first version but I'm really hopeful I've been talking to her.
33:23.82
mike_flywheel
That that's that's super cool. So this is a capability that if you are a subscriber to couplely is an incremental tier. It sounds like um oh ah.
33:25.19
Tim Johnson
Now for a week and she's awesome.
33:36.25
Tim Johnson
Note free free. It's going to begin as free until it's until we've really really nailed it. Um, yeah, yeah, yeah, oh yeah.
33:42.38
mike_flywheel
So Everybody run when you see this podcast go live. Hopefully it's already live. It'll be in the description. Go try it out but this is like a ah ah personal assistant so you've got the the app obviously links you with information that is exchanged with your partner., But this is almost like yourself therapist is that sort of the concept like built within the app. Yeah.
34:00.63
Tim Johnson
Exactly it's your personal relationship therapist slash assistant in your pocket twenty four seven what is something it's connected. It's exactly.
34:09.85
mike_flywheel
And is it connected with the things that are coming through the app. So like hey this is how I feel about the response I Just read why am I triggered or what does it mean that I feel this way that type of ah granularity.
34:23.61
Tim Johnson
Exactly I've just had an argument with my girlfriend. What happened she complained that I didn't load the dishwasher properly right? The pro. There's reason that she's complaining about that is because her love language is acts of service. You know that that's very important to her I can also see on her personality profile that she's very very detail driven organized and these are 2 of her big things that are important to us So when she does things she doesn't properly does she doesn't detail focused I can see that you're much more creative and your love language is. Words of affirmation so you are probably chatting away and not thinking about it thinking up fine ideas or things to do don't worry. This is why this argument is happening with you guys here are some steps that you can do These are the sort of responses that it's been giving us. It's Wild. It's it's.
35:11.13
mike_flywheel
That is super freaking cool I.
35:18.53
Tim Johnson
It's so wild Mike sorry I cut you off I want to hear what you you're thinking.
35:19.46
mike_flywheel
No, no, no, no go I get it is good. These podcasts are about being chilling energy. So like it doesn't have to be Q and a whatever man go jump in you're in.
35:28.79
Tim Johnson
Ah, the the moment I knew we had something with this was when I was ah testing it and wework shout out to the we work crew that has been amazing as well as getting out and working a few days a week with a whole bunch of other founders. There's a group of 25 of us that work at we work. 1 university toronto is's the best and. I was sharing it and it was in this really ugly code screen yellow orange writing. Um we have an Ai engineer from University Waterlooos doing his ph d in in engineering shika. Thank you, he was helping us build this and then we had some of the. Crew ah start asking questions and so we're we're pulling their data from what they have in their relationship and I knew that we had something when one of the girls asked the question and she was like oh my god I need to remember this and then she took out a phone and took a photo of the response that the Ai said. That's when I was like okay this is exciting. We've got something.
36:29.53
mike_flywheel
But I love it. Well let's talk about the the cost because we you talked about a freemium model. We're talking about some badass features. Um, how does it work to both people need to like um subscribe first go walk us through the tears if you can first.
36:31.85
Tim Johnson
Um, yeah, yeah.
36:40.13
Tim Johnson
No, yeah, there's only there's only real one here annual. It's eighty nine Ninety Nine canadian a year 50% the cost of speaking to a couple's therapist once and you get couplely for the year and it's only 1 person in the couple. But needs to buy so you can treat your partner to a couplely subscription and have fun questions conversation points personality information and date ideas for the year
37:10.98
mike_flywheel
I'm almost wondering if we should be releasing this podcast before Valentine's day so people have a gift to buy. But if you if we release this I think we're going to try to do this on Valentine's day so maybe you're listening right now in this is on Valentine's day if you haven't gotten a gift yet or if.
37:13.48
Tim Johnson
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
37:26.13
mike_flywheel
Part of the day did not go as planned. You'll be able to go find your way to couplely which sounds super important which where should people go Um, if they're looking to I guess you can sign up or download the app like what's the the sign up process and where can people find it more. Yeah.
37:41.49
Tim Johnson
Yep, it's on Ios and Android just search couplely in your favorite app store of choice.
