A brisk jog on the street, a grueling strength training session in the gym, or 200 meters of butterfly in the pool – regardless of the type of activity, many people care about their physical health. They also pay equal attention to their mental well-being: they learn to interact with their emotions, overcome stressful situations, and improve their quality of life.
In order to take good care of ourselves, we are offered many opportunities – they are available online as well. These are different applications that meet different needs of people. Solutions for physical and mental health are also provided by BetterMe, which created the BetterMe: Health Coaching(iOS and Android) and BetterMe: Mental Health(iOS and Android).
In an interview with Mezha.Media, the company’s founder and CEO Victoria Repa told more about these products and the development of new tools for users.
BetterMe creates products for people’s physical and mental health. How did you get the idea to work in this field and how did it all start?
The inspiration for launching BetterMe came from my personal transformation to a healthier lifestyle and my desire to help others do the same.
I grew up in the Donetsk region in a working-class family, my parents were engaged in their own agriculture, and since childhood I actively helped them with this. Due to the constant physical work, health was not a priority for our family. Even when I was young, I faced difficulties in my relationship with my own body and problems associated with leading a healthy lifestyle – when you don’t even know where to start. At a time when models with 90-60-90 parameters were popular, my body did not fit into the general concept of beauty. Like millions of other girls, I suffered from self-acceptance and was constantly trying out various unhealthy diets.
The period of my experiments with my body was when I was working as an analyst at a media company. It was then that I noticed that the demand for health and beauty content was growing, and the query for weight loss was ranked 4th on Google. This eventually led me to the idea of founding BetterMe. Although at that time my main goal was to lose weight and help others do the same, after 8 years in the Health & Fitness market, I realized that a healthy lifestyle is not about losing weight, and this stigma needs to be changed. That’s why my team and I are now advocating for healthy habit change to achieve long-term results. Our goal is to make a healthy lifestyle accessible to everyone who wants to change.
Together with the team, we created two key applications: BetterMe: Health Coaching for physical health and BetterMe: Mental Health for mental health, and launched the BetterMe Store, an online store with sportswear and accessories for daily workouts.
The BetterMe: Health Coaching offers various workouts and meal plans. What sets it apart from other similar products?
BetterMe products meet the needs of users of all ages, genders, physical abilities, and sports backgrounds. Whether our users are fitness beginners, professionals, pregnant women, amputees, or diabetics, BetterMe offers all the tools they need to build a healthy lifestyle and achieve sustainable results.
For example, in cooperation with Esper Bionics and Future for Ukraine, we recently developed training for people with amputations in the BetterMe app: Health Coaching app. The training program was developed by certified physiotherapists and includes classes for people with upper or lower limb amputations (more than 200 unique exercises in total) of varying intensity and duration.
In general, the BetterMe: Health Coaching app contains more than 4000 workouts, meal plans, the ability to track water and calorie intake, lifestyle programs, self-care tips, psychological support in online chat, and much more.
When I was studying the app, I noticed the recommendations on “Nutrition in Time of War”. Tell us more about this section.
Since the beginning of the full-scale Russian invasion, my team and I have focused on supporting the physical and mental health of Ukrainians. For example, in the first days of the war, we provided all Ukrainians with free access to our apps and launched a number of new initiatives adapted to current challenges, including the “Eating in War” recommendations in BetterMe: Health Coaching. These guidelines were created in collaboration with a nutritionist and include advice on how to maintain healthy eating habits during times of constant stress – avoiding binge eating, why it is important to consume enough salt, what can replace meat, and what foods should be kept in stock at home and in a shelter.
Another app is BetterMe: Mental Health – offers meditations, breathing exercises, etc. What is its main purpose?
I am convinced that mental health is an integral part of overall health. Personally, I meditate every day: for me, it’s a way to set myself up for the day, calm down and gain energy. Just like the body, the mind needs constant care and attention. That’s why we created the BetterMe: Mental Health app, which aims to help users achieve a balanced and mindful life with tools such as customized daily plans, guided meditations, breathing exercises, affirmations, sleep sounds, and 24/7 access to mental health professionals.
Over the years, new courses have been added to the app, such as the culture of interaction with people with amputations. Tell us more about the current and future functionality of BetterMe: Mental Health.
Since 2022, my team and I have developed a number of new features for users of both apps. As for BetterMe: Mental Health, we focused on creating tools to help reduce stress, improve sleep, and overcome other effects of war.
In particular, the company joined the National Mental Health Program “Are You OK?” initiated by the First Lady of Ukraine Olena Zelenska, and together with the NGO Bezbariernist with expert support from WHO in Ukraine developed an online training course “Important Skills in Times of Stress” in the BetterMe: Mental Health app. It is designed to provide users with stress self-help skills in an interactive way.
The app also features a section developed with the support of UNICEF Ukraine with tips on how to support children’s psychological well-being during the war. In particular, it includes games that adults can play with children to distract them from the sounds of sirens and explosions.
