Here at Indigo, we’re always trying to find ways to make therapy more approachable. One of the biggest barriers to seeking help is the fear that a therapist may not get you.
We’ve always taken a lot of pride in our client-therapist matchmaking because we know that, when it’s done right, it can be truly life-changing. The research doesn’t lie: the relationship between client and therapist is one of the most consistent and reliable predictors of therapy outcomes.1 2 Research also shows that accommodating client preferences can improve outcomes and reduce dropout.3 4
Today, after a successful public beta that launched in March 2026, we are proud to announce the next chapter in The Indigo Project’s digital evolution: the official launch of The Indigo Matchmaker, Australia’s first trauma-informed platform for client-therapist matching.
The Indigo Matchmaker combines thoughtful technology, considered matching and real human care to help you find a therapist on your wavelength.
What makes The Indigo Matchmaker different?
Working with Sydney digital studio Nightjar, we’ve combined contemporary UX design with more than a decade of therapist-matching experience to create a platform that includes:
- A trauma-informed matching journey from the very first question, designed around empowerment, safety, choice, control and trust.
- Real-time risk assessment and immediate escalation, so people who need urgent support can be directed to the appropriate services as quickly as possible.
- More than 300 inclusive matching inputs to pinpoint your ideal therapist, spanning areas of focus, therapeutic approaches, personality, identity, preferences and how a client wants therapy to feel.
- Over 14 years of client-therapist matching expertise, translating the wisdom of Indigo’s Therapy Matchmakers into a structured system.
- Human oversight where it matters, with certain presentations automatically referred to our Therapy Matchmaker team, clients able to speak to a real person at any stage and no AI used to generate matches.
- A carefully curated therapist team rather than an open marketplace, with every practitioner vetted through Indigo’s strict multi-step process.
- A simple, personalised user experience despite the complexity behind it, with each client shown only the questions and recommendations relevant to them.
This has been years in the making
When we started Indigo in 2012, mindfulness was only beginning to enter the mainstream. Therapy was spoken about far less openly, and our key mission was to break the stigma around mental health.
Flash forward to 2026. The language of mental health is front and centre, and online therapy is ubiquitous. People can now access thousands of therapists outside their area, from the comfort of their couch.
But more choice doesn’t always mean better choice. The last thing you need when looking for help is to be endlessly scrolling through a therapist marketplace.
We pride ourselves on being a practice before we are a platform. The technology exists to support the care, not the other way around.
It’s pretty simple – we’re a group of humans who care deeply about therapy and about finding the right therapist for each client. At the heart of that is our therapy matchmaking.
Throughout the design of The Indigo Matchmaker, we kept coming back to one central belief: the experience of seeking mental health support should never add to someone’s burden.
How could we make that help-seeking moment clearer, safer and more supported?
What makes The Indigo Matchmaker trauma-informed?
When we describe The Indigo Matchmaker as trauma-informed, we are not just saying that some of our therapists work with trauma.
We are saying that the platform itself has been designed around recognised trauma-informed principles.5
That means thinking carefully about the whole experience: how clients are empowered to make decisions and asked about sensitive topics, how safety concerns are identified, how choice and control are preserved for the user, and when technology should step back so that a human can become involved.
The Indigo Matchmaker includes a real-time risk-assessment process embedded into the enquiry journey from the first question.
When someone’s responses indicate that they may need crisis support, they are directed immediately to appropriate services. Other sensitive or complex presentations can be escalated to Indigo’s human Therapy Matchmaker team for expedited review.
The platform is a reflection of everything we’ve learnt over 14 years in practice, making sure that care begins at the first moment someone reaches out for help.
More than a decade of human care, built into the platform
We made a deliberate choice not to use AI to generate therapist matches.
Instead, The Indigo Matchmaker translates more than a decade of expert human judgement into a structured, adaptable system without removing the humans. It intelligently triages enquiries to help ensure that people who need an urgent response receive one.
Clients can choose from more than 300 areas of focus, therapeutic modalities, personal preferences, therapist personalities and preferred availability. They are shown only the questions relevant to them, and their journey changes depending on their answers.
The result is a responsive, clear journey and a carefully considered shortlist of therapists.
Tech should not remove human care from the process of seeking therapy. At any point, clients can contact one of our human Therapy Matchmakers for assistance.
A matching platform is only as good as the therapists inside it
We put an enormous amount of careful curation into our practitioner roster, meaning that every therapist recommended via The Indigo Matchmaker has been vetted through a multi-step process we’ve designed to make sure they have what we call the Indigo magic.
After 14 years in practice, we know it when we see it.
We search high and low, reviewing hundreds of submissions, so we can find the practitioners we know are aligned with our mission and values.
We want to understand a therapist’s life experience. How they communicate. How they relate to people. What they care about. How they make a client feel.
The Indigo Project is not an open therapist marketplace. Therapists cannot simply upload a profile and join. The reality is that we have already done most of the searching before a client reaches The Indigo Matchmaker.
This means clients receive a shortlist drawn from therapists we know, trust and genuinely believe will suit them. And if we don’t believe we have the right therapist for someone, we will be honest about that.
What if the first therapist does not feel right?
Even the most thoughtful matching system cannot guarantee chemistry between two people. Sometimes a therapist may look right on paper but not feel right in the room. That’s why we offer our Perfect Match Promise.
If a client doesn’t connect with their Indigo therapist after the first or second session, our Therapy Matchmaker team will help them find someone new. Subject to the terms of the promise, Indigo will cover the cost of the first appointment with a new therapist.
We believe clients should feel supported through the matching process, not penalised for discovering that the first fit was not right, and we want to do whatever we can to provide that support.
Why are we calling it Australia’s first?
Across the development of The Indigo Matchmaker, we formally reviewed the publicly available matching processes of leading Australian online therapy services.
We did not find another Australian platform publicly documenting that its matching system had been designed around trauma-informed principles, including real-time risk assessment, appropriate support pathways, meaningful client choice, responsive questioning, detailed fit-based matching and clear human oversight.
We built The Indigo Matchmaker to make sure that when someone decides to reach out for help, that decision is met with clarity, insight and care.
To help you feel safer, more informed and more empowered when choosing a therapist. To give you the best possible chance of finding a therapist who really gets you.
Because we know the right therapist can change your life.
And we’ll help you find them.
Get matched via The Indigo Matchmaker.
References
- Flückiger, C., Del Re, A. C., Wampold, B. E., & Horvath, A. O. (2018). The alliance in adult psychotherapy: A meta-analytic synthesis. Psychotherapy, 55(4), 316-340.
- Norcross, J. C., & Lambert, M. J. (2018). Psychotherapy relationships that work III. Psychotherapy, 55(4), 303-315.
- Swift, J. K., Callahan, J. L., & Vollmer, B. M. (2011). Preferences. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 67(2), 155-165.
- Swift, J. K., Callahan, J. L., Cooper, M., & Parkin, S. R. (2018). The impact of accommodating client preference in psychotherapy: A meta-analysis. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 74(11), 1924-1937.
- Blue Knot Foundation. Trauma-informed principles.
If you need urgent support
Please remember The Indigo Project is not a crisis service. For urgent help, call 000 or Lifeline on 13 11 14.
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