37:45.44
mike_flywheel
And got it and AtsCOUPLY just case people like people are like oh is it like double I it's actually like quite simple. It is just couply and so that's a really easy 1 to find thankfully and we'll put in the description as well.
37:51.14
Tim Johnson
That's it.
37:54.55
Tim Johnson
Yeah.
38:04.70
mike_flywheel
You've had a really cool experience where you were you kind of lived out a bit of that dream working at the startup and then branching out to your own and either at a or B Um, what's sort of like some of the best advice you've.
38:14.11
Tim Johnson
Yes.
38:23.88
mike_flywheel
Received That's sort of impacted how you've crafted your journey and how you show up in the things you do at couplely.
38:34.77
Tim Johnson
I think it's something that I'm really working on and it's this idea of conscious consistency. We have a lot of things that we do a lot of completely completely. Unconsciously um, and I'm really want to. Try and consciously be consistent at the things that are going to generate the most value and be the best for me and for my users and for the company I think that's something that's that's something that I'm really working on I think in terms of advice. The best advice I've got was from Ivan Yuen who's one of the co-founders of whatpadge and he said product market fit doesn't come from the big things. It comes from the tiny tweaks. It's like the inverse of death of a thousand cuts. It comes from the constant iterations over and over and over again over a period of years that lead to true product. Market fit. It took watpad a long time to achieve that true product market fit but that that is something that has always um I've always thought about. And it's really he said just try and find the 1% or not point 5 if you can find that in each and every release you're going to get there. You're going to get there.
39:56.70
mike_flywheel
So either this or the the conscious um focus piece that you talked about are there any tools that you've been using or any approaches that you use on either of those fronts either to create super useful feedback cycles. For the small half a percent 1% improvements or for your own state of being around how you're consciously deliberating deliberate being deliberate with your time and energy and focus.
40:21.92
Tim Johnson
Yeah, so being close to the users is really important. We've always allowed our users to contact us directly very quickly through the app my whatsapps in couplely so that's been amazing for discovering bugs for any any just. My writer things that show up people can just what's at me and I can get it solved very very quickly and just talk to them human to Human. It's no weird chat Bot stuff. They can just get in contact with me or or or or 1 of us very very fast. That's awesome I Love that? um.
41:00.52
Tim Johnson
Organizing and structuring the team we use slack and treo and and canva now is starting to become more of a thing for us too I'm really really impressed with the way that canva is growing. It's just such a cool product. So that's starting to become a little bit more of a thing that we all use. And then leveraging video has always been a big thing for me but creating sops through vidyard and loom have been fantastic. So whenever you're taking someone through something doing it on video making sure they know how to do it and then giving them the video so they can refer to that has. Been really really helpful just for onboarding new people. We've been using a lot of student um placements. So we've got partnerships with Arizona State University with the family and couples counseling department. Um, and that has been. Really wonderful for us to build these relationships with these future therapists who are looking to do a placement as part of their course and so onboarding those those students and and creating systems that allow that all to happen automatically has been really good I think just focusing on our systems has been. Has helped a lot of this happen quite automatically which has been super cool.
42:17.59
mike_flywheel
Yeah, that's awesome. Your journey sounds like it was without bumps in the road but oftentimes that's the just the nature of how we talk about it but is there something that you know in either wapat or a couplely. But I think couple like because you're living in it. You're the founder.
42:22.26
Tim Johnson
Oh oh god.
42:36.44
mike_flywheel
That as a founder. Um, it's something that if looking back you would have done differently on how you approach things you know you can't change the past. But if someone else is going on the journey something that they should be eyes wide open to or paying attention to that. Maybe you miss The first time they're.
42:43.49
Tim Johnson
Yo yeah.
42:52.33
Tim Johnson
Yeah there's so so so so so many things and if any aspiring entrepreneurs are listening to this and and want about some ideas or get some learnings I'm always always down to chat I think the big thing for us is we should have got involved. With the creators and folks in the zeitgeist of relationships way earlier way earlier. Um the doors that these guys are opening the insights that they have are so powerful and I think for any business that is consumer. Creators are the future I think a lot of our businesses are going to be create a plus a tech person. Plus maybe ah, a sort of Mba Mckinsey type person are going to be the dream founding teams of the future because they are the modern day alchemists that can spin.