In addition, together with the well-known Ukrainian presenter and actress Olena Kravets, BetterMe has launched a collection of audio bedtime stories from contemporary Ukrainian authors. The stories are designed to distract Ukrainians from worries and stress and set them up for a good night’s sleep.
One of our most recent implementations was the Communication Without Barriers training course, developed in cooperation with Superhumans, which aims to improve the culture of interaction with people with amputated limbs to develop ethical communication in society.
BetterMe and the Ministry of Economy of Ukraine have also recently launched a program to improve the productivity of Ukrainians as part of the “How are you?” initiative. This is a comprehensive tool for maintaining the physical and mental health of employees and improving stress resistance and concentration at work.
In addition, during blackouts, the BetterMe: Mental Health, as well as BetterMe: Health Coaching, became available offline. Since then, thousands of video workouts and advice from psychologists can be viewed without access to the Internet.
Since the start of the full-scale invasion, BetterMe has attracted about 2 million Ukrainian users. The company plans to introduce more similar initiatives aimed at supporting the mental and physical health of Ukrainians.
What challenges did you face when developing and testing applications?
The main challenges we face are caused by the full-scale war. First of all, it concerns the organization of work processes and the team. For example, developing new projects in the face of blackouts and ensuring quality communication within the team required some updates.
A special experience for our team was the development of training for people with amputations at BetterMe: Health Coaching and the training course “Communication without Barriers” in BetterMe: Mental Health. We felt a great responsibility to make these tools as useful and easy to use as possible, as there are no analogues on the market. That is why it took a lot of resources from our team and partners to develop these initiatives.
Who is your target audience? How many users do you have in total? What are your plans to expand your audience?
BetterMe has an audience of more than 150 million users around the world who are looking to improve their lifestyles. Most of our users are from the United States, but we also have a significant share of our audience in Canada, the United Kingdom, and Europe.
We are actively working on expanding our geography to cover even more countries and are currently studying the culture of health & wellness in different markets.
What metrics do you collect and analyze? How do you ensure the privacy of user data?
At BetterMe, we collect data that allows us to improve our user experience and enhance our functionality, such as age, weight, height, user goals, etc. We invest a great deal of effort and resources to comply with data privacy and security laws and regulations and are constantly improving our practices (some of which are described in our Privacy Policy, which stands out from similar policies by providing a great deal of information to be transparent).
What other products does BetterMe offer?
In addition to the aforementioned apps, BetterMe: Health Coaching and BetterMe: Mental Health, in 2021 we launched the BetterMe Store, an online store of high-performance casual sportswear, sports accessories, and the BetterMe Fitness Tracker, which increases motivation and accelerates habit change.
In the BetterMe Store, you can find charity sportswear lines, 100% of the profits from the sale of which the company donates to support the initiatives of its partners: FFU (Future For Ukraine), for prosthetics for the military. We have also previously donated money to UNICEF, United24, and the NGO Zemlyachki for various charitable purposes.
In addition, the company has launched BetterMe for Business, an enterprise solution for international businesses that offers individualized support for employees’ physical and mental well-being. This approach helps teams perform at their best and contribute to business success.
Do you use artificial intelligence in your products? If so, which model and why?
At BetterMe, we support the use of innovative technologies, but we believe that they should be combined with the principles of behavioral psychology to maintain an individual approach to each user. We are currently integrating artificial intelligence into our products on a point-by-point basis, as we trust the expertise of our certified coaches to address health issues first and foremost.
BetterMe: Health Coaching now has an AI-based Plank Fitness Test feature that uses a camera to help users assess their fitness level and choose a workout with the right load. In addition, our team uses artificial intelligence to optimize internal operational processes.
Tell us about BetterMe’s achievements and awards.
Since the beginning of the full-scale war, BetterMe has not only maintained its position, but also continued to grow. We are one of the market leaders, providing our users from all over the world with an increasing number of different tools to achieve a healthy lifestyle. Despite the challenges of today, our team remains united, actively introducing new products and prioritizing the needs of our users around the world.
One of the most recent honors we have received is the BetterMe: Mental Health app won The Webby Awards 2024 in the People’s Choice category of Health & Wellness & Fitness Apps. This award is also known as the “Internet Oscar”. Our app was selected as the winner among 13,000 entries from over 70 countries.
In addition, the company has recently received the Highly Commended award from the Reuters Sustainability Awards 2024 in the Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Award category.
At BetterMe, we are constantly improving our products and services to meet the ever-changing needs of our users. Our main goal is to expand our ecosystem of products so that users have everything they need for health and well-being at their fingertips.
In addition, we also prioritize social responsibility, realizing that a successful business goes beyond profit. In keeping with our mission to create a healthier world for everyone, we are committed to launching even more tools to make it easier for anyone who wants to make a difference to achieve their fitness goals.
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