Podcast Summary: Med Spa CEO

Host: Heather Terveen
Episode: Want to Attract Premium Clients? Make the Shift from Suggestive to Assumptive Marketing
Date: September 3, 2025

Episode Overview

Heather Terveen tackles the mindset and strategy shift needed for med spa and aesthetic practice owners to attract premium clients. The episode centers on moving from "suggestive marketing"—where options are cautiously presented—to "assumptive marketing," where authority, expertise, and confidence drive the client journey, offer design, team consults, and messaging. Heather draws on examples from major brands and everyday practice to show why this shift is essential for those seeking to build a premium, in-demand business.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Defining Assumptive vs. Suggestive Marketing

• Assumptive Marketing: Used by premium and luxury brands. This approach assumes clients want the comprehensive, best solutions and positions the practice as the authoritative expert.
• Suggestive Marketing: Common with mass-market brands, suggesting or waiting for customer direction. It tends to dilute offers and undermines perceived expertise.

Quote:
"People want to follow people that they trust already have it figured out. When you are more assumptive in how you present what you know online, you will magnetically attract more patients and clients that trust you." (00:25)

2. How This Shows Up in Offers, Packages, and Pricing

• Suggestive offer design leads to safe, smaller packages based on assumptions patients can’t afford more or don’t want comprehensive care.
• Premium providers confidently recommend complete, high-ticket plans that serve the true needs/goals of their best clients.
• Pricing should reflect transformational value, not just time, effort, or individual services.

Quote:
"Without assumptive marketing, a provider might list microneedling, tox, peels separately, but doesn't actually with confidence say, 'This is the plan, this is the package that I recommend for you.'" (06:50)

3. Assumptive Authority in Marketing & Messaging

• Marketing should assume your ideal client is seeking a trusted guide with the solution—no need to over-explain basics.
• Shift from content like "this could be a right fit for you if..." to "here’s your solution, here’s what comes next."
• Draws on Apple and Chanel as iconic examples. They decide what’s best, assume clients want the best, and don’t compromise positioning.

Quote:
"When you shift to assumptive messaging... think of big brands, right, like Apple, Chanel—they are rooted in assumptive messaging and marketing." (16:30)
Apple Example:
"They assume that their customer base has a lot of faith in what they decide ahead of time... Apple crushes them with just customer loyalty because they are rooted in assumptive thinking." (18:15)

4. Consult Process & Team Training

• Assumptive sales transforms consults from passive Q&A to guided roadmaps.
• Rather than asking, "What do you want to do today?", lead with, "Let's walk through your roadmap/blueprint."
• Equip team to confidently propose comprehensive annual or long-term plans, not default to minimum viable offers.
• Avoid projecting price sensitivity—present the best plan and remain neutral to the client’s response.

Quote:
"It sounds on the surface so nice to be like, 'What are you hoping to do today?' But actually, the patient... probably doesn’t even know how to answer that question effectively." (22:55)
"When you let [patients] take the lead, it naturally lowers their confidence... It literally makes them feel like they should be the discerning one, instead of putting the trust in the fact that you actually are the ones who know what the best roadmap is." (27:35)

5. Assumptive Marketing in Everyday Content

• Stop teaching basics if your audience is already sophisticated—premium clients already know; they want expertise and leadership.
• Example: Don’t make content on “how tox works” for an audience already getting injectables.

Quote:
"Your premium patients and clients likely are already getting tox. They're just looking for the authority and who is really excellent at doing it." (35:35)

6. The Psychology Behind Assumptive Marketing

• Self-perception theory: People act in line with the identity you reflect back—if you speak to them as committed clients, they rise to meet that.
• Cognitive ease: When messaging is confident and assumes readiness, the offer is processed as more trustworthy and actionable. Over-explaining creates doubt.
• Decision-making psychology: Certainty in recommendations makes it easier for buyers to say yes.

Quote:
"If you speak to them as if they already are the kind of person who invests, commits, and follows through, they will actually rise to meet that." (45:15)
"When your messaging assumes readiness instead of over-explaining, the brain perceives the offer as more trustworthy and actionable." (46:00)

7. Summary & Action Steps

• Audit your current offers, consult scripts, marketing content—where is your business defaulting to suggestive (passive, apologetic, or diluted) instead of assumptive (leading, confident, authoritative)?
• Design branded, signature packages that reflect transformation, not “a-la-carte” services.
• Lead with the solution your premium clients are looking for, unapologetically recommend what they need.
• Remember: "You’re not just offering treatments, you’re prescribing outcomes."

Memorable Quotes & Moments

• On Leadership Energy:
  "Leaders are assumptive, right? Leaders don’t suggest. Leaders say, 'We have a lot of experience in this category, and we know that this actually works.'" (14:35)

• On Team Training:
  "Certain team members are just better and are more assumptive in their authority when they're actually talking a patient or client through the conversation." (20:40)

• On Price Sensitivity:
  "Team members avoid talking about price confidently... that's just them projecting their own price sensitivity which happens, instead of just saying, 'I am an advocate for what I think is the best game plan for the next year.'" (29:45)

• On Brand Confidence:
  "Chanel or any premium brand... They're unapologetic about who they cater to, their pricing, how their brand stands out... they assume a certain type of psychographic about their customer base." (38:15)

Noteworthy Timestamps

| Timestamp | Segment | |-----------|-----------------------------------------------------------| | 00:25 | Importance of assumptive marketing & recap of episode aim | | 06:50 | How suggestive offers dilute expertise and reduce value | | 14:35 | Leaders and premium brands model assumptive energy | | 16:30 | Comparing Apple/Chanel (assumptive) v. competitors | | 20:40 | Consult process: shifting from passive to guided | | 29:45 | Team’s price sensitivity and its effects | | 35:35 | Social content, assuming audience experience | | 45:15 | Speaking to ideal client identity/self-perception theory | | 46:00 | Cognitive ease—why confidence sells | | 50:05 | Calls to self-audit: offers, consults, marketing |

Takeaways for Med Spa CEOs

• Audit everything through an “assumptive” lens: offers, consults, marketing, and team training
• Reframe your customer journey—clients look for leaders who confidently prescribe outcomes, not options
• Stop apologizing, diluting, or over-explaining
• Craft messaging that assumes expertise, readiness, and desire for your premium experience

Closing Thought:
"The more powerful you show up in these areas, the more those premium patients and clients who are looking for leaders will magnetically be drawn in to what it is that you are doing." (54:20)