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Private Practice Startup Podcast
Episode 89: Why S & M is Essential for Your Business
00:43:12
Kate Campbell & Katie Lemieux
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A
Welcome to the Private Practice Startup, where we inspire you from startup to mastery. We chat with entrepreneurs, experts in the mental health and business arenas, and successful private practitioners to give you the tools needed to make your dream practice a reality. Visit theprivatepracticestartup.com for awesome resources, free trainings, and so much more. Here are your hosts, Dr. Kate Campbell and Katie Lemieux.
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B
Startup Nation.
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C
Welcome back to another episode of the Private Practice Startup podcast. I am one of your hosts, Katie Lemieux, and I'm here with my talented and fabulous.
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A
Oh. Co host. Yes, that's a nice little intro. Hey, guys, it's Kate Campbell.
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C
I gotta change it up every once in a while.
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A
I know, right?
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C
Don't wanna be so dry and boring, especially on a Friday when we're trying to pull in the energy and make it all exciting.
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A
Yeah. And we have a really exciting, really titillating podcast, I guess you could say.
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C
Oh, are you trying to use new words too?
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A
Is that what's happening there? Yeah, I'm switching it up a bit. Yeah. So we actually had a podcast interview on Joe Sanock's podcast for the Practice of the practice, where Katie and I talked about the six reasons why S and M is essential for your business. Are you curious yet?
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C
Do do, do, do, do.
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A
Whoa, that's a good title.
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B
I don't know.
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A
It was a fun podcast.
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B
It was.
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C
But before we get into that and you listening to all those six essentials of why S and M is essential for your business, we wanted to let you know that last week we had an awesome, exciting and invigorating podcast with Tiffany McLean.
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A
You guys, it was so funny because Katie and I, we once a month we'll record these podcasts back to back. And she was our third podcast. And we were kind of rushed this morning, and as soon as we got on the Skype call with Tiffany, it was like we took a shot of Tiffany McCarthy McLean espresso. Oh, my gosh, her energy is so contagious. It was freaking epic. It was awesome.
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C
And if you guys don't know her already, Tiffany is always talking about fees and money. So tune into that podcast if you haven't already. And she talks about four ways to lean in and make bank in your private practice. So she talks about really debunking a lot of the issues that private practitioners have around money, asking for money, raising your fees. And she also has an awesome E course and download right on her website. But before we get into our podcast with Joe, we also know next week we are releasing Our podcast with CPA Susan decobo. It is getting to be around tax time. Well, I guess at the release of this podcast, whenever you're listening, it could always be tax time because you really should be following up on your taxes and keeping up to date with them. But Suzanne actually answers your our listeners questions about taxes as well as talks about tax strategies for private practitioners. So if this is the first time you're joining us, welcome. We have an amazing gift for you. We would love for you to head over to Private practice. Look for that resources tab and there you'll find the A to Z cheat sheet essentials for building and growing your dream practice. That is our gift to you so we can support you on your private practice journey. And we would love to interact with you guys a little bit more. So head over to Facebook and look for the private practice startup and join our group. And if you're a long time loyal listener, we totally appreciate and honor and acknowledge you and want to talk about our sponsor for today?
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A
Yes. So our sponsor for today's episode is Brighter Vision. Perry and his team over at Brighter Vision are amazing. They really are so great. They're really collaborative and gosh, we've sent so many coaches over there and everybody that we have referred their way has just said nothing but positive things. They build responsive, uniquely designed, mobile, friendly, beautiful WordPress websites and they do that for a very small monthly fee. And yeah, we couldn't say enough positive things about them. So we highly recommend them. And if you guys let them know that the private practice startup referred you, they will give you you your first month free. So that's a great resource for you guys. And you can always check out the link to Brighter Vision on our show notes page. So yeah, now that we've talked about our sponsor and kind of intro'd a little bit, today is gonna be a really unique episode. So this is actually the second time that we're doing this. We're doing a reverse interview and this was actually inspired by Joe Sanock. I had listened to the Practice of the Practice. I'm a fan of his and his podcast is great. If you guys haven't listened already, check it out for sure. I was listen to it maybe like three months ago or something like that and I heard him being featured on another podcast doing what he called a reverse interview. And I thought it was such a cool idea because it's a great way to provide additional value to multiple audiences. And so we are trying this out. We tried it out a few weeks ago with our episode With Clay cockerel on his 50th. It was his 50th. Yep. Yeah, his 50th episode. And so on our episodes, that's episode number 61, where we talked about the tips for technology assisted counseling. So, anyways, back to our episode with Joe. You guys are going to hear our fun interview with him. And it's definitely entertaining and engaging. And we talk about the six reasons why S and M is essential for your business. Anything else you want to add? No.
