Attempting to bring about gratitude and appreciation to do-gooders – ThankShip’s mission
“Everyone knows social work is a thankless job. This is one of the reasons why people are not motivated to do social work. We want to change this to a job where people feel motivated to be part of social change.” says Ajay Sagar. Doing good, loving, and caring for others are all meant to be done unconditionally. However, a token of appreciation for the work you do, can only encourage people to do more. This is exactly what Thankship does.
Thankship is a social platform to appreciate an act of kindness or recommend someone’s good work. Their mission is to enable people to appreciate the work that makes a difference in their lives. Thankship is founded by two Brothers. Lalit Sagar and Ajay Sagar started their entrepreneurial journey on 25 Dec 2014 and they are currently in the Beta stage and have developed an MVP (Minimum Value Product) – being used by 150+ users.
The duo says, “Thankship will provide you online tools to say thanks, send certificates, recommend and appreciate people doing good work.”
Why not Facebook or LinkedIn or any other such platform?
Thankship is intended to be only a social profile that lists all the recognitions you get for your social and humanitarian work in life. Facebook showcases a mix of public life and the social work, somehow taking away focus from the latter.
LinkedIn showcases a person’s professional profile and a few recommendations. However, Thankship showcases all the thank you letters, recognitions and recommendations at one place. Think of it as the cabinet with badges, or the digital equivalent, a (Facebook like) wall full of medals and certificates that inspires a person, and others to continue to do good work. “It is something you can hang on to, share with friends, and read again, especially during times when you feel bit drained”, says Lalit.
Thankship is a new and unique idea to encourage social change. None of the current set of social platforms gives a view of all the social work done by that individual. Thankship profile gives a view of all the social work done by an individual – growing the network of people who witness the work of a person and someday spread the word, if need be.
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“It’s not easy for social workers to spread awareness of their work and get noticed by national and international awards groups. Most of the time lack of motivation and appreciation kills the urge to good work for society. That’s one of the reason we have very few social workers. Thankship enables people to say thanks to social workers around them and share their story of social change with much larger audience. Such small notes of thanks give then lot of positive energy and enough motivation to continue to do good work,” says Ajay.
The target audience
Anyone who has been subject to cyber bullying would know, Facebook and Twitter can have negative comments whereas Thankship only has the positives – appreciations and recommendations. Using Thankship, one can write, browse, and share stories of kindness, appreciation and recommendation. The users can write a note of thanks to anyone in any social network. Thankship has currently integrated with Gmail & Twitter (Facebook to follow). This allows a user to write for other users on these platforms.
One can follow social workers and get updates of their recent work on one’s wall and also provide testimonials through “badges”. Badges are given to users, by users as a testimony to their personalities – Helpful, Leader, and Creative etc.
Thankship’s product has various use cases and therefore a large customer segment. People could use Thankship to thank their family/friends on the work they are doing, NGOs could use this platform to appreciate work of volunteers, donors, and other stakeholders, businesses could use this platform to showcase the work of their philanthropic arm, and at workplaces people could use Thankship to appreciate the hard work of their colleagues. The possibilities are many.
“Couple of days after Thankship launch, I got few references of social work from friends. One reference was of Delhi guy Ashutosh who donates blankets and woollen clothes to homeless people in winter. After sharing his story on Thankship, I got a call from him and my friends. Ashutosh told me he never thought anyone will ever notice his work. He was surprised by this appreciation and was motivated to continue this social work every year. On the other hand, my friends told me that they were inspired by Ashutosh”, says Ajay.Charting a path
The Sagar brothers are now looking to enhance the existing platform to allow people to send cash gift cards, create a Thankship social link for websites (similar to Facebook like, Twitter tweet) that allow visitors to say thanks to website/blog owners, and create an enterprise version of Thankship for corporates to start and manage full lifecycle of appreciation and recognition programs.
“Our big dream is to enable and inspire billion+ people to appreciate kindness and participate in social change. We know the journey is not easy and smooth. We are prepared and on our way!”