Welcome to The Business of Being Well. If you're a hands-on practitioner who wants to grow a profitable business without working your life away, you're in the right place. So sit back, take a deep breath, and enjoy the show.
Tara Trottier takes us on a ChatGPT crash course. If you're curious, confused, excited, or even apprehensive about ChatGPT then this episode is for you. We'll start with the basics and then explore specific ways you can utilize this tool to save you time and mental space.
If you've been taught that more clients and faster appointments is the key to your practice's success then you need this episode to remind you of the magic, sacredness, and energy that exists in your simple touch. Etienne Peirsman quickly became one of my favorite guests to date and I know you'll appreciate his perspective, too!
Maybe you thought sales and marketing were the same thing? Wellness Business Coach Joanna Sapir shares the critical difference between the two and why that knowledge holds the key to attracting and retaining your practice's ideal clients! Joanna's FREE Resource for our listeners HERE
Today I'm talking with sleep consultant Ava Dark! If you're anything like me, much of your sanity hinges on the amount of sleep you're able to get. Ava and I chat about the irony around the phrase, "sleeping like a baby", how gentle/attachment parenting and sleep training CAN co-exist and how to address sleep issues with young and older kiddos by having healthy sleep boundaries.
Zack Shreier may not be our "typical" guest but he does have some very applicable nuggets to share with all of you health and wellness practitioners! Zack's childhood diagnosis of type 1 diabetes was the seed for his first invention that landed him on Shark Tank. I especially enjoyed comparing and contrasting the scaling power of product vs. service-based businesses. Zack shares about his experience working with the FDA to approve his most recent invention along with his data-driven, nutritional approach to sustaining his productivity and capacity. We cover lots of entrepreneurial topics and I'm excited for you to listen in.Click HERE to access Zack's special bonus for our listeners.
We all know that stress can have a negative impact on our health, but it can be hard to know how to reduce it. Fortunately, in this episode Dr. Zephanie Cole shares three pillars of health you can dive into to reduce stress and improve your overall health. I have so enjoyed coaching Dr. Zephanie over the past several years; her personal and professional story highlight the importance of knowing your hormone levels, gut health, and toxin load.If you consider yourself crunchy/healthy but are still dealing with annoying symptoms (life fatigue) you'll especially want to pay attention when Dr. Zephanie shares about her favorite test that addresses each one of her three health pillars for reducing stress.
In this episode I'm talking to Kara McKeage, owner of Pepper's Personal Assistants. We chat about ditching the shame around outsourcing household help and the unmissable signs that you need to hire support at home; including feeling overwhelmed, feeling resentful, and having difficulty managing tasks. Kara dives into the client/personal assistant matching process and the most common tasks she sees clients delegating to a personal assistant including laundry, vendor management, pet care, and meal prep. While delegating tasks in your home may feel vulnerable at times, this episode will give you the motivation and resources to do so, allowing you time to focus on more profitable and fulfilling tasks only you can do.
Join Dr. Danielle Angela and guest Jamie Van Cuyk as they talk about overcoming delegation fears and hiring well. As a practice owner, it can be difficult to let go of control and delegate tasks to your team. As women, this fear often comes from the false belief that you have to prove that you can "do it all", and that you will be seen as a failure if you need help. However, this is an essential part of success and growth. Delegating tasks to your team allows you to focus on the most important tasks that only you can do, which ultimately makes it possible for you to make more money and have a bigger impact.
In this episode of the Health and Wellness Practitioners podcast, host Dr. Danielle Angela and her two guest financial experts, Dr. David Richardson and Dr. TJ Neveau discuss financial systems that every practice owner needs to have in place to get ahead and create wealth. Many health and wellness practitioners are drowning in student loan debt, if that's you, Drs David and TJ will provide practical hope for achieving personal wealth. Plus, they outline what it looks like to work with a financial planner to achieve your unique goals.
In this episode, Dr. Danielle Angela sits down with leadership coach Jen Hope to talk about overcoming imposter syndrome. They identify symptoms of impostor syndrome and how self-compassion and acceptance, although difficult to practice, are keys to overcoming imposter thoughts. Plus, if you dread marketing your practice, Jen shares practical ways to build your competency and create confidence.
In this episode of the Health and Wellness Practitioners podcast, host Dr. Danielle Angela speaks with money coach Mikelann Valterra about how to stop stressing about money. Mikelann discusses her decision to become a money coach and how helping people develop a healthy relationship with money can improve all other areas of their lives. Money can often be a block for people, causing stress and frustration, but Mikelann emphasizes that it should be seen as a tool or resource to live the life we want. You will gain insight into how to manage your finances and find a healthy balance.
In this episode Dr. Danielle Angela is joined by Dr. Jodi Dinneramn. Dr. Jodi is a chiropractor, author, mom, wife, and creator of the SEWP school. Dr. Jodi shares her tips for practitioners who want to learn more about creating a joy-filled Staffless Practice. But wait, don't go firing your staff right now! If your practice requires more than you, Dr. Jodi shares how to focus on and utilize your team's true talents. Automation holds the key to so many successes in your practice but did you know you can automate with a personal style?? Dr. Jodi shares how to do that and so much more on this episode of the Health and Wellness Practitioners Podcast. In this episode we discuss: Your Staff & Their True Talents (who needs to drink the Kool-Aid?) You Don't Always Need 0 Staff, You Need the Right Staff What To Do Next on Your Staffless Practice Journey Time Studies & Empathy
Welcome to the Health and Wellness Practitioners Podcast. I am your host, Dr. Danielle Angela. In this show, I and my guest experts will talk about everything from getting your practice started to developing your clinical skills, growing your practice your way, and of course, dealing with the real stuff like burnout and work-life balance. Whether you've been practicing for decades or just started your journey, you'll find something here for you. So take a deep breath and enjoy the show.Hello, hello friends. Welcome to the Health and Wellness Practitioners Podcast, episode 238. I am your host, Dr. Danielle Angela, and in this episode, we are going to be talking about how to make a marketing plan for a new practice or business.Now, before you run away from this podcast, I know that you don't like hearing about marketing, but I just want to encourage you that, you know, if you went through the time to study the modality that you practice, whether it's midwifery, chiropractic, acupuncture, massage therapy, whatever it is, you are a smart person. You are capable of learning new things, and marketing is just a skill. It's just a skill. Some of us have, you know, invested a lot of time and energy in developing that skill, and others haven't. But wherever you are, it's okay. You can learn the skill of marketing.And don't forget too that, you know, marketing is the essential, like the first component, the first function of running a business. And if you want to be able to help people, then you've got to be able to get the word out about what you do and how you serve in your practice, right? So don't be afraid. And well, actually, even if you are afraid, it's okay. You can still move forward and learn the skill of marketing anyway. And remember why you are doing this. It is ultimately at the end of the day to be able to help more people. And as a reward, you make money and you get to live a better life. Okay, so. When it comes to making a marketing plan for a new practice, it can get really confusing real fast because there are so many different strategies and tactics that you can take, especially in 2023 with so many different social media platforms.Before we dive into specifics, I want to give a shout out to one of my favorite books on this topic, which is the One Page Marketing Plan. And the One Page Marketing Plan kind of breaks down the overall strategy and then the tactics. So the strategy is like the approach and the tactics are the “what to do”. If you really wanna go deeper into this topic and you want to spend time improving your skill set and marketing, then I definitely highly recommend getting the one-page marketing plan. It is called the One Page Marketing Plan, but it is not a one page book. It's just FYI. Okay, so...as I was mentioning, there are so many different things you can do and so many different ways you can go with marketing your business in today's world, right? So let me give you first, two things that I really, really, really encourage new practitioners or people who are starting a new practice; you could be a very seasoned practitioner and not a seasoned business owner, right? You could be in practice for two decades and not have ever owned your own business, but maybe you want to start one now whatever the case is. if you are starting