Many health care  professionals

"Warning" by Drift Words / Matt

supplement their incomes with professional writing.  If you are an author or journalist whose livelihood has fallen on hard times due to illness or the economic recession, check out these fabulous resources posted by the National Association of Science Writers.

(Thanks to Catherine Dold, freelance science writer, for passing this info along to one of my favorite discussion lists, Boulder Media Women!)

Tags: Freelance, Income

After living in Colorado for 7 years, I have found the most amazing veterinarian. You might be asking what that has to do with your health care practice getting and keeping more clients. So . . . let me tell you! Dr. Wendy Hauser’s Coal Creek Animal Hospital does several things that make me feel like I belong there. Do your new clients feel the same way?

Put Your Client at Ease

At Coal Creek Animal Hospital, every employee wears a name tag. Think that’s cheesy? Think again! When they wear their name tags, I’m not embarrassed by forgetting their names.

If you are a sole practitioner with no office support, then perhaps you want to fore go the name tag. However, if your name, like mine, is often pronounced in multiple ways or is not a name that is commonly heard or easily remembered, you may want to repeat it several times over the first few sessions so that you client does not feel awkward about forgetting it or possibly mispronouncing it. The bottom line here is to put your client at ease.

Let Your Client Know that You Understand

Everyone from the office manager to the veterinarians always fusses over my dogs – Opie, Taylor, and Punky – as if they were my children! And, they do this even when they are not in tow! I’ve convinced myself that Dr. Hauser and her staff think my pups are their favorite patients – and they’ve only met two out of the three so far!

Do you do that? Do you ask about your clients’ children or dogs or significant other? If they’ve mentioned them to you in the past, you definitely should inquire about them again. It lets your clients know that you are listening, that you care, and that you get that they care about the other members of their family!

Take Your Time

Another thing that Dr. Hauser does that really works for me is that she takes time to visit with my partner and me even on her busiest days.

What does that do for me? It builds rapport. It makes me think that she actually enjoys seeing and spending time with me and my partner! I get the impression that it’s not just about the money! Can your clients say the same thing?

Keep Your Eyes Open

So here’s one of my secrets for great marketing. . . . Keep your eyes open. Don’t limit your study of marketing strategies to only your profession. Not all marketing is equal. However, there are many professions, like ours, that are built on relationships. Your financial planner, your religious community, your veterinarian, and your graphic designer all have services to sell. But, more importantly, they have relationships to sell.

Take a look to see what simple and cost-effective marketing strategies other professions are implementing that you can “borrow” for your own practice. And, drop me a line here to let me know what you are finding and experimenting with!

Tags: Relationships

If you aren’t sure about where to begin working on your private practice, you may want to start by creating a Life List for Your Practice. Here’s how you do that. . . .

"Up, Up and Away! 236 / 365" by mollyjolly / Maria Johnson

Step 1 – Start by making a list . . .

a “brain dump” of everything you know you need to do for your business. Do you need to put your Marketing Kit together? If so, itemize exactly what you need to do i.e. find a graphic designer, find a printer, find an office, print receipts, meet physicians, create a menu of services? Be as specific as you can be when making your list.

Step 2 – Then, add to that list (being as specific as you can) everything that you know you want to do with your business. Do you want to write a book? Expand to multiple locations? Hire other therapists? See clients only on the weekend? Offer EMDR? Facilitate retreats in France? Provide workshops on hypnosis? Begin offering public speaking? Think big! Be bold! You have the rest of your professional life to accomplish these things!

Step 3 – Think of your Life List for Your Practice as a product that is a working list in continuous flux. It changes as you change. As you accomplish these goals, check them off.

And, back to Step 1 – As you become aware of new to-do’s for your practice, make sure you add them to the list.

What are the to-do’s you have on your Life List for Your Practice?

Tags: Goals, Life List

Working on your business is not the same as working in your business.   That came as news to me when I first read Lynn Grodski’s primer, Building Your Ideal Private Practice.  I used to think that if I was seeing my clients or charting notes on my clients that I was working on my business.  After all, this is why I went to graduate school — to learn the clinical piece.

It’s Not Enough

Unfortunately, the clinical knowledge and skills of psychotherapy did not begin to prepare me for the business end of private practice.   As long as I wanted to work in an agency or hospital for someone else, that would have been good enough.  However, for those of us who have the entrepreneurial bug and yearn to be in business for ourselves . . . the clinical knowledge and skills are only half of the private practice package.  In fact, you can easily and quickly starve to death if you know nothing or do nothing to work on the business end of your practice.

Working On Your Business

To paraphrase Lynn Grodski, “working on your business is at least as important as working in your business.”  And, working on the business means spending time, money, and resources to create and sustain a healthy flow of clients coming into your business.  Some of these tasks include:

• Developing ideas for new services;
• Learning about new marketing strategies;
• Re-working packaging for your services;
• Branding for your business;
• Designing business cards, letterhead, postcards, and advertising;
• Networking with other professionals to educate them about your business;
• Creating (and using) a marketing kit;
• Writing articles / books for publication;
• Drafting informational brochures for client education; and,
• Updating your professional vita;

To work on your business means recognizing that your work in private practice extends far beyond just the skills of counseling and psychotherapy.

What I’m Doing

Today, I have met with my graphic designer, Jennifer Gunther of Nudge Creative, to rework my business card and letterhead.  I have vetted a potential printer for my print needs. I have collaborated with my blog designer, Beth Hayden of Basics of Blogging.  I met another colleague for lunch to brainstorm about my marketing needs. I’m writing this post for my blog.  These are the things that I am doing to work on my business today.

What about you? What are the ways that you are working on your business today?

Tags: Articles, Brand, Brochure, Business Card, Packaging, Resume