创业偶像打造正能量产业

    Nataly Kogan understands the pursuit of happiness—in her younger years, she lived for it. As a Jewish refugee from Soviet Russia, Kogan escaped her native country at the age of 13 with a handful of suitcases and $600 in cash for her entire family of four. Jumping between refugee camps across Europe, Kogan finally made it to the United States where her pursuit of happiness really took off. She graduated top of her class from Wesleyan University. She worked at McKinsey & Company, then at Microsoft. She got married and had a daughter. On paper, Kogan had achieved the American Dream. But still, she wasn't happy.

    Kogan is the CEO and Chief Happiness Officer of startup Happier. She not only finds herself in better spirits, but spends her days trying to pass the feeling along to others as well. The secret, she says, is understanding that you can't actually be happy, but you can always be happier. That's the message conveyed with her new app, Happier, which she describes as an "emotional bookshelf in your pocket." Users upload anything that makes them happy, from posts chronicling their small daily success stories ("I got a great parking spot!") to photos of their favorite foods or places. Anytime you need a pick-me-up, simply open your Happier app and enjoy all of the happy moments posted by your friends.

    Since its launch in February, users have shared over one million happy moments, says Kogan. The app is only the first step along the way, however, and Kogan hopes to build the business into a media company and lifestyle brand, similar to Oprah or Martha Stewart, she says. In addition to "Happier TV" and "Happier Videos," Kogan envisions licensing Happier products, like clothes, cars, or even a Happier Airline. With a $2.4 million seed round under her belt from investors like Venrock and Resolute.vc, Kogan's march toward making the world a happier place is well underway. "Life is made of moments," she says. "Choose to create and collect the happy ones."

    Fortune interviewed Kogan about the app, the American Dream, and how happiness is changing lives around the world.

    Fortune: Many people use mainstream social media sites like Facebook or Twitter to post things that are negative or even hurtful, but you think Happier is different? Why?

    Kogan: There is a tremendous amount of research that shows that Facebook makes people miserable. Dr. Nicholas Christakis (Harvard) is a formal advisor to Happier, and he's looked into a lot of research of social media making people miserable and I think it's one of our strongest selling points. I totally get why Facebook makes people miserable. It's a stage now where we are all creating these versions of ourselves that are awesome—we have great vacations, look great, have awesome friends. And then what people do is compare their real life to this very braggy, curated life that your friends are posting on Facebook.

    In Happier, the expectation is everything is positive, so you don't need to show off. A happy moment is a different type of social content, it's smaller, it's more personal. It doesn't need a cool photo and it doesn't need to be impressive. It can be as tiny as "I just got a great parking spot!" or "My kid gave me a hug after work." You don't need to feel bad when you're posting positive things, nor do you need to feel like you need to make a big deal out of it like you would on Facebook.