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C
Enjoy.
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D
Today on the Practice of the Practice podcast, we have Kate and Katie, who are from the Private Practice startup. Most of my listeners already know you ladies, so we're just going to dive right in. How you doing today?
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A
We are awesome. So excited to be here.
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D
Yeah. Well, Katie, how's your morning been?
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B
My morning has been all right from a stressful day yesterday. So today we're so far, smooth sailing.
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D
Yeah. Well, you guys are a little bit of refugees with the hurricanes, and by the time this goes live, hurricane season will hopefully be over by December.
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B
It will, thank goodness.
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A
Yeah. It ends on November 30, which can't come fast enough. I actually spent my morning at my private practice, which is still out of power, and we've been out for two weeks now. So hopefully we'll be able to move back in by Monday. Fingers crossed.
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D
Well, and I think we were talking before we started rolling about the importance of having the option of doing online counseling and even moving states for a little bit to get out of the way of a hurricane. Maybe. Katie, can you talk a little bit about kind of that process for you when we evacuated? Well, I guess, yeah, the process, but even just the importance of setting all that up before we dive into kind of our main topic, you know, just maybe some quick hit things to consider when you want to add that to your practice.
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B
Yeah, that's a great question. And I think, you know, I'm. I'm a person who looks at life and things happening in life as always, an opportunity. Right. Even though there might be, like, devastation or destruction, I always look for the opportunity. And, you know, there's things that happen in life like a hurricane coming. And what's interesting about the state of Florida, unfortunately, the islands are a total different story, but at least we have somewhere to go. But it was only north, and the whole hurricane was ascending on our state completely, so it wasn't like we could go east or west. Everyone was headed north, and it took a long time to get out. But when I was out, yeah, I had power that was Great. But it really just made me realize the importance of an online company. Because when you have an online company, you can, number one, work from anywhere that you have power. And if you're serving the globe or the nation, your business keeps running. And it's been hard. I mean, we're in private practice, you're in private practice. And when your sole income or the majority of your income is from private practice and you can't work, it's a little bit difficult. So, you know, whether you're doing online counseling or you've created a book and you. You have passive income, some type of passive income or some type of global market is really, really important. So for those of you who are thinking about other means or other revenue, I really highly encourage you guys to take a good look at that to support you and your family whether anything happens or whether you want to take three months vacation. You deserve it.
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D
Yeah. Yeah. Well, Kate, take us through your story of you and Katie coming together to make the private practice startup.
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A
Yeah. So that's an interesting story. Katie and I actually met in 2006 in our licensure supervision down here in South Florida, and we did that for two years. And then our supervisor at the time twisted our arms and convinced us to resurrect the Broward association for Marriage and Family Therapy down here. And she didn't have to twist her arms too hard because we were really ambitious and wanting to be connected to the community. And so I was president, Katie was vice president. We resurrected the chapter, which became a thriving chapter and still is today. And Katie and I realized, wow, we work so well together and really just play off of each other's strengths. And we collaborate so well, and we're really visionaries and love being entrepreneurs. And so we decided to get into business together. And we got into business together to do trainings initially. And it's just, it's really grown and evolved from there. And. Well, Katie has a successful private practice out in Coral Springs and mine is in East Fort Lauderdale. And we both attracted other mental health professionals who wanted to know, how are you doing what you're doing? How are you growing such a successful practice? Because we didn't get the business and marketing tools in school. And so we started organically attracting people and coaching them through private practice and just loved it and really decided that that was gonna be our niche in our area, that we really. Because we're most passionate and the need is there too.
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D
So I know a lot of people try to start partnerships, whether that's in starting a Practice or doing consulting. And, you know, Kelly Miranda, there's some folks that do it also. What are some things as you were exploring doing a partnership together that maybe you learned along the way, were failures along the way? What did you set up? Because that's different than when it's just like, me and I'm like, I'm going to do a bunch of podcasts. I'm going to do that. Like, I don't have to check in with anybody. And there's some benefits to that. But there's also, like, today my website was down and I'm like, crap. Like, I gotta get on the phone with my IT guy. And so what were some initial things that when you started that partnership that you guys considered that you made sure that you were on the same page just to have, I guess, no more stress than you need to have in a partnership.
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A
Katie, do you want to respond or you want me to respond?