your own channel business. I highly encourage you to get a jumpstart on social media as soon as you can. So if you are a student and you're studying your modality, you're a chiropractic student or an acupuncture student, it doesn't really matter what you're studying. Start a social media account for your future business as soon as you know that there will be a future business. This really freaks a lot of people out, by the way, because they're like, oh my gosh, I'm just a student, I know nothing, I don't even have a business yet, can I really put it out there? And the answer to that question is yes, you can. And the only person that can really decide that you can't is you. Although, yes, you have to abide by the user terms of agreement for any social media platform that you decide to use - you can start using that social media platform within those terms of agreement anytime that you are ready to take the leap.And I know as a student, you might be thinking, well, I can't give people advice. I don't know enough information, et cetera. But you know that most of the things that you follow on social media are not educational per se, right? They're not teaching you the encyclopedia. Oh my gosh, I just aged myself big time by saying the encyclopedia. I used to go to the library and read the encyclopedia before dance class after school. Okay, that was a side note, but you don't have to teach people in-depth information. In fact, you can just share about your life and share about who you are and what you're studying and why you're excited about what you're studying. And that's really enough.But imagine that you get a one to two year jumpstart on social media before you even start the business. You'll be so much better off because the people that follow you will already know what's up. They'll already know why you're doing what you do. They'll already know what it is that you've been learning and what you're offering. And they'll be in the know when it's time for you to open your business and start booking new clients or new patients. So I highly, highly, highly, highly, highly encourage you to get started on social media as soon as you are willing to take the leap.Okay, the second thing that you need to start doing as soon as possible is narrowing down a target market for your future business. Now, again, this can be kind of a scary suggestion for some people because they think that I'm telling them that they need to have a niche and they don't have to have a niche to have a target market. In other words, that doesn't mean that you have to be an expert in something very, very specific in order for you to be clear about who the target market is for your business. So I know we've talked a lot, a lot, a lot about target marketing and ideal patients or clients on this podcast, but it bears repeating because it gets misunderstood so often. So hear me, okay? Listen up. This is important. This is really important as a future business owner. In the quest to become a leader, you want to have a successful business, then you need to have a defined target market for that business. This is not the same as having a niche practice. A niche practice definitely requires having a very clear target market, but the beauty of target marketing is that when you're marketing to a select group of people, you will actually attract all kinds of people through your marketing. So you've probably heard me say this before, but I'll say it again. Marketing to everyone is like marketing to no one. When you're just trying to market to everyone, nobody really listens because it's not connecting with people on a deeper emotional level.When you're clear about who your target market is, you can then connect with those people on a deeper level because you can express your understanding of what they struggle with and what they're really going through in their real lives and also that you can help them.See the difference? So yes, while you need to have a target market to have a successful business or practice, it doesn't mean that you have to have a niche practice. Your target market will be attracted to what your target market is expressing through your marketing, but so will lots of other kinds of people. And that doesn't mean that your target marketing isn't working by the way, so don't get distracted. Stay focused on the target markets, even when your marketing is attracting other types of people. It just means that your marketing is working.So if you want to market to no one, then try marketing to everyone. Or if you market to everyone, you're really marketing to no one. If you want your time and energy in marketing to be effective, then you need to have a clear target market. So what is a clear target market? Let's be really clear about what a clear target market is. A clear target market is not women. A clear target market is not children. And a clear target market is not families. A clear target market is actually narrowed all the way down to a specific type of person. One type of person.I have been on a sabbatical from practice for a few years now, but when I was still actively practicing and growing in practice, my ideal patient avatar's name was Sarah. And Sarah was a photographer. She had three children, she was married, she was running her own business, and she was very busy with all of her kids' sport activities. Sarah struggled with headaches and there was definitely a correlation between her menstrual cycle and her headaches, but one of the only things that she found that relieved her headaches once they came on was chiropractic care.Of course, it took Sarah a bit to understand that. If she stayed consistent under chiropractic care, then her headaches didn't come back. But it was when she got off track with her appointments, when she had long shoots at weddings, wore her camera around her neck, you know, like with the strap that goes around her neck, set her computer for very long hours editing photos - that the headaches would come on.So eventually Sarah learned that chiropractic definitely helped her with her headaches and if she stayed consistent with care over the long term, her headaches were far less frequent and far less intense. So that was Sarah. Sarah is someone that I could clearly help because chiropractic helped relieve her headache intensity when she had a headache, but it also helped her reduce the frequency and intensity of her headaches over the long term and I'm really good at helping people relieve headaches and neck pain through chiropractic care. So I felt really comfortable focusing on that target market in my practice. So see how specific I was with my ideal patient avatar? That's really, really specific, right? A lot of times I ask people, who is your target market? And they're like, women between the ages of 25 to 65. That's not clear enough, friends. I don't know about you, but I was a different person when I was 25, when I was 35, and I'll surely be a different person when I'm 45 than I am right now.I have different problems, I have different needs, I have different dreams. So to be able to be effective in marketing to any specific person, you need to be really clear about eating healthy a very narrow population, if you will.Don't let this scare you.Don't let this scare you.Don't let this scare you.Because what often happens is your brain will tell you and other people in your life around you will also tell you that you're scared turning people away by focusing on a target market. But again, remember, when you market to everyone, you really market to no one. It's very ineffective and it can feel like you're putting out a lot of energy and getting nowhere. So if you want to be effective in marketing, you've gotta be clear about who the target market is, even if your friends and your colleagues tell you that you're doing it wrong or that you're gonna be risking making people feel excluded from what you offer by being clear about who the target market is for your business.I don't know why this is such a struggle for us in health and wellness professions, because it is just an obvious, necessary, essential part of business outside of health and wellness professions. I think because we learn specific modalities and maybe because some of the other mentors and teachers that we learned from back in the day when they were growing their own businesses, it was probably less important for them to have a target market and they could just be like, oh, I have this amazing thing that I do, chiropractic, or, you know, I'm gonna do this acupuncture, right, or Reiki. And they could just talk about that in their communities, they could advertise it in the newspaper, they could put something in the church bulletin, and people would think, hmm I need to try this chiropractic thing. But that doesn't happen anymore. It doesn't work that way anymore. So we can't just go out and try to teach the world about whatever the modality is that we learned, whether it was chiropractic or again, Reiki, acupuncture, massage therapy, whatever it may be. You have to be able to connect with people with where they are and what is going on in their lives right now in order for you to be seen and heard and for them to know that what you offer is for them.Okay, so far we have covered starting out on social media and we've also talked about target marketing. Next we're going to dive into relationship marketing.Relationship marketing is so, so, so simple. And as we talked about in the last episode, it's so important. You can get easily distracted by Facebook ads and Google AdWords and email marketing and TikTok and Instagram and as I shared in the last episode if for any reason any of those platforms were taken away from you because maybe you violated terms of service or your account was hacked or whatever happens then you lose all of the work that you've put in there. And if that is the only way that you are