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Foreign welcome to Ask Allison. Y' all ask the questions about having a fun and thriving practice and I answer them. We have a worksheet for you today so you can bring this answer into your life. You can Access that@AbundancePracticeBuilding.com links where you'll also be able to ask any questions you have for Ask Allison. If you want more support, we've got some free trainings in there too. If you can't get enough Ask Allison, check out our YouTube channel for our entire Ask Allison library. Welcome back to Ask Allison. Here's today's question. I know indeage is important, but I'm having a really hard time committing to one. You are not alone. Okay, before I get into this, I want to thank Therapy Notes for sponsoring Ask Allison. I've talked about this practice management system for years and you might know all their features by heart, but I want to tell you what really sets them apart, and it's that they genuinely care about your experience. It's not just about troubleshooting problems you might have. They actively implement user suggested features like secure messaging, clinical outcome tracking, real time insurance checks, and their AI feature, Therapy Fuel. Everyone at TherapyNotes believes in the product and they want you to love it too. Plus, they're independently owned, which means no venture capital, no pressure to prioritize investors over customers. This independence allows them to keep their prices fair, their focus on innovation, and prioritize their customer experience. With over 100,000 therapists already on board, they've proven you don't have to compromise success for quality. If you're ready to see for yourself, try TherapyNotes free for two months with the code abundanttherapynotes.com so if you've been in the private practice world for any length of time, you probably heard this phrase a thousand times. You need a niche. It's crucial for your success. And if you're anything like I was when I was starting, you might be resisting the idea. Maybe you're overwhelmed with the pressure to find the perfect niche. Or maybe you just can't seem to settle on. I get it. The pressure's real. The videos, the posts, the well meaning advice, all of it can start to feel like this heavy weight on your shoulders. And the last thing you want to do is feel like if you don't pick the right niche, your entire practice is going to crumble. But guess what? That's simply it's not true. You don't have to get the perfect, exact right niche right out of the gate. In fact, there's a better way to approach this process that's actually going to help you feel less stressed, more confident as you move forward. So let's break it down. Today we're going to talk about why a niche is important. How to choose one without getting overwhelmed, and what to do if you're struggling to make a decision. By the end of this, I want you to feel like you have a clearer path forward. So first things first, we're going to clear up a big misconception. Choosing a niche is like dating. It is not like getting married. I know you've been told time and time again that you have to pick the right niche and that your entire practice will revolve around it for years to come. But that's not true. A niche does not have to be a career long commitment. Think of it like dating. You can date someone for a little while, not working out. You can move on with someone else. That's how choosing a niche works. It's not about locking yourself into something for the next 30 years. It's about finding something that works for you right now. Maybe you all grow it in a few months, that's perfectly fine. Changing your niche, especially at the beginning, is something that's maybe going to happen and it's not as hard as you think to shift it. Yes, you're going to have to redo or update your website, your listings, those kinds of things. It's not the end of the world. It's not something you'll be doing every few months. So take the pressure off yourself. If you're feeling stuck about choosing the perfect niche. I want you to give yourself permission to try something out. To pick something that feels good now and see how it works for you. You can always change it if it doesn't fit. Now let's talk about something else that can keep you stuck is like forcing insight. You can't just sit there thinking about niche and land on a niche. Choosing a niche is something that requires reflection. Yes, but if it's not an easy answer. Finding your niche requires a deeper level of asking yourself a series of question about who you do your best work with, who you enjoy working with and who you don't. You can't meditate those answers into existence. If you sit there trying to make a decision without reflection, you're likely going to choose something out of fear or anxiety, which is not the best foundation for your practice. If you need help with this, our $27 know your niche course is clarified within an hour to an hour and a half. The niche of thousands of other Therapists. At this point, you can DM the word niche and I'll send you the link for it. Or if you're listening, head to the show Notes. Here's another big niche roadblock that many of you are dealing with. What if you already know your niche but you're feeling like you're not good enough for it? Here's that thing, imposter syndrome, right? It's real, but it doesn't have to control you. You might have a niche in mind, like working with high achieving professionals, which is more of a demographic, like high achieving professionals with panic disorder. There's your niche, but you might start doubting yourself. Maybe you feel like you're not successful enough to be the therapist for them, or perhaps you want to work with a specific presenting issue, say combat trauma or eating disorders, but you feel like you don't have enough experience or training. Let me tell you