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Sure. No, I'll respond. One of the things that I think was really helpful is I have a very good friend who's a family law attorney, and she said, katie, you need to treat your business as if it's a marriage and you actually need to talk about divorce first. And she goes, you and Kate needs to talk about if you are going to end the business relationship. What does that look like? So really starting, I mean, it might sound like grave, but starting with the end in mind, because then you can work backwards and get really clear. A lot of Kate and I are very transparent in our communication. We have systems, and even so, sometimes we're so ambitious, we kind of. It's interesting because we share the same email, and for some reason, when it doesn't refresh, like, we'll both respond to the same person and didn't realize that, but there's just, like, little things like that that happen, but it's just a constant conversation, you know, and being able to talk about things. And I think the other thing that's really important is we don't take each other personally. We know that, you know, when I'm stressed is that it's just I'm stressed or Kate's stress. And we'll vocalize that. And we don't really put it on the other person. Instead, we utilize each other as a sounding board, but also a way to decrease stress and also be able to hand things off. Like, Kate was down here during the hurricane. Like, she had to worry about six different properties, right? And I said, not a problem. I'm evacuating. I'll have power. Don't worry about the business. So it's just really awesome to be able to have that support. And I think we just do that naturally. And I think our relationship was more. It started off as a business relationship, and it grew into a friendship where I think sometimes people are friends and then they want to do business. It's kind of like, I don't know, maybe rooming with your best friend, and then you realize, like, oh, you know, they're really dirty.
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D
They're really dirty.
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B
Working. But. But we started off as a business relationship, which I think has helped, and then it evolved more into a friendship.
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D
That's awesome. Well, so I think about. If I were in a partnership, I would either feel like, man, this person's not keeping up with me at my pace, and come on, pick it up a notch, or I'd feel like, man, I'm not keeping up. It seems like I would always feel this sense of, am I working hard enough? Am I working too much? How do you guys handle that? Because I just know my personality would have a hard time with that.
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A
You know, we're both so driven. We really are. And we had a taste of what it was like to work together for three years on the board of the Broward association for Marriage and Family Therapy. So we knew that we were really driven. We're hard workers, and we always give our best. And when we're. When we have something that might be going on in our personal life, like a hurricane or situations that are out of our control, we just are very open with each other and communicate. We pick up each other's. Neither one of us are ever slackers, so if someone needs to step back a little bit, the other person kind of picks up. So it's just a really good team scenario. And it really does all boil down to the communication.
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D
Awesome. Awesome.
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B
The other thing, too, we have different strengths. I'm very much a systems person, and like the law and legal, and Kate has headed up a lot of our technology, even though she doesn't love that. But there's different strengths that we have that really correlate with each other. But also, then we, you know, we outsource and we hire people. We've had a. When we started, we had a team of volunteers, which we're so grateful for. So really building team and culture was really important and giving back to them.
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D
Now, do you guys separate out who does what? Like, here's one area that Kate does and another area that Katie does. Or is it kind of. We'll each take chunks out of each.
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A
It's a little bit of both. Yeah, it's really a little bit of both. I handle the majority of the tech stuff, which is a lot. I build our website and handle a lot of the other. The online aspects of things, and then Katie will take care of other aspects of the business. And sometimes we share and we just kind of chunk it out. We're using Trello now to communicate and organize things. So we're kind of like navigating a whole new world with that, which is really cool. We were using Slack before. We've tried Asana but didn't love it. But Trello is pretty cool so far.
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D
Yeah, that's what I use with all my virtual assistants and all my consulting clients. So anyway, S and M, where do we start?
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B
So where do we start? I think we should kick it off with a few questions to the listeners. And I know that we're not going to get the answers, but you guys are going to answer them in your head. And so when you guys, either some of you are already in practice or some of you are aspiring to be. And so as you go down through the list of the things that you need for your practice, I'm going to guess that one of those things was like an office. Right.
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D
And maybe could we frame out what the S and the M is before we dive into that?
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B
We're gonna get to it, Joe.
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D
Okay.
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B
You know, it's kind of like the mental. Exactly.
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D
All right. Okay.
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B
Trying to be our topic. So, you know, we think about most often getting an office and maybe some paperwork and I don't know, probably some business cards and a logo and a website. But most often we don't think about the essential of S and M. So what is S and M? S and M is sales and marketing. I know you guys mind is in the gutter or something like that over there, but really it's about sales and marketing. And when we get into business, it doesn't matter what business it is, S and M is really like one of the number one things that we need to spend our time, energy, and money in. And a lot of times people will want to either rent or buy an office and fill it with $10,000 worth of furniture. But what we really need to look at is where is our budget for sales and marketing? Where's our education around sales and marketing? Because ultimately sales and marketing is the. That's going to bring people into the practice. I know when I first started off, I didn't know anything about business, and I definitely did not put number one I didn't have a monetary plan to bring clients into the business, and I didn't have a plan around sales and marketing, nor did I really know much about that. And it was very, I would say, very salesy in the beginning, which nobody likes. That feels really uncomfortable. So that is what S and M is, and that's what we're talking about today.