bringing in new patients or clients to your business, you're in big trouble.So instead of putting all of your eggs in one basket, a basket that could be very quickly and swiftly taken away from you, you need to focus on relationship marketing. All relationship marketing is, is just getting to know people in your local area, or if you're an online or hybrid type of business, getting to know people who are in your area are in similar types of professions or businesses as yours that do something a bit different, but there's also some overlap.Building these relationships is key because when people know you, like you, and trust you, and they also understand what it is that you do that's unique and different, aka who your target market is, then they'll refer their friends, their family, their potential clients, who are maybe not the right fit for them, to you instead, because they know, oh, this person has this problem.I know the exact person to help you with that problem. Person A has a problem. Person B is the expert in solving that problem. Person A, you need to go see Person B. So that's what we want working for you, right? We want people to know you as the go-to expert for a problem. And when you are known as a GoToExpert, you will be receiving referrals from existing clients, from existing patients, from other practitioners, providers, and professionals in your local area or even around the world.The beauty of this is that you will be receiving those referrals and not having to rely solely on social media or spending money on advertising. The downfall of this is that you never know where those referrals are coming from or when they're coming, so you can't rely on this strategy alone. However, that being said, this is the foundation of marketing when you are a health and wellness practitioner who works with clients one-to-one, especially if you have a brick and mortar service. If you work with your clients in person because what you do is so personal. People need to know you. They need to like you. They need to trust you in your community as well as amongst your patient or client population. When that's happening, you'll be receiving referrals like you won't believe.Okay, so, oh, oh, oh, I don't want to forget to add, and I didn't talk about this in the last episode.The people that come to you by referral are very, very often your ideal patients or clients. The people that find you through social media ads are usually not. They're usually people that are looking for a deal or they're just wanting to try this out for a visit or two.But the people that come to you by referral have been informed by someone that they know, who they trust, who has said, this is what you need to do, go see this person. And they've probably also shared a bit about their experience and what to expect, right? So the people that schedule with you as a new patient or client who have been referred to by an existing patient or client or another practitioner, provider, professional are very often amazing patients or clients to work with in your practice. So it's worth it. It's so worth the time and the energy that you invest in building those relationships.Another thing that I want to express to you about building relationships, aka relationship marketing, is that it doesn't have to be cheesy. You don't have to take lunch to the medical doctor's office down the street. You don't have to go door to door from business to business passing out brochures and business cards. You don't have to take a cake to, oh, I don't know, the auto shop down the road and introduce yourself. It doesn't have to be what other people have shown you that it is. It can just be reaching out to people that don't already know you, that you don't already know, who you want to get to know, and you want to find out, are they like-minded? Do you like them and are you interested in what they do, who they are, et cetera? And from there, relationships grow and develop, and eventually referral relationships grow and develop as well.So this is key, but so often overlooked. What I don't want is for you to DM me on Facebook or Instagram and say, oh my gosh, I'm so struggling with getting new clients or patients. My business is so slow. Please help me and you say, and I ask him what have you been doing for marketing? And you're like, well I tried running some ads, but that didn't really work.And I'm like, okay, what else have you been doing for marketing? And you don't know, or there's just nothing. You've been doing nothing.There are so many episodes in this podcast to help you get momentum going in your practice and they're all free. So implement what you learn here on this podcast because it works, okay? And on the note of it working, I wanna give you two stellar examples. First, my client Dr. Katie. She is in Illinois. She came to me, gosh, initially probably like 2016, she was thinking about starting a practice and she was working for another company, earning a really high salary. And it was very comfortable for her. She wanted to start her own practice, but she wasn't quite ready yet. So she came to me later in 2019, I believe it was, and she was like, all right, I'm ready, let's do this. So she started her own practice that year. And she started to feel fine. Now, three and a half years later, she just celebrated her highest grossing month in January and then celebrated her highest grossing month in February of 2023. She also bought a brand new dream vehicle and paid herself five figures for the first time this month. Imagine if that was you. Let me tell you how she did it.She was very specific about a target market. She is known as a go-to expert in her area for helping babies and for prenatal care, but really a lot of her clinical time is spent working with babies. So, that is example number one. Her target market is babies, oftentimes with lip and tongue tie issues, tethered oral tissue, maybe plagiocephaly, torticollis, etc.Okay, example number two is Dr. Erika. Similar situation, but a little different. She was, I think, about seven months pregnant with her third child when she came to me and said she wanted to start her own practice and I was like, well, okay, go for it. And she said, everyone thinks I'm crazy because I'm so pregnant and I wanna start my own business, but I don't wanna go back to work as an associate. Okay, totally doable. So let's do this. She kept her expenses low, just like Dr. Katie did. She made sure that she was focused on a target market. She set the hours that she wanted to work only. And now, roughly, what, five or six years later, she's making a lot of money. In her practice, she's working part-time hours. Granted, she has a lot of things going on. She's got a lot of side projects happening now, but her practice has nearly exploded. And it has happened because she's become the go-to expert in her community for helping children with sensory issues, children on the spectrum, et cetera. So two amazing examples of how this can work for you. Okay. And in both of those cases, yes, people told them you shouldn't do it that way. You should do it this way, but they followed the advice that I share here on this podcast, as well as what I offer in my coaching programs. They did it and they're doing it so successfully.Okay, so, how to make a marketing plan for a new practice. First, start on social media as quickly as you can. Don't be afraid that you don't know enough. Just get started, be a real human and the payoff will come when your business is ready to open. Secondly, ensure that you know who the target market is. Oh, I want to add to this just a quick note that defining a target market is a decision. You don't have to go on like a soul searching journey to discover who you're meant to serve. Just decide this is a target market that you want to work with. Even if you're not entirely sure, it's okay. Define a target market. You can let it evolve as you evolve as a practitioner.Then third, start building relationships now or as soon as you can, if it's not today, OK? These three things are going to help you get such momentum when you are ready to open your practice. If you need further guidance on how to build relationships and how to become that go-to expert in your community, how to become KNOWN as the person to go to for a specific problem so that you are receiving referrals and not wasting your nights and weekends at screenings and health fairs or spending thousands of dollars on social media ads that you don't really have to spend anyway. Reach out to me because I have a group coaching program starting in March called KNOWN and it is going to be exactly for you whether you have just started to practice or starting one soon, or you're a seasoned practitioner who just needs to get a better handle on growing your business. KNOWN will be amazing. It's such a simple, simple process that I teach in this experience, but it's so easy that it's sustainable and actually can even feel fun. All right, so DM me on Instagram if you want to learn more and chat about if it's a good fit for you. You can find me at Dr. Danielle Angela on Instagram. And then be sure to join me next week for another new episode. I will see you then. Take care.Hey, thanks so much for joining me for today's episode. If you love this podcast, then be sure to join our free community, the Health and Wellness Practitioners Group over on Facebook where you can continue the discussion and get to know other people in the community as well. We're a group of chiropractors, naturopaths, acupuncturists, midwives, doulas, massage therapists, mental health therapists, counselors, nutritionists, and the list goes on. So come join us, get to know other people, build some personal and professional relationships. You can find the group by heading to drdanielangela.com forward slash community and request to join the group. I will see you inside from there.
