A new company in Colwyn Bay has taken up the challenge of supporting the mental health needs of men by creating an online video platform aimed at providing support when people need someone to talk with.
TalkSally.co.uk has been created with the support of Business Wales, the Welsh Government’s business support programme, to provide a safe and welcoming environment that allows people to talk about themselves, and interact, at times when they just need someone to be there. It aims to help improve mental health, combat loneliness, increase confidence and happiness and hopefully stop any future need for structured counselling.
The new company has been launched by Sally Jones, a professional counsellor with over eight years of experience and comes at a time when men accounted for three quarters of UK deaths by suicide last year*.
The idea to create Talk Sally came about when a man she had been counselling through her original business wanted to carry on seeing her and engaging her services even after his problems had been resolved. Ms Jones realised that a number of men felt the same way ie they needed someone to talk to about their everyday lives, be they family pressures or even things like how to handle a first date.
Commenting on the creation of Talk Sally, Ms Jones says:
“I recognised that even when potentially complex issues had been resolved and my counselling had proved successful, certain people, mainly men, still wanted to engage and have a mechanism by which they could communicate about everyday life. Essentially, they just wanted someone to talk to, almost like a virtual friend.
“I felt it important that a platform was created offering this service and opportunity. It has proved particularly successful around Remembrance Day and I and my colleagues have supported a number of servicemen during this period who just needed someone to listen and engage at a time when memories will have been stirred.”
Since launching, TalkSally.co.uk has already supported a broad range of people of all ages and is proving so successful that Ms Jones is recruiting more Counsellors to help with the demand.
She added:
“It’s a very unique skill being able to communicate thoughtfully and effectively online when silences can occur, and you need to be able to keep the conversation on-track. That is why the recruitment process is so important and I’m looking forward to growing my team in the very near future.”
Business Wales, which is funded by the European Regional Development Fund through the Welsh Government, supports the sustainable growth of small and medium-size enterprises across the country by offering access to information, guidance and business support.