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D
Sweet. So what else should people consider as part of their S and M plan?
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Right. So it might be helpful to jump into our six tips about S and M. Cool. Kate, you want to.
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D
What's number one?
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A
Well, before we jump in there, I just, I want to acknowledge the stigma, you know? And for those of you listening, if you think in your mind when you hear the two words sales and marketing, what do you notice that comes to mind? What do you feel? Do you get an ick factor or does it feel sleazy or uncomfortable? And if so, you're not alone. A lot of therapists kind of have that, like, you know, freak out moment. What I gotta sell myself now because most therapists go to school and they learn to be great clinicians. They don't have the business or marketing or sales background. If they're lucky nowadays, maybe they get one class in that. But when I went through school, there was certainly no training for anything like that. So we want to offer you guys a different way to think about it before we even get into our tips. And the reframe is really, it's about building relationships. It's about an organic process of having building relationships, nurturing those relationships, and really having a conversation and communicating with your ideal client and potential referral sources, letting them know that you're going to be the person, you're going to be the person to help them with their problems and achieve their goals. And when marketing is done the right way, you honestly don't even have to sell yourself. Because people will realize through the conversations that you've had online, through what they're reading, through what they're seeing, maybe they're watching videos or blogs or vlogs. And it's gonna help you naturally convert your leads into clients. So when you set yourself up and you do marketing the right way from the get go, you really don't have to be that sleazy salesperson because people know when they're calling you that you're gonna be the person to help them achieve their goals.
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D
Yeah, I totally agree. I know that when I was in almost in college, I sold vacuum cleaners door to door. And so when I talked about like sales and marketing. For the longest time I had this ick factor because I was selling something I didn't want to sell. I had no relationship with these people and I didn't believe in the product itself. But hopefully you believe in your product. Hopefully you aren't just kind of throwing your business cards everywhere. It's actually part of a relationship strategy where people just learn when you're a good fit as a therapist.
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B
Exactly. So the number one thing that we talk about is really knowing your ideal client. So know thy ideal client is really essential. And I think sometimes the mistake that we make, and I've sure made this mistake and we've made this mistake, is we feel like we have to prove ourselves through our credentials or our philosophies or our beliefs. And really completely the opposite. Really knowing who your ideal client is and we talk about the demographics, the psychographics, the geographics. Also knowing your clients external and internal pain points is really essential because just like when I work with my couples and I show them the Brene Brown video on empathy versus empathy, it's really about feeling with people and it's about getting people. People want to be known and people want to feel gotten. So the more that you are able to connect with and be with your ideal client, experience them and then actually put that copy or put that into image, your ideal client is automatically going to go, oh gosh, have they been in my head? Have they been like hanging out with me? Because this is exactly how I feel. This is what I struggle with. These are my problems and these are the results that I want.
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D
Awesome. So what's number two for the sales and marketing?
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A
Number two is to have a budget for marketing. And that's something that was a mistake that I made. When I first started in private practice in 2006, I tried to do a bunch of things for free so I would attend free networking. I built my own website. And of course we know time is money, but if I had started from the get go and I knew how to invest my money in the smart way, I would have had a greater roi, greater return on my investment there. So really the majority of your income, anywhere between 40 and 60%, especially in the beginning, should be going towards sales and marketing. And you know, it's just so important to have a clear budget and a financial plan when you're getting into private practice. And if you're already into private practice, it's okay, you can, you can create that plan now.
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D
So how did you guys come up with 40 to 60%?
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B
Great question.
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A
So I was actually.