Welcome to the Health and Wellness Practitioners Podcast. I am your host, Dr. Danielle Angela. In this show, I and my guest experts will talk about everything from getting your practice started to developing your clinical skills, growing your practice your way, and of course, dealing with the real stuff like burnout and work-life balance. Whether you've been practicing for decades or just started your journey, you'll find something here for you. So take a deep breath and enjoy the show.Hey there and welcome to the Health and Wellness Practitioners Podcast, episode 237. I'm your host, Dr. Danielle Angela, and in today's episode, we are going to be talking about why Facebook ads are not bringing you your ideal patients or clients. It's just gonna be you and I chatting about this today on the podcast, similar to the last couple of episodes, but I am going to be having some new guests coming onto the podcast over the next few weeks and months, so just know that. you'll have some new people to hear from coming up soon.In the meantime, I want to share with you more about how to get new patients or clients into your practice because I want you to be able to help more people. And that's the whole reason why I started my online business. Okay, maybe not the whole reason. I mean, part of the reason that I started my online business was because I saw so many health and wellness practitioners, specifically at that time, female chiropractors struggling to grow their practice. But I saw growing a practice and getting new patients as the easy parts and the work-life balance, if you will, as the hard parts. And it was my own struggle with work-life balance, as you probably know from listening to this podcast, that led me to taking time off from practice and being able to really reevaluate what my definition of success was in practice.Well, long story short, one thing led to another. And here we are now. I help one of those practitioners who have grown busy businesses and who are feeling burned out to regain some control over their lives and take back their time and their energy. I help health and wellness practitioners get more new clients and new patients into their practices without screenings, health fairs, and ads. And I help them, wellness practitioners, start brand new practices.Okay, so in today's episode, we're going to talk specifically about why Facebook ads are not working for you. And when I say not working for you, I don't mean like Facebook's not approving your ad, but more so that they're not working for you. A couple of other things are happening. The ads are running and you're getting new patients or clients, but it's not working out so well orthey're just not coming at all.So let's talk more about why that is happening, okay? Listen, I am not a Facebook ads expert, so I have to give you that disclaimer. I am not saying to never use Facebook ads either in this conversation, but I am just showing you the other side of the story, showing you what, you know, someone that wants to sell you Facebook ads, management is probably not telling you.The truth is that for most people who are running Facebook ads to get new patients or clients, one of two things are happening. They're either getting new patients or clients booked for an initial exam or a consultation, whatever that first appointment is. And they're getting quite a few bookings, maybe 20, 30 or more a month, but very, very few of those people are actually showing up for that initial appointment.Or, like I said before, they're just not converting. In other words, the ads are not actually getting new clients or patients booked. So, if your Facebook ads are actually getting new client or patient booked I want to propose to you this idea that...They are actually working, even if very few of the people show up. Because what happens when you run Facebook ads. and you're inviting people to schedule a consultation or a new patient appointment or whatever that first visit is with you. You're playing a numbers game.And the beauty of this is that, you know, the whole reason that people are attracted to Facebook ads to begin with is that you can automate your marketing, right? That's our hope at least. You can automate your marketing so then you don't have to do it. And so many health and wellness practitioners don't actually want to have to do that part of running a business, so it's very attractive to set up Facebook ads and get them running for you.So if your Facebook ads are bringing in or getting booked, a lot of new patients or clients for that first visit, the first appointment, but very few of them are showing up, that's just the nature of the game. It's just how the numbers work. So you might get, like I said, 20 to 30 bookings for each month and maybe only three to four of them actually show up out of that 30. That's about 10%.That generally means that it's working pretty reasonably. I don't want to say it's working well, but it's working somewhat as expected.Now, of course, yes, in the ideal scenario, you can be running ads and getting that many bookings and also improving the show up rate of people coming to those first appointments.But it can really take some testing and some tweaking to make that happen, which also means continuing to spend money on the ads to get that to happen. So if you've got a lot of money to invest or in other words, waste on Facebook ads, go for it. Keep testing them. Keep running the ads, keep getting the bookings and keep figuring out what needs to change to improve the show up rates.But if you don't have the money to spend or usually waste on Facebook ads when you're only getting maybe three to four people to actually show up to their first appointment, then stop running the ads, stop wasting your money.I never want to see someone put themselves in a position where they are hurting because they're holding on to things that are not working. Hurting meaning like you're not able to pay rent because you're running Facebook ads instead. That's not a healthy situation for you to be in. And ironically, I was just looking back at some of my reels for the last couple of years today. And I saw one from maybe 2021 or 2022 where I said, never need the patience more than they need you.And what I mean by that is never put yourself in a situation where you're so desperate for money to pay your bills that you need people to need you. It's not a healthy relationship. And those of you that study relationship dynamics, you know it's codependency. So let's not do that if we can avoid it. If you find yourself in that situation right now, my heart goes out to you. I know how hard it is. I have talked to hundreds of people over the last 15 years who have been in that situation. But you've got to figure out a way to make changes so that you don't need people more than they need the service that you provide. Never need the money more than they need you, okay?All right, so if the ads are running and you're getting plenty of bookings, but only maybe 10% of those people are actually showing up for the appointments, they're working as expected. But as you and I both know, it's really annoying to have all those cancellations and no shows. It's really annoying because it leaves so many gaps in your schedule. It creates a lot of context switching. In other words, like multitasking where you're like, okay, I'm going to have this new client and then you're sitting and waiting for them to show up and they don't. So you've wasted time or now you've got to switch to another task to utilize the time that you would have been giving to that new client and they're not there.So what do we do? Then try to work on improving the show up rates, improving the no-show rates, decreasing the no-show rates. But if your ads are simply not getting bookings at all, I want to tell you it's probably not your fault. It's probably just, here's the thing. The words that you use in marketing on social media are so nuanced and you can change just one or two words in a sentence and that can change the way that your ad converts. Significantly.So you may not be saying something wrong or have the wrong marketing message in the content of the ad itself, but you might need to change the copy. You might need to change out the image or put a video with that caption or who knows, right? You have to be willing to keep testing to figure out what works. Overall, if your ads are not getting bookings, it's not your fault.Ultimately, we're playing a numbers game. Okay, so the more money you spend on ads, the more visibility you create, the more people may see whatever it is that you were asking them to take action on in the ad itself. And if you want more people to take action, such as booking a new patient or new client consultation, then you've just gotta increase the ad spend. Again, if you don't have money to increase the ad spend, that's not an option for you.So what if the ads are not working? What if the ads are working, but just not getting enough people to actually show up after the bookings, right? And you're just tired of it all. and you want a different approach. I want to ask you, how solid is your network? A lot of people come to me saying my Facebook ads are not working or I'm spending thousands of dollars a month in Facebook ads and I'm just not seeing the return on my investment and I can't keep spending this much money, what else can I do? And when I ask them, well, what else have you been doing for marketing, they say nothing. Oof, that's a really tough position to put yourself in, put your business in, because if you start running ads and you don't know that they'll predictably bring you new patients or clients, but you're not doing anything else to bring in new patients or clients, it's a very risky place for your business. You've gotta have a steady stream of people who are interested in what it is that you do and how you serve, right? What it is that you do so that they know they want to work with you.So if you've skipped this phase that I'm about to share with you, you've got to go back to the drawing board. And this doesn't necessarily mean just ditching your social media ads, completely abandoning ship, and going all in with this other approach. But it might. That's really your call as a business owner. You can, of course, layer these two things in together. So that you're working on this other strategy I'm about to share with you and your ads are continuing to run and you're figuring out how to improve the processes with those ads or the conversion rates with those ads.The other thing, or what I should say as the most important thing that you can and should be doing as a business owner is developing relationships in real life with people in your community. And yeah, this is not online, it's not on social media, it's not on Google. But here's the thing. We've gotten so distracted by all of that stuff. We've gotten so distracted by Facebook ads, Instagram ads, Google AdWords, SEO, websites, TikTok, Snapchat, the list just goes on and on. Email marketing, et cetera, et cetera, that we've forgotten that what we do is an in-person service and people need to know you, like you, and trust you in order to become a new patient or client in your practice. To a certain extent, they don't necessarily have to trust you with their lives, but they kinda do also at the same time not to over exaggerate the scenario or the relationship. I think you know what I'm talking about though.So if you've skipped over the most foundational aspect of marketing or the most foundational aspect of growing your business, you've got to go back to the drawing board and you're going to start working on building relationships with people in your community, in real life, so they know, like and trust you. And what does that mean? Well, it's as simple as just connecting with people in your community, connecting with them. The massage therapist, a physical therapist, lactation consultant, the doulas and midwives, the other chiropractors; you know the professional categories might be there's probably plenty of those people in your area unless you're in a very rural place in which if you are that's okay. You just take a different approach you're going to connect with the other small