43:47.24
Tim Johnson
Nothing into gold just with a camera they can create attention build Community I have been amazed working with these guys. How hard they work how focused they are. It's really inspiring really really inspiring.
43:58.90
mike_flywheel
What What do you think was the hesitation because like it it sounds logical as you're saying it but I can still see myself starting a company and being like we're too small. They're going to be like wait until you've got users and then maybe you do wait until you've got users or I can't afford this.
44:09.20
Tim Johnson
Um, yeah, yep, yeah.
44:17.32
mike_flywheel
Like what were some of the blockers and challenges and like what were some of them that were just assumptions right? or talking about relationships and things that like maybe you assumed that it like if you actually put your assumptions aside you could have achieved differently where where was that balance for you.
44:20.21
Tim Johnson
But it's it.
44:31.35
Tim Johnson
It's definitely around imposter syndrome. So it's definitely around like not feeling like you belong not feeling like you've earned your stripes I remember being terrified of the idea of really giving people any kind of relationship advice because I wasn't formally qualified. Despite reading through the whole masters book list from doing a masters in marriage therapy I still felt like I wasn't I shouldn't be doing this I was doing something wrong doing it whereas. Whereas like you can you can learn so much about a topic within six months if you really put your head down read the books immerse yourself into the topic you can start to hold your own and you understand the structure around it. You're going to know these things that you don't know but even just knowing the things that you don't know make you better than 99% of folks out there in terms of your knowledge and that that was the big that for me I think was the big hold up and I definitely spoke to some a great ah vision coach who we did a session with just dealing with like what are the what are the things underneath what is. What is stopping you what is blocking you and as I blurted these things out I was ah shocked I was shocked that I was even saying things like this because I'm a confident person but I still had to just give myself permission to go for it. So it's almost like giving yourself permission.
45:58.61
Tim Johnson
To just go for it.
46:00.59
mike_flywheel
That's ah, that's cool and maybe um since you mentioned it the vision coach and is that something that you think is like a helpful resource for founders because I think that there's a piece of confidence that you need to convey. Ah not not not bit conned.
46:13.94
Tim Johnson
Yeah, yeah.
46:17.97
mike_flywheel
Confidence or you're like completely building a fake product but to your point you can't get kind of bogged down by imposter syndrome or self-doubt and so you need to come across to the right level of confidence and desire around what you're doing. Would you suggest that for others first.
46:31.57
Tim Johnson
ah hundred percent it's ah I like and and and and find your person find the the person who's who's right for you if it's a therapist therapist if it's if you can organize it within ah a friendship group but you're going to have stuff and we all have stuff. In there and because the founder journey is so public the pressures on you've you've raised money. You've got your friend's money. You've got the people that you respect and admire the most in the industry. Perhaps them. You're spending their money you you have this kind of weighing on you and so. Just working with someone to bring that stuff up very very very very powerful. Um and doing it in a conscious way like you're not gonna really get it having beers with your mates ill I'll scratch it but just working as someone who that where this is all they do. This is all they do all. They do is find your blocks. Gonna work with you on it. You're gonna pull it out and for me by the time I uttered it. It was it felt like this shadow that I had lingering underneath and then when I time I pulled it up and pulled it out. It was like a minnow and I was like oh fat. That's what I've been worried about like okay I'm good. Let's set the camera up. Let's start making some relationship advice videos. It's got.
47:47.38
mike_flywheel
I love it. Well I think that's a great way to to kind of wrap up for today. Tim, we'll make sure all the stuff's in the description couplely. You know you can visit their website but we'll we'll have it in in the show notes couplely io really easy to find I've learned attend today. It's super cool. What you're doing it sounds like the tam is massive and you're going after it and not you know sitting idle you're you're releasing some really cool new features and capabilities and being really aware of all the elements of how this business comes together and. Using some great tools and in the process. So I've learned a time. Thank you so much for coming on today I hope our users are going to learn a whole bunch from your journey or they had a minimum learn about how they can apply this to their current or future relationships. But thanks to bunch. Thanks for everyone that tuned in. Any closing thoughts on your side Tim before we wrap up.
48:39.76
Tim Johnson
Appreciate you having me on. Thanks everyone for listening.
48:42.86
mike_flywheel
Have a good day. Thanks.