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B
I took a week of Guerrilla Business school. Yeah. So we were talking about the triangle about customers or product, the sales and marketing aspect. And I'm blanking on the third aspect. But what they talk about is it's not only just towards the sales and marketing, but also your education around it. So that's where they came up with the 40 to 60%. So not only the website or actually paying for sales, but whether it's learning how to write good copy. So taking that amount of money and obviously it decreases over time as you kind of get that cruising altitude with your business and you're kind of jiving with things that work. But I know for all the people that do well in business and all successful people, they're constantly investing in their education. I know that. Joe, you were saying you just hired a new coach. I know. I've just spent probably like 15 grand by May in education and training and we're constantly investing in that. So whether that's learning to. And this kind of goes into number three, when we talk about strategies, is really identifying three to five strategies that really you align with. I think sometimes, and I know that I felt this way and it felt very overwhelming initially, it's kind of like, oh, well, here's a LinkedIn strategy. Okay, should I be doing that? Oh, well, here's a strategy to, okay, people are doing Facebook ads. Okay, should I do that? Here's Instagram. But I'm not even on Instagram. Why would I be doing that? You know, and so really just sitting with yourself and getting present and what do you align with? You know, do you love, like, I don't know, do you like to take pictures? Do you like the imagery stuff? Do you like to write? Are you afraid of video? And the other thing is to try things out. You never know what you like. I know when I started doing video, it actually reminded me of my years between first grade and 10th grade. And this is probably a little known fact that most people don't know about me is I used to do drama and I loved doing drama. And being in front of video is kind of just like having fun for me. So I kind of fell in love with being on video and being a little humorous and silly. So trying things out, identifying three to five strategies that you might want to try out. Some people are great in the community. Awesome. If you want to create a networking or do networking, cool. It's just really understanding what aligns with you. Trying those three to five things out and then I know we're going to talk a little bit about tracking and analyzing, to see.
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D
Well, I think it's so easy to listen to a podcast like yours or ours, and it's like, you know, you hear, oh, be on Facebook, be on Pinterest, do these things. And if you take it all in, like, I'm not doing every single thing that I interview somebody on. And for a while, I thought that the podcasters I listened to that they were taking action on every single interview, but they're not. And even thinking about a Facebook group, for a long time, I felt really guilty, like, I should have a Facebook group. All these other consultants that are kind of in our space have these thriving Facebook groups with thousands of people. But then I realized I don't want to be managing a Facebook group. I don't want to be spending all that time doing a Facebook group, and that's just not where my people hang out. But when I've been doing the World Changers Challenge a couple times a year where we have a very focused, intentional time together. So right now, we're in the midst. So in September, we're all writing an ebook together. We're each writing our own ebooks. And so to have a month that I am super active in that Facebook group, doing Facebook lives, seeing that energy just come out, I'm into that. I'm not into managing a Facebook group for a year. So instead of having thousands of people, Yeah, I have 700 people or so that are in that group, but they're super active for a short period of time. Then they take a break, they go kind of implement, and then they come back for the next World Changers Challenge. And so for me, that works. And for you guys, something like that might not work. And for someone else, it might be that they have a Facebook group or they're not even on Facebook. And so really, paring down where you spend that time I think allows you to continue to level up beyond where you're at. So I love that strategy, and especially kind of giving people permission to cut back on everything they need to be doing.
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B
Right. And I'm glad that you shared that, Joe, and that speaks to you, being aligned with what feels right to you, and it's so true. And now, you know, I think about the book, the one thing, and I know that Kate and I have been really learning a lot about online marketing this year. Like, ridiculous amount. And for me, what I'm doing now is, like, finding one person and then just, like, geeking out on everything that they have. Right. Like, I don't need to then jump over here or jump over there. It's just like, let me follow this system and understanding and see if it works and if it's creating results and it feels in alignment to me. Awesome.
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D
Yeah. So is the guerrilla marketing, is that where you're kind of spending your time learning, or was that kind of a past thing that you did?
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B
So Guerrilla Business school, I went. So at the beginning of this year, I actually went to a free seminar called the Millionaire Mind Intensive, and I. I purchased their Quantum Leap program, which is like five different programs, you know, like workshops and things like that. And so Guerrilla Business was part of that. But Kate and I have been really geeking out on Donald Miller's story brand.
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D
Oh, yeah, he's great.
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B
Yeah. Russell Brunson, of course. We read Jeff Walker. I don't know if that was earlier this year or last year, but those things have been really inspiring. A lot of our work online and Amy Crane and her Facebook ads. So that's been really supportive to what we're doing, and we're getting really good results with that.
- [26:03]
D
Well, and I love that idea that you said in S and M number two of having a budget and having education be part of that. So often, especially people that are under that hundred thousand, they bootstrap it, and partially, rightfully so. But it really limits how fast they can grow. Especially if people have created a group practice. Why not consult with them or join a mastermind group? Why not pay for the course or, you know, the individual consulting to learn how to do that? Just this morning, I was talking to a consulting client who signed up for consulting with me, and she's like, you know, you've done this before. Why would I waste my time when my hourly is so high for counseling if I save an hour of just Googling around, you know, I've paid for, you know, part of that consulting. And so we oftentimes have that bootstrap mentality. And to really get to that next level, over and over, we see that the most successful practices are the ones that say, I need to stop doing what got me here and really shift to taking hats off and outsourcing things, bringing in people that are experts in that area, or finding technology that can just kind of automate a lot of that.