businesses in your area And then get to know people who are in positions of influence in your local area as well.But the premise that we're working toward here is that you're developing trust with people in your community and you're becoming the go-to expert for something. And the for something is also a part where we can fall short and we'll talk more about that in an upcoming episode. But when I say you've got to become known as a go-to expert for something, that means like, people know that when someone that they know has a specific problem, you are the person they need to go to. Let me give you an example. A lot of my clients specialize or focus on tethered oral tissue in their patients or clients. So they're assessing and...I'll use the term treating loosely. They're assessing and treating lip ties and tongue ties. They're of course addressing the fascial restrictions, the subluxations, the decreased joint mobility, whatever may come along with the lip and tongue ties. And if they were to focus on relationship building, which they do, then they want to be known in their community as the go-to expert. So if a woman is having difficulty breastfeeding her newborn baby, and a friend says, oh my gosh, you're really struggling. Maybe your baby has a lip or tongue tie. You need to go see Dr. Erika, because she is the go-to expert in our area for this issue.See how that works? So instead of saying, instead of going out and talking to people about the modality that you practice and saying, “everyone needs Reiki because everyone has an energy field” or, “everyone needs a massage therapist because everyone has muscles and muscle tension” or, “everyone needs a chiropractor because everyone has subluxations”, you instead focus on the people that you most want to serve and what problem in their words, brings them to see you.I know that if you're an introvert, it can feel kind of scary to think about connecting with people in real life and trying to tell them what it is that you do or explain it to them. But I wanna just encourage you to not take that perspective on this approach. You don't have to convince people that what you do is wonderful or that it even works. All you need to do is get known in your community. Go connect with people. Learn about them. Find out what they love. Find out what problems they have. Be curious about them. Put them and their interests and their needs ahead of sharing about yourself because really nobody is like, I can't wait to go out and learn about that chiropractor or that massage therapist down the street. But they would be probably be happy to spend half an hour or so telling you about themselves. And that's where you develop trust with people, when they feel heard, when they feel seen.Okay, now one more thing that I want to share with you before we wrap up this conversation is that well, as I mentioned, we can get very distracted with SEO, social media, Google, Snapchat, Twitter, whatever, right? The list goes on and on and you can spend a lot of time and a lot of money working on those platforms to grow your practice. Any of those things could be taken away from you without any warning or any notice for any reason that the third party deems necessary.o think about it. Do you know someone who's had their Facebook account shut down? Do you know someone that had their Instagram account? Totally wiped out. I do, I personally know people that that's happened to. And in some cases, it wasn't even about censorship. They just had their account hacked or something weird happened and they couldn't retrieve or recover the account. And their account of 20,000, 30,000, 40,000 followers, gone.So imagine that that happened to you, that your account was bringing you new patients or clients, in other words, new business consistently and that you were relying on that consistent new business to pay your overhead, to pay your payroll. And then suddenly, Google or Facebook or Instagram just took it away. Just because they decided to. And there was nothing you could do about it.Here's the truth. The time, the energy, and even the money that you have invested in building relationships in becoming known as a go-to expert in your community, in your area cannot be taken away from you by a third party. So that is one of the biggest reasons that I am such a huge proponent of all health and wellness practitioners and really all small business owners taking the time to invest in becoming the go-to expert in their area for a specific problem that people know that they have because once you establish your reputation, the only person who can take that away from you is you if you do something wrong to ruin your reputation. So don't do that. Okay.I have a course coming up, it's actually like a group coaching program, in March, called Known. And in this group coaching program, I'm going to teach you step by step how to become known as an expert in your area, how to become the go-to expert in your community, so that people are sending you referrals.And you no longer have to rely on Facebook ads, screenings, health fairs, farmer's markets, or any other cheesy things you don't wanna do on the nights and weekends away from your family to go get new patients or clients. If you want to learn more about Known, just be sure to send me a DM on Instagram and we'll chat more about if it's the right fit for you. You can find me at Dr. Danielle Angela, and I will see you back here next week for another new episode of the Health and Wellness Practitioners Podcast. Hey, thanks so much for joining me for today's episode. If you love this podcast, then be sure to join our free community, the Health and Wellness Practitioners group over on Facebook, where you can continue the discussion and get to know other people in the community as well. We're a group of chiropractors, natural paths, acupuncturists, midwives, doulas, massage therapists, mental health therapists, counselors, nutritionists, and a list goes on. So come join us, get to know other people, build some personal and professional relationships. You can find the group by heading to drdanielleangela.com forward slash community and request to join the group. And I will see you inside from there.
In this episode Dr. Danielle shares why asking for referrals is important, who to ask and how to ask for a referral without feeling salesy.
IN THIS EPISODE WE DISCUSS: The Health & Wellness Practitioners Podcast refresh How to help your audience find you online Building relationships with people in real life Becoming KNOWN as the go-to expert in your holistic health care profession Our free community of support for holistic health & wellness practitioners
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: The right time to set up your bookkeeping and your bookkeeper How to find the right bookkeeper for you The best finance system and how to utilize it Growing your team when you're at your limit
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: Knowing if your content is book-ready Compiling scattered thoughts Revenue-generating writing Being motivated by a bigger purpose
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: People want alternatives A group of helpers you can trust Your answer to Facebook ads not working
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: Burn out from never feeling like enough How to live life differently Being honest when it's not working
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: Where to start with documentation Maybe the issue is your electronic health record system Neurodivergence and fallacies to consider Intentional and realistic time management
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: What do money and love have in common? The secret sauce to sharing your purpose You're helping, so get paid for it Money is a magnifying glass
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: The hiring race Money talk with job candidates Hiring again when you've been burned before Leading after hiring and firing mistakes The bad hire recovery process
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: Knowing the value of your work Clients are willing to pay Providing care to underserved populations Paying for care even when all your friends are chiropractors Failing fast to be successful Continuing education as a business investment
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: A day in the life of a homesteader and chiropractor Functional medicine, but make it virtual Going online and the loss of adjusting in person The politics of wellness
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: Building your dreams, literally Clients of a practice vs. clients of a practitioner The mindset you need to grow your business Setting goals and adjusting goals How to turn your vision into reality
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: Utilization review as supplemental income Getting started with your new venture Do you have what it takes to do utilization review? Probably! Weighing the disadvantages of extra income
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: Catalysts for transitioning from in-person to online What does it look like to care online? Getting clear with your online care intentions
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: Conversing with your body through cycle tracking Menstrual wellness in work and life Maximizing your benefits from the fertility awareness method Learning from your body to better your life
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: The interconnectedness of the body and brain: Ehlers-Danlos example Living with cerebellar tonsillar ectopia Critical thinking for better patient care Is unity the answer for chiropractors? Blessings and curses of experiencing medical trauma
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: Mercier Therapy origin and application Developing new therapy and sharing with practitioners Find out if Mercier Therapy is right for your practice Overcoming cesarean and birth story shame The nature of teaching others your techniques
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: The power of a regulated nervous system Realistic expectations under systems of oppression Seeing others through the nervous system lens Moving through adversity with consciousness Signs you're ready for trauma coaching
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: The journey of a doula The changes and growth of doula care What you need to know if you're considering becoming a doula How to thrive in your new doula career
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: Transitioning to the container of support method When to make packages a primary part of your practice Disarming push back when decreasing single sessions Demonstrating boundaries to uplift your clients
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: Deciding what to post on Instagram Rethinking your social media to-do list timing Why you don't want to go viral
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: Building structure that supports the life you want The key to making your practice profitable and life-giving Where you think you need to spend your time vs. where bookings come from Empowering your clients to get the care they need with a few simple phrases Giving clients what they want, no trickery needed
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: Your new favorite resource for hiring The right time to hire an associate, independent contractor, or employee The first step to a great hiring experience Knowing the law even with an attorney Getting clear on what you have to offer Visualizing your dream hire and taking the leap of faith
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: How to bring to bring your clients closer through sales - not push them away Putting relationship before salesmanship The five-step selling staircase Why sales are a necessary part of caring for your clients Selling without treatment plans or products
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: Using the Profit First approach to do more than break even Profit First crash course with the pros How to turn proven strategies into lasting strategies Is Profit First right for your practice?
