Marketing Your Private Practice - Part III

You are already successful in getting SOME new clients, otherwise you wouldn’t be in practice, right?

But are you getting the right kind of clients? Ones that appeal to your clinical skills and strengths? Ones that can pay your fees — or whose insurance lists you as a preferred provider?

My goal when working with therapists is to help you identify what you’re already doing well that attracts your ideal clients and to encourage you to do more of that — but to do it consistently, so you don’t have that “feast or famine” look to your appointment books.

The temptation is to take as many billable hours as you can right now and worry about marketing later, but that’s exactly what leads to feast or famine.

The problem I find with most therapists is that when you put something on your to-do list that has to do with marketing, you’re the only one making sure it gets done. If a client emergency comes up, marketing is what suffers. That’s okay once or twice, but marketing has to be a priority — you need to be consistent. It’s better to do one thing consistently than to do four or five things only once.

I conducted a survey of therapists recently and found that the majority of therapists responding spent one hour EACH MONTH on marketing their practice. That's not really enough to build your brand. An hour a week will get you closer to filling your practice.

Some therapists nationally have done an excellent job creating their personal brand. Their name is synonymous with the work they do. What kind of work do these therapists do?

– Dr. Ruth [sex]

– Michele Weiner-Davis [relationships]

– Frank Pittman [affairs]

You can either build your brand yourself, or capitalize on a national brand … especially a well-known one. For example, you might be “Omaha’s Dr. Ruth.”

Even if you only want a handful of new clients each month, you can attract your ideal client by conscientiously choosing what kind of clients you want to work with, and using some specific strategies to attract those kinds of clients.

For example, if you want to work with clients on stress management issues and you like the way Blue Cross Blue Shield (BCBS) insurance reimburses, put together a brown bag lunch talk on “Reducing Stress on the Job” and pitch it to an employer who has BCBS as their insurance provider.

Read more in Part Four.