A Triangle startup is about to bring ease to the personal coaching market with the help of artificial intelligence.
The company, Durham-based SoleLife, is a one-stop-shop digital platform that helps coaches run the back-end of their business while better connecting with clients. The goal is to increase revenue for certified coaches by taking away time-consuming tasks and leaving them with more time to conduct sessions. In addition, the platform also matches customers with the right coach using evidence-based assessments.
SoleLife has been around for about 18 months, and plans to launch its beta version sometime in May.
The platform is free to the consumer, and operates on a SaaS monthly subscription model for the coaches. In addition, a percentage will be taken from the billing of new clients brought to the coaches through the platform.
Founder Nichole Lowe moved to the Triangle area a few years ago from Southern California where she ran a brick-and-mortar coaching business after stints as a TV producer and music producer, including several projects with Prince. She also was a student-coach mentor, and mentored about 500 students.
Lowe found it extremely frustrating to have to do all of the back-end work, and wanted to see the coaching industry catch up to the mobile economy. She didn’t understand how the coaching industry could be the second-fastest-growing industry in the world, she said, but still be so difficult to scale an actual business.
She found that every coach she talked to had the same two complaints that she had: the back-end work takes too much time and clients are hard to match with.
So, Lowe moved to the area and started building her idea. Earlier this year the company raised $130K in seed capital to help fulfill its vision.
“The ratio of non-billable to billable work is estimated at 50/50,” Lowe said. “Through the use of our platform, coaches can shift this ratio to 5/95 on one single platform.”
Lowe started the company thinking she was about two to three years ahead of the market, but now that the Covid-19 crisis has hit, tele-coaching is becoming extremely popular.
“During these unprecedented times, we at SoleLife are heartened to see so many coaches step up to the plate in what is proving to be a defining moment for digital coaching/health,” Lowe said.
The SoleLife team has been working 16-hour days to get the platform fully ready as quickly as possible. Lowe expects full commercialization in July or August.
“We’re excited to get the word out there,” Lowe said. “I love being in the Triangle. I think that this tech community is by far the best I’ve seen. We’re happy to be here to create those connections and build our company here and create jobs.”