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: The number one struggle hands-on providers face when marketing their practice Overcoming inconsistency in marketing Starting a lead generation system
In this episode of The Business of Being Well Dr. Danielle connects with Char Watson from The Doctors DOO. Together they unpack how providers can get back to providing patient care without constantly worrying about the business side of their practice.
In this episode of The Business of Being Well Dr. Danielle is joined by guest, Michelle Fernandez of The Foot Traffic Podcast. Dr. Danielle & Michelle dive into sales funnels for your online and brick and mortar business. They uncover what a sales funnel is, why it's so important to your practice and how to leverage your sales funnel to bring not just more new patients/clients into your practice but the RIGHT new patients. You'll learn how to grow your practice with a sales funnel without feeling salesy or pushy, because we don't like that used car salesmen feeling either. We know that you may have freaked out a little when you saw the words, "sales funnel", but don't worry, Michelle breaks down the 3 part sales funnel so that you can see just how simple a sales funnel can be. This is an episode that you don't want to miss... so what are you waiting for??? Let's dive in!
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: * The Key To Overcoming The Fear Of Putting Yourself Out There * The Power Of The Subconscious Mind And How It Relates To The Actions We Take And The Actions We Avoid Taking * Overcoming Limiting Beliefs Through A Daily Mindset Practice * Simple Tools To Stay On Track With Your Goals During Difficult Seasons * How To Help Patients/Clients When Your Schedule Is Already Full
Promoting Your Practice Without Feeling Slimy, Sleazy or Overwhelmed with Ericka EllerDR.DANIELLE: Hello, everyone. Welcome to the podcast today. Ericka Eller is part of the foot traffic team. And if you haven't heard of The Foot Traffic Team there's The Foot Traffic Podcast who I think is hosted by Stacy Tuschel and Ericka works alongside Stacy. So she is here today to share with us, um, lots of things. Ericka is as passionate as I am about helping people prevent burnout in their work. We're gonna talk about a surprising way, probably that you haven't considered, that's gonna help you have more of that work life balance that we're all seeking, that feels so elusive, but is real. It is a verb instead of a noun. Okay. So Ericka, why don't you go ahead and introduce yourself and share a bit about who you are and what you do.ERICKA: Yeah. Hi, thanks so much for having me. I'm really excited for this conversation and just feeling really hopeful to add some incredible value for your listeners and help them to see that there is a lot easier way to build their business without, like you said, burning out and just feeling that constant state of overwhelm that a lot of us can feel as we're just getting started and even as you just continue to notice growth.DR. DANIELLE: Yes.ERICKA: Yeah. So, as you mentioned, I work with Stacy Tuschl, she is the founder and CEO of Foot Traffic and she has The Foot Traffic Podcast. Then we have our signature program, The Foot Traffic Formula and I am a head coach and I'm also head of sales for that program and within the company. I'm in the program with all of our members. My strategies are very sales centric so all of the trainings that I do are very much on how to increase your revenue through sales strategies within your marketing. But I am also very strong with mindsets and we get a lot of entrepreneurs that come into the program that are very excited about the possibility of building their business, but there's still that trepidation of, will it work? And will I be the unicorn that your strategies don't work for? So, you know, just kind of really helping to bust a lot of the myths that are out there about business and what business has to be in order to be successful, what it has to look like. I just love what I get to do because I get to come alongside our members and business owners and help them to see that it is possible for them to succeed and not completely burn out.OVERCOMING THE FEAR OF SALESDR. DANIELLE: Okay. So right away, I can tell you that a lot of the people that listen to this podcast are gonna hear the word sales, or even the word marketing, and they're like, “run!” I know they don't wanna listen. I think it's a perfect combination that you focus on helping people with sales. I'm sure you have an amazing skill set in that, and the mindset piece, because fear of sales comes from a good intention, but it is a fear. It's a fear!ERICKA: Yeah. Well, and I think a lot of it comes from past experiences that you've had where you've been sold to and it didn't feel good. It felt like someone just came at you out of a left field. They didn't know you. They didn't know what you needed and they were trying to sell you something. And, you know, as you're trying to nicely say, “no thank you”, they're still coming at you. But meanwhile, they have not built a relationship with you. There is zero rapport. They do not know what your needs are. They do not know what problems you face and they don't even know if you have the problem that their product is a solution for, their product, or their program, or their service. We get that all of the time. I get to look at every member that comes in through our program, they fill out an intake form. One of the questions that we ask is, what is the one thing that you're most worried about or what do you not enjoy in your business right now? I'd say probably 90% of people say, I don't wanna sell; I don't like selling. So that's where I come in to really help them let go of that fear that they have, that's tied to selling, because the reality is, if you have a business, there is a product, a program, or a service that you are trying to get people to be a part of. Right? So you are selling. But when you think of it, from a standpoint of you are serving, you are helping someone, you are making someone's life better. You are helping them to transform who they are right now into the person that they want to be or into the business or whatever it is that you are promising as that transformation that you know, and wholly believe that what you have will do that. Right? So, when you think of your business, in that light of I'm here to help someone I'm here to serve the feeling and the actions are so much different from, uh, I don't wanna sell. I don't wanna put myself out there. I don't wanna do that because then you kind of get stuck in that place of stagnation because you don't wanna take action. So your results are directly impacted on both of those thoughts, whether you are excited to serve and to help, or whether you are holding back because you don't wanna appear salesy.DR. DANIELLE: That's the thing I hear all the time is that they don't wanna feel salesy or appear salesy. They're afraid that other people will think that they're sales and I can definitely relate to that. There are many things that I've learned about business now, after being a business owner for 10 years where I can look back and go, oh yeah, I didn't wanna do that because I was afraid of what people would think about me. Not because I couldn't learn how to do that. I'll add to that, I could have grown my business much faster if I hadn't had the fear holding me back from doing things that I could have been doing.ERICKA: Yeah. And the thing is, fear is a natural emotion and we can lean into that. But we can also acknowledge and recognize that fear is coming from a thought so just interrupt the thought and change it. I always tell our clients you're so focused on what can go wrong or why you don't wanna do something, but can we give equal time to the thought of how it could go right? When you do that your brain starts to kind of pick up on, oh, well wait, okay, this is a new thing, let's spend a little bit of time here. At first it's uncomfortable because you've never done it. And when you've been so focused on why it won't work, you know why you're gonna be the exception to this, what people are, think that's everything that you are going to find and you are going to recognize as truth, but until you keep pressing into. I have something that's gonna change people's lives. I have something that's going to change the impact of someone's health and generate to come because of whatever that is. When you get excited about that, you show up entirely differently.SHIFTING YOUR PERSPECTIVE ON PROMOTING YOUR HANDS- ON PRACTICEDR. DANIELLE: The people that listen to this podcast are healers. And in my opinion, the most important work that we can be doing on the planet right now is healing. Healing ourselves, healing each other. I just share that for anyone that's listening. That's like, well, yeah, what I do is important. What you do is vitally important for how the world moves forward in a new way; in a variety of ways. That can mean a lot of different things. It means all the things too, at the same time. One of the threads I want to follow with you in this conversation is that people often say that marketing and sales feels exhausting to them. And I find that for service based providers, especially for most of the people that listen to this podcast who are working with their clients or their patients, one person at a time, don't have a lot of time to give to marketing and sales. So of course adding more to their plate feels exhausting, but if they wanna help more people, they have to do the marketing and the selling to be able to serve more people. So it feels sort of like a catch 22. What are your thoughts about how to navigate that?