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B
Amen to that. Do it, don't delegate it or delete it.
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D
Yeah, exactly.
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A
Very true.
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D
So what's your next tip there?
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A
Yeah, so we're talking a little bit about playing on your marketing strengths, which is important, and then also thinking about which of those marketing Strategies are going to be a good fit for your ideal client. And so that was number three. Number four is really finding a clear system. Actually finding clear systems, that's plural. You really need to be doing your research. We've talked about the importance of attending trainings and learning and growing. And if there's different aspects of the business that are not your passion and they're not your strength, find somebody else who can either take it over for you, find a training that you can learn about it and be able to work out those systems that way. That's something that's really, really important and it needs to be results based because if you're finding that you're wasting a ton of time in a certain area, you've got to change that system and strategy. You want things to be streamlined, you want things to flow for you, you want things to work for you. And there's a lot of resources out there in private practice so that you can systematize things.
- [28:14]
D
What are some of the resources out there that you guys like?
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A
Well, there's obviously there's things like calendly for scheduling. You can automate that. There's like simple practice, practice management type systems that you can use. We've used Slack for communicating with our team Trello. There's different ways so you're not searching through a million emails, things like that. Katie, anything you want to add?
- [28:46]
B
Well, I think just in regards to marketing and sales specifically. I know that Grant Cardone, he's big on sales, he's real estate mogul down here in Miami. And the other people that we've mentioned, like Russell Brunson, Kate and I transitioned our complete platform from. We had like, oh my gosh, like three things going on. We had like constant contact and then we were using leadpages and we had something else. So we transitioned our system into get rid of response, which we also do webinars on all our email marketing. So things like that. I know that when we wanted to go ahead and launch a webinar, that's when we looked at Jeff Walker's system. So being very intentional about what is it that I'm doing and what results do I want. Who in the industry is really the top person? That's kind of like my go to like who's the top in the industry? Let's just go straight there like you said, Joe, it's a. Why recreate the wheel?
- [29:35]
D
Yeah, totally, totally. So after systems, what's the next S and M?
- [29:41]
B
Super important is track and analyze. A lot of times people don't track and analyze. And why is that important? It's important because we can't change or improve that which we do not measure. And this is where we really like to implement the 8020 rule. So really tracking and analyzing whatever you're doing for a period of three to six months and analyzing the data. I know when I was doing paid type referrals online directories, AdWords is I would keep track of where all my referrals are coming from. And then I applied the 8020 rule, I looked at the top two things that were generating clients, and I got rid of the rest. So that's also very important in whatever type of S and M we're doing. Right. Is that you want to know what's working so you can place your money there and then remove your money from places that aren't working.
- [30:24]
D
What gets in the way of tracking and analyzing for therapists? Because I think that's one of the tips that is hardest for therapists. Katie, what have you seen?
- [30:33]
B
I think one of the things things is when you go into business and the E Myth talks about this, right. Being the technician is you're trying to do the job of many. So a lot of times as kind of feeling people or therapists, we're not all so crazy about the numbers. I mean, there's some of us that really like the numbers, but most of us are like feeling people and connecting. So that gets in the way. But when you have a good again system that tracks things like that, that's really essential. So for me, people are either contacting me through my website, which automatically populates an Excel document, or as they call, I'm just entering it on in the form myself. So at the end of the month, I can track and measure. I know for me very early on I've used Google AdWords. That's been a great help for my business. And I hired a company, I'm not the one looking at the analytics. They send me a report. We talk about it once a month. We talk about where we need to do this or change this or do that. And I let them do the work. They're the experts. Experts in that. So again, Joe, that goes back to your comment about, you know, hiring someone, even if you're in the bootstrap phase, is looking at where you can outsource. And that really goes back to having the plan.
- [31:41]
D
I'm really glad you bring up AdWords as an example. John Clark, who has the Private Practice Marketing Workshop podcast, he just launched Unconditional Media. I don't know if you guys have heard about it. But it's basically, you know, a therapist, you know, that's running Google AdWords, and he filled up within, I think, two weeks after coming to slowdown school, and now has a wait list for it. But to have somebody that you can trust, that you can say, okay, I shouldn't be spending my time first learning Google AdWords, second, then navigating how to set it up correctly, which you're probably going to do. Incorrect. And then third, like, looking at that data in the same way we have a renovation going on with this house we bought. I knew that I could do the demo phase. I can tear walls out like it's nobody's business now and throw a sledgehammer. But building a wall that's straight and doing electrical, I would do it wrong and then have to pay someone to undo my work and redo it.
