Ajmal Saleem of Treat at Home App.
Tell us about yourself?
My name is Ajmal Saleem, Co-Founder & CEO of Treat at Home App. Back in 2018, I was 19 and left with two options, whether to pursue my startup or a medicine degree.
I decided to pursue both and currently I’m also in my final year med school. Initial years at Treat at Home started with market study and research but I had an opportunity to indulge in operations with the Covid pandemic.
With the break from school, I scaled Treat at Home close to $70,000 in ARR for the past 2 years. Now, I participate in accelerator, funding activities for Treat at Home and continue to attend classes for medicine.
What do you think is the single biggest misconception people have when it comes to startups?
Even from my own perspective, it was a very glamorous with all the buzz surrounding the startup community.
All the funding, IPO’s and so on. Success has been widely spoken about but very few are aware about the path. Startup journey is one of the most exciting to take on if we are filled with passion and vision, but most look at it as an escape from the usual job lifestyle.
If you could go back in time to any moment from your journey, and give yourself one tip, what would it be?
It’s hard to choose from but the top most advice would be to have pursued Treat at Home earlier in my life and put together our team sooner, so that we were geared up with scale to cater to people during the pandemic.
What makes you stand out as an entrepreneur?
As all founders have, the crazy drive towards passion and perfection of solving real-life problems and not willing to give up whatsoever.
What are some of the best working habits you’ve gained over the past couple of years?
The most important is I practised to manage both learning and working at the same time. It was difficult at first because med school has one of the hardest curriculum to cope with.
But with the dedicated contribution of my team at TAH, I find it easier to manage both at the same time.
Give us a bit of an insight into the influences behind the company?
The vision to make healthcare more affordable and accessible to patients by enabling them to connect with verified medical professionals in their region.
Where do you see your business in five years?
Pan-India presence facilitating various healthcare services from the comfort of patients’ living spaces.
What do you think the biggest challenge will be for you in getting there?
Traditionally, the first interaction when it comes to healthcare starts with talking to a person about your concerns.
As we are working with an app based model, it will take some time to build confidence and trust among patients to schedule services online after experiencing better health outcomes.
Talk to us about your biggest success story so far?
Earlier when we started, our key focus was to connect patients with healthcare professionals at a large scale.
Multiple service bookings with peer-to-peer interaction was only possible through app based model and we focused on that.
Moving forward, we realised that Indian people needed ‘human intervention’ particularly in the health sector and our pivot started towards adding our call based booking system.
Post launch, conversions significantly increased and we saw a tremendous change in user behaviour. First booking happened through call and consecutively, patients started using our app to schedule services.
How do clients and customers find you? Are you much of a salesperson for yourself?
Patients reach us through Google search, ads and social media. Existing users refer our services to other patients and we also have partnerships for inflow of leads.
Medical professionals find us through their community and our Provider team is set up to increase supply in new regions.
What one tip would you give to fellow startup founders?
Pursue your passion wherever you’re at life. Build the right team, only they can take your vision and product to new heights. If it’s time to pivot, be open to change and keep hustling.
And finally, what do you hope the future brings both you personally, and your business?
With Treat at Home app, we envision to revolutionise India’s health sector by creating a network of verified medical professionals where patients can access reliable healthcare services at an affordable cost.
Follow Treat at Home App on Twitter or Linkedin.