“What you do is vitally important for how the world moves forward in a new way; in a variety of ways.”ERICKA: Yeah. It definitely starts with a new mindset. Right. And you acknowledge that in order for your practice or your business to grow in the way that you want, you have to be open to trying something different. You can't get a different result by doing the exact same thing that you've been doing all this time. With marketing and sales, rather than viewing it as, you know, just this obstacle that's something that you don't wanna do. It's this burden. Thinking of it as an opportunity to just reach more people. It's funny because I mean, I love everything about sales. I just consume all the podcasts, all the books, I have my own coach to help me in how I perform with sales and marketing. People kind of think that's a little strange, people are like, you get really excited about sales? It's an opportunity to just reach so many more people and to help so many more people. And like, when you think about that from, you know, just kind of like the, the very large picture, right. If you didn't have so much sales and marketing, it would take a lot longer. It's not that it's impossible, but I mean, everything just kind of clicks when you use sales and marketing together, your messaging is much more clear, you're reaching a larger population Then in turn, you are nurturing along the way. They are getting to know you, to like you, to trust you and then making a buying decision at that point, rather than just putting something in front of someone and saying, Hey, buy this thing, right. It's very difficult to get someone who's very cold to you. “It's (marketing) an opportunity to reach so many more people and to help so many more people.”They have not had that encounter. They haven't gone through a true marketing funnel, to really experience. If your messaging is off then they might be your ideal person, but the way that you're talking to them isn't compelling them to want to learn more. So changing the attitude of this is something that I have to do, I'm a doctor or I'm a chiropractor, I'm a nutritionist. I just want to do this. I hear that all the time where I will hear people say, I sell clothes, I just design clothes. I just wanna sell them, but I don't wanna have to worry about all this other stuff. Whatever it is. I'm an artist, I'm a teacher, you know what, it doesn't matter. There's just that resistance that you come across. So when you open yourself up to the possibility of how can this help more people and rather than taking the burden off of yourself, but how can this help other people you pull yourself out of the equation because when you get really focused in on what you have to do and what this means to your time, but consider how this can also make my life easier. I think that that's when it changes.DANIELLE: I have grown into taking the perspective that, if what you do is good for people, then when in your marketing and selling, you're helping them understand why what you offer is good for them. Especially for hands-on practitioners, it helps me to help them change their belief system, their mindset around marketing and sales too, because it reminds them that what they're doing is actually good for people. They're not selling them grapes that are gonna make lemonade and, and that doesn't happen, right. They're not selling them a broken, used vehicle. They're selling them something that's potentially going to change their life in a really transformative way. Why would you not wanna share that with more people?FOCUSING ON WHO YOU SERVE & THE SOLUTIONS THEY NEEDERICKA: Exactly. You kind of hit it on the head. Kind of the used car salesman, right? That's the connotation that people have with sales that like you are like pulling something over on someone. You're having them buy something that's not gonna benefit them. It's gonna be totally something different than what they thought it was. If you're thinking that, then you need to go back and kind of take a step back on, okay, what are you actually offering and go through your value ladder. How does this help? Who is your, your client and what are the problems that keep them up at night? If they could wave a magic wand, what would be the problem that they would have a solution to, and does your product program or service answer that? Then, what's the transformation that you are promising and is that the transformation that they are really wanting to have in their life? When you kinda work it backwards and then you see that these all align, it feels a lot less heavy, like you're duping something that they don't want or they don't need. Instead, you understand what the impact is. If they don't decide to do it, but also what could that transformation be if they do decide to go with it? Then you're just helping them to make a decision from there.“...you're just helping them to make a decision”DR. DANIELLE: I mean, our conversation already has me feeling like I'm gonna just go focus on some sales this afternoon.ERICKA: I love it!MARKETING STRATEGIES FOR THE OVERWHELMED PRACTITIONER DR. DANIELLE: Now on that note, I think it's easy for people to get excited about something new and think, oh yes, I'm gonna do this. Then they get started and they find, maybe let's say it takes more time than they anticipated, or it's not as effective as they had hoped that it would be right away. With so many of our listeners struggling with feeling burned out, especially over the last year and a half of taking care of so many people whose stress level is also much higher than usual, I would love to hear from you how we can reframe this? Okay. I have to, like, I have to focus more on marketing and sales as not an additional thing that you have to do, but how could it actually make their lives easier? How could it make their business more efficient? ERICKA: That's a great question. We teach the model of a marketing funnel. The idea of a funnel is that you are taking your prospective client through a process from beginning to end. You ultimately know where you want them to end up, but how are you having them engage with you? Is it going to be a free consultation? Maybe a checklist, guide, or a video series? Whatever it is, how are you compelling them? Where they think, Ooh, that's gonna give me a quick win. Then you're nurturing them along and explaining Hey, I work with people that have this problem and here are some results of people that have worked with me, these are their transformations. You start helping them to imagine what that transformation could look like for themselves. Let's use the diet industry. This is an $80 billion industry and it's growing and growing and growing because a lot of people are looking for a solution. You always see those before and afters and people imagine, “that could be me!”. Well, if that person could do that in this amount of time, what can I do? So they start imagining it, then they go into whatever, you know, they're taking the supplements or they're in the program, whatever it is, and they're expecting instant results. And then they're thinking, well, this is the magic pill. And then maybe they have found that one thing we all know that that's not the case, but you know, that they found the thing. They're like, well, I took it this morning and I haven't lost any weight. Then the next day they wonder what else is out there? So that's why the industry is growing so much. If it worked we wouldn't have the obesity rate that we have. With marketing and with a funnel, you have to understand that it's gonna take some time. People, first of all, have to go through the funnel, you have to try certain things. And that's what we do. You have to track and pay attention to the data you are given. I can't even tell you how many coaching calls I've gone into where people have said, okay, well, I've built my funnel and I don't think it's working so I am gonna change my funnel. I have to say, okay, hold on, let's just give this a second. Let's look at the numbers. How many people have actually seen your offer? They might say like 10. Okay, great! Now, did you have anybody sign up of those 10 people? Who's opted in and they'll say five, I only have five. I'm like, do you realize you have a 50% conversion? That's amazing. Let's just put it into perspective, but they're hearing these crazy stories out there on the internet like, I made a million dollars in 30 days. They're imagining this and it's not that they can't get to that place, but it's gonna take some time and it's gonna take refining and you're tweaking and you're putting it out there and then you make some more changes. We have found with members that we are coaching that we have stellar results. We have so many businesses that are creating $100 K funnels, and it's just because they've stuck with it. We have one member who's been featured in Stacy's podcast. She's a great testimony because she was one of the people who on a coaching call was like, ah, you know, I think I'm gonna just drop that and I'm gonna try something else. And I was like, well, wait, wait, wait, no, like, let's look at the numbers, I think you have something here, you just need more people to see it. I think if we change this and if we look at the landing page numbers, your ads are performing, so that's great. But when they get to the landing page, there's the disconnect that's when you lose 'em. So let's tighten this up a little bit and you just make little, little micro changes, one thing at a time, don't change everything, because then you don't know what's working. People want to complete an overhaul all at one time. And we can't fix what's broken because we don't actually really know what's broken because we're not looking at the numbers in its entirety. So I think it gets overwhelming because you're trying all of the things and you want the results now, but with marketing, it does