- [32:34]
A
Right.
- [32:35]
D
And so I am going to outsource that all day long because I don't want to learn that stuff. That's not my big thing that I want to be doing with my time. And so I think there's so many of those areas that. That when we're tracking and analyzing, we feel like we're bad business people if we don't spend the time doing it ourselves. But it's just not a good use of your time, usually, Right?
- [32:58]
B
And with Google and Facebook and things like that, oh, my gosh, they're looking at ways to change every day. There's no way, unless we're spending 40 hours of our work week learning about that, that, you know, we should have to do that. Unless we just really love it. I mean, if you're a geek in numbers and you love all that stuff. Right on. You know, but if you're not, like you said, Joe, just outsource it.
- [33:17]
D
Well, and, Kate, I don't know what you think about this, but even if you're a geek with numbers, like I am, or I love art and design and all, so making the images for the podcast, I loved doing. But I realized if I go onto Canva and spend an hour making this beautiful image and can find someone that will do that for, you know, 15 bucks an hour, that's just not a good use of my time, even if I love it when I'm doing it. What do you think?
- [33:45]
A
Yeah, I mean, I really agree with what you guys are saying. It's important to know what your passions are and to really follow through with engaging yourself in that, because otherwise you're going to burn out. And when you try and be all things to everybody and try and manage all aspects of your business. It's not realistic. It's too much work. As an entrepreneur, you can work 24, 7 and that's just, just not sustainable, obviously. And so being able to track and measure, you know, I'm not a numbers person. I am like just. Or, you know, was never born a numbers person. I struggle with numbers. It's not my strength. But I do have systems for tracking and measuring things and they're very easy to set up. You know, just having a Google form and being able to input or have your assistant input your information of all of the potential leads and who's converting and where they're coming from. And it's so easy to be able to just pull that automate. It's a form that automatic automatically populates. You can just pull that up. You can see everything very easily. And you know, there's a lot of, lot of systems to help support your tracking and measuring, so.
- [34:51]
B
But I'm glad you said that, Joe. It's funny because I just saw someone post on Facebook and I made my own little sign and my sign says, and it sits right next to where I work. It says, is that worth 165, 400 plus dollars an hour question mark? And it says, no, I didn't think so. Get back to making money. Do it, dump it, delegate it, or delete it. So that's a reminder, as we do as entrepreneurs, need to identify where our time is best spent and where we can outsource things. So I'm glad that you share that.
- [35:18]
D
Yeah. Well, even this week upgrading our hosting because we kept crash. The website kept crashing because of downloads from the podcast and other things. You know, some people would say, well, I don't want to spend an extra 70 bucks a month. But I was on it. I think I spent probably four hours of the last month after. Of the last week after having my assistant on the phone. So I tried to get it solved with my assistant. That didn't work. And then I had my IT support and all this. And, you know, there's just a time when you just say, I'm gonna pay the money, I don't care. Like, I need to be doing the things that I need to be doing, not not spending my time on this. And I think that's the mindset of those top practices that are really ready to scale, where they go from that six figures to that multi. Six figures.
- [36:00]
A
Yeah, we kind of had a similar thing with our website. Our website has been running really slow And I've tried to outsource on fiverr and upwork and people are like, yeah, I can fix that, I can fix it. And we pay money and it's still running slow. And then finally got on the phone with Google or Godaddy yesterday and they were like, ok, here's the fee of what it's going to cost cost to fix it. And it was basically all of our images are too large. And if I was going to sit there and resize all of the images on every single page of our website, that would take me days and days and days. So to be able to outsource stuff like that is just so important.
- [36:34]
D
That's awesome. All right, so what's next?
- [36:37]
A
Okay, so the last tip number 6 of S&M would be KISS. So keep it super simple. When we first started we went way too wide. And this happens with a lot of private practitioners as well. They want to be generous. They don't want to leave anybody out. They want to, you know, they enjoy working with different populations. And for us with our marketing, because we didn't have a strategy because in the beginning we weren't tracking and measuring. It was like throwing spaghetti and meatballs. That's the other S and M against the wall trying to see what sticks and you waste so much time. Bonus. S and M. Yeah. So don't throw the spaghetti and meatballs. S and M kiss instead. Right? Keep it super simple.
- [37:17]
D
Simple instead of the old one was simple stupid.
- [37:21]
A
Exactly.