right now, you are enough for whatever niche you choose. Sometimes these feelings of inadequacy are rooted in fear. It's easy to think that you have to be perfect before you can work with a certain population. But the truth is you don't have to be perfect, you do to be willing to grow. So sometimes those feelings of inadequacy are rooted in fear. Sometimes those feelings of inadequacy are rooted in lack of experience and lack of education. If you feel like you don't have the training yet, that's what supervision and continuing education are for. They are there to help you develop and expand your skills. So if you know your niche but you feel like you're not ready, get support on your way to the niche. Start meeting with a colleague. Attend a training. Keep a journal of all that you're learning and what you're confused about. Get consultation or supervision. Take clear, actionable steps toward that niche and you're going to feel much more confident. And when it comes to the fear that your niche won't pay for your services, like, oh, people with X disorder or people struggling with Y, they're not going to pay out of pocket. That's just a myth. Most niches, like the vast majority of niches, are willing to pay for therapy if they can. So it's making sure. And there's like 1% of niches, like working with an unhoused population, they cannot pay for services, but a lot of people can. So if you're holding back because you're afraid your ideal client won't have the financial resources to pay for your services, I want you to dig deeper. Are you offering real Value. Don't let your imposter syndrome answer that. I want you to answer that. Do you see clients? Do your clients see the worth in the work you're doing? Like, are your clients reaching their goals? If so, they're going to find a way to make it work. You don't need to undercut yourself because of assumptions about pricing. No, you're not going to make, you know, a ton of money working with an unhoused population. But most other presenting concerns are experienced by people across the financial spectrum. Another couple things that get in the way are decisiveness versus perfectionism. So let's take a step back and talk about just like decision making in general. Are you decisive or do you tend to struggle with decisions? If you hesitated to even answer that question, you're likely someone who struggles with decision making. And guess what? You're not alone. Many people have difficulty making decisions, and that can spill over into choosing your niche. If you're someone who tends to avoid decisions, then the thought of picking a niche might feel like a huge burden. But here's something I tell my students. If you're struggling with indecision, just choose one of the things on your list of the ones you've cut down, like the few that you are trying to choose between. Just choose one. Go with it for six months. It doesn't matter if it's the perfect niche for you. It's about taking action and learning as you go. A good enough niche is good enough. Even if you decide to pivot later, the marketing lessons and the insights that you gain from applying your strategies will transfer to whatever niche you choose down the road. Now, for those of you who are decisive, like me, you might be feeling a little anxious that you haven't chosen your niche yet. If you're someone who likes to make quick decisions, then sitting with the unknown can be especially uncomfortable. And this is often driven by perfectionism. Perfectionism has a way of making us freeze because we're worried that the decision won't be right or that we'll make the wrong choice. And here's the thing. There's no perfect niche. There's only the niche that feels right for you right now. And if that changes in the future, that's totally okay. Sometimes you just have to take the leap and trust that you're going to learn along the way. It's much more freeing than waiting for the perfect answer to magically appear. So at the end of the day, the goal isn't to find a niche that's perfect and unchanging for the rest of your life, it's to find something that works for you. Now, a niche is a tool. It helps you focus your marketing and attract the right clients. And also, you know, make sure you don't get as burned out. But it doesn't have to be set in stone. So if you're feeling overwhelmed by the pressure to find the perfect niche, then take a deep breath and give yourself permission to try things on. Start with something, get comfortable and see how it feels. And remember, you don't have to rush it. You don't have to have it all figured out right away. So if you're diving into this world of niches, you've probably already heard the term ideal client. If you DM me the Word Sheets, this week's free worksheet is Niche versus Ideal Client. You'll also get a link to all the previous worksheets in the series to help you navigate your practice with much more clarity and confidence. And if you want to nail down your niche today, DM me the word niche. I'll send you the link to our $27 Know youw Niche course. If you're listening on the podcast, it's in the Show Notes. All right, thanks for tuning in today. I hope this helped take some of the pressure off. I'll see you next time on Ask Allison. If you're ready for a much easier practice, Therapy Notes is the way to go. Go to therapynotes.com and use the promo code abundant for two months free. I hope that helped. If you have questions for Ask Allison or you want to get your hands on the worksheet for this episode, go to abundancepracticebuilding.com link if you're listening. You probably need some support building your practice. If you're a super newbie, grab our free checklist using the link in the Show Notes. I'd love for you to follow rate and review, but I really want you to share this episode with a therapist friend. Let's help all our colleagues build what they want.