- [37:21]
D
And I'm like, I always felt like don't call me stupid. Keep it super simple. I agree. I think that oftentimes we make it overly complex and really don't think about what is it that we want our potential clients to do on our say, website, for example. And so I've seen so many people that you go to the main website, you click on their Contact Us page, that person is about to schedule an appointment and then they have a pop up download my ebook. It's like this person is about to give you 150, $200 an hour over 10 sessions and you're going to give them an ebook like that is distracting from what you're supposed to be doing. Now if you're on a blog post and you want to build value and expertise, like that's moving them towards scheduling that appointment. But even just keeping it simple for the leads that are coming in, asking yourself, am I moving them step by step closer to picking up that phone or clicking that online scheduling or dropping an email to us to schedule an appointment that's the reason you have a counseling website. Schedule a freaking appointment. Anything that distracts from that or moves you away from that is not keeping it super simple.
- [38:29]
A
Amen. Yep. Couldn't agree more. Even having your social media links, you don't want to be driving people away from your website. You want to have people staying on your website following your call to action and making it very clear.
- [38:41]
D
Yeah, I'm a big fan of having only three or four menu buttons on a counseling practice to just have kind of an about us specialties and then contact us. You know, you can have your blogs kind of down below somewhere, but when it's, you know, I want you to read my blog post. Subscribe to our blog Recent Blog posts. Your blogging is mostly for SEO. You can connect with your clients for sure through it, but when that's your big call to action, I think people lose clients too. So keep it super simple. So the six ways to scale with S and M, we have ideal client budget for it. Three to five strategies that you align with systems. Track and analyze and kiss. Holy cow. Kate and Katie, you guys rock. So if every counselor, owner, counseling practice owner were listening right now, you know, worldwide, what would you want them to know? Why don't we start with Kate?
- [39:39]
A
I would just want them to know that sales and marketing shouldn't be intimidating. It's all about building a connection and having a conversation and nurturing those relationships over time. And it can be done so organically and so naturally. It doesn't matter if you're an extrovert or an introvert. Just play on your strengths and start small. Start with one first step that you can do and it's totally manageable and possible to have the practice of your dreams.
- [40:07]
D
Katie, what about you?
- [40:09]
B
What I would say is, I think a lot of what Kate would say, but what's most important is that you just kind of sit in align with what's really important to you. And one of the things that I tell my interns all the time, I go the great thing about being a therapist is you actually already have sales and marketing skills. You just think that they exist within the four walls or online or whatever. And you guys are already naturally good at engaging people and connecting with people and asking questions. And that's really all what sales marketing is essentially in the beginning, but it is more obviously. And really identifying ways to take your skills and transfer them into other contexts is really important. And I know we didn't get to talk about the sales part so much, but when we talk about really setting up your. You're marketing the right way. Like Kate said, the sales becomes easy. Now, we could talk probably for another podcast of having that initial call, but it's the same thing that you do on your initial call with you do with your marketing is you're asking questions. You're positioning yourself as the expert in the guide and helping people get results. Bottom line, it doesn't matter what if you want to lose 10 pounds, if you want to, I don't know, be able to shoot a bow and arrow and hit the target every time. Ultimately, people want results. And if you can help people understand that, you can get them the results that they want and connect with them in a genuine way. It's a win. Win.
- [41:23]
D
Yeah. When we were at Slowdown School, Koopla Media, Brendan and Connor did a session about how to talk about the video. And I just love how simple they framed it. They said, okay, what's the struggle people are dealing with? What's the plan that you come with? And then what's the outcome that they get? And if you just have your first sentence of your psychology Today, of your website of other things have those components, people connect with that, it shows them some hope and they're ready to schedule.
- [41:49]
B
Exactly. And we make it too complex because we like to go into our psychobabble about, I do cognitive behavioral therapy and emdr and it's going to help you release the trauma of the past. And people are like, what?
- [42:00]
D
Yeah, no, no, yeah. If you do emdr, that's important work, but nobody knows what that means outside of us. So it's like, are you having a time hard, hard time falling asleep because of the trauma in your life? I have this plan where I use this approach called EMDR so that you can go back to sleep.
- [42:17]
B
Yeah, perfect. Get some rest.
- [42:19]
D
Awesome. Well, Kate and Katie, thank you so much for being on the Practice of the Practice podcast.
- [42:24]
A
Thanks for having us. This was awesome.
- [42:27]
D
Yeah. Stay safe down there in the hurricane zone.
- [42:30]
B
Thanks.
- [42:30]
A
Take care, Joe. All right, bye. Thanks for joining us on the Private practice starting. Visit theprivatepracticestartup.com for awesome resources, free trainings, attorney approved private practice paperwork, and so much more. SA.