take a little bit of time. It's like putting out an advertisement in a magazine for your practice. You do it once and you're like, well, I got one person, that wasn't worth it. But that's still one more person than you had last month. What if you changed and adapted a few things? What if people need to see you a couple of times? You've probably had an experience of something that you've bought or someone that you've worked with that you had to hear about them and see them multiple times before you decided that you were gonna make a buying decision.DR. DANIELLE: Yeah. I just paid for a $3,000 program yesterday. I had been in their sales funnel essentially and I never felt sold to. They just shared their results for their people and they did it in a really fun way and I could see the possibilities for myself and what they shared. I was like, whenever I get that email that finally lets me buy this thing, I'm gonna do it. It came yesterday and I was already committed. I already knew that I wanted it weeks before I could even purchase it because I was on a wait list. This has been a really hard lesson from me in my own business, what you're talking about because back when I was growing my hands-on practice. I had my organic social media reach. That was really all I needed to see as many clients as I wanted to be seeing. It worked really well. It was great because I knew exactly what to do to help other people do the same thing. Then when I started to transition and focus just on my online business, my coaching practice grew really fast. I grew to multiple six figures in three years. Then I got to a plateau and it was the same the next year. I thought, “what's missing?” I guess my organic social media reach is not enough anymore, but I had never looked at the conversion on opt-in pages. I had never looked at any statistics on a funnel. Instead of looking at that information, I would just always go create a new thing and a new thing and a new thing, a new thing and it was exhausting. My whole team was also stretched really thin. About a year ago, it's been kind of a process over the last couple of years, it really crystallized a little over a year ago. I was like, I can't keep doing business this way. I teach that this doesn't make business sense and this is not sustainable. I'm wearing my people down and I'm worn down. So I decided to essentially wipe the slate clean and we're gonna start from the ground up and we're gonna build systems from the start. So all the things that you're describing now, like looking at the conversion on an opt-in page and watching what's happening in the funnel, I'm like, oh wow, we're doing it. I can't believe that we're doing that, but we're doing it. But it comes back to where we started, which was, I didn't wanna look at that information because I thought it was just salesy.ERICKA: Yeah. I hear a lot of people say, I'm not really good at numbers, I don't wanna look at that. You know, it doesn't make sense to me. And I mean, I probably wouldn't consider myself, you know, like a numbers person either. But what I've learned is that looking at the numbers, you don't become Einstein, but you just have more insight into what is happening inside of your business. And to not look at that is, is just simply foolish because you could be leaving a lot of money on the table because you just think something is broken. It's not that it's broken, it just needs to be fixed. You just need to tighten something up and once you do that it just makes such a difference. I think that goes back to that mindset piece that we talked about originally. Allowing yourself to be open to the idea that you can look at numbers and it's not scary. Looking at one thing at a time. We keep our members pretty streamlined as far as like, this is the basic information to look at, you don't have to go into huge, huge detail. You could go into a crazy detail if you wanted to. But, if you're just getting started, basic information like how many people have seen it, how many clicks, how many people opted in and did you get any sales from that and going from there. One thing that you had talked about was starting over. A lot of people are like, okay, I'm just wiping it clean, but we still go back to… do you know what your best seller is? Do you know that if you have multiple products or programs and a lot of people do have a lot of offerings. Then your people are confused because they're not entirely sure which direction to go. That's the cool thing about a funnel, it can be very strategic where you can bring people in at the beginning and you're like, welcome to my little ecosystem here and here's your first step. Here's the first thing that you're gonna engage with me with and oh, you finish that. Awesome. You know, Hey, here's this thing that I have to offer you and you kind of take 'em through a process so that ultimately they get to where you want them to be in just a few steps. Instead of like, I'm gonna throw this at you, I'm gonna throw this at you and I'm gonna throw this at you. You're still getting them there, but it's just so much more logical this way rather than hoping that they land where you want them to be and that it's the right fit.FINDING A SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS GROWTH APPROACH WHEN THE INDUSTRY NORMS ARE BURNING YOU OUT DR. DANIELLE: Okay. Can we play with a couple of scenarios because I can think about who listens to the show and what's reality for that person. And also know that it's reality for a lot of other people too. So one example that comes to my mind would be someone who, um, let me give a little like backstory or like a history to this example because I think for a long time, especially within a chiropractic profession, but this probably applies to a lot of other hands on professions as well that if you were just busy in your practice, then you had a successful business. But just being busy doesn't necessarily mean that you have a successful business. So I know a lot of people who are very busy in their businesses and that might be like, they see a lot of patients, a lot of clients and they really don't have room for more in their schedule. They're like, oh, I don't need a sales funnel. I'm seeing all the people that I can possibly see. However, the limitation is in thinking that your business is you, you are your business, right. And if you separate yourself from your business and see where could your business go? And what if you took yourself out of the equation and like your, um, capacity out of the equation and started thinking bigger then yeah a sales funnel is gonna help you bring in more new patients or clients so that you can grow a team of practitioners who then help improve, increase the revenue in the business and you can make even more money and you can help even more people. But they get into this place where they're like, they're so busy with all the people in their schedule already that they can't even fathom thatERICKA: Next. Oh yeah. I've taught a lot of people that are in that same place. It's usually kind of like that one on one service based approach where they're like, “I'm tapped out, I literally cannot figure out how to schedule one more person, I don't get lunch,I barely get to pee, I don't have time, I'm at the practice from 7:00 AM to like 7:00 PM, Monday-Friday”. They're coming to us because they realize something has to change. Right. So like what is scalable? And so looking at what you are offering and like you were saying, taking yourself out of the equation. So rather than like you being the business, you have a business that you are the founder of or you're the CEO, but are you delegating? Are you allowing other people to come in under you and do what you do and be able to grow that way? The other method is, what could be another way to work with patients? Not so one on one? What could I do so that, someone can come across on social media, through an ad and they find a membership, maybe it's a course. I see this work really, really well. That's usually where a lot of practitioners want to go where they're like, okay, I can't work with so many people hands on, but I could teach many through a course. It's not as in depth as if they were working one on one, but it's still helping so many more people and helping people to understand the power of whatever it is that you were teaching. You were talking about chiropractic and how many people are resistant to chiropractors? I mean, I used to be one of them, like, I will say it, I was just like, someone's gonna break my spine and I'm gonna be paralyzed. Like, that's what was going to happen. But it took me getting educated and understanding how chiropractic is such an incredible foundation to overall health. When you're utilizing other things that you're experiencing in your body, like when you start taking care of the chiropractic piece, everything else just starts to feel better, you know? You just kind of accept that this is just the way that it is, you know, like I'm always gonna feel this way. That's the way it is in your business. Well, this is just the way that it is as a busy practitioner and you just need that outside guidance to say, but what if you tried a different way, a different approach? What if you actually added some other practitioners and grew that way so that it's not just you seeing all of the clients/ patients. How could you work with them in a new way that you're kind of thinking outside of the traditional practice model. “What if you tried a different way, a different approach?”DR. DANIELLE: That actually came up in a conversation I had with someone a couple of weeks ago. I was in this conversation with her as a researcher. I was doing some target market research and I'm asking a series of questions that I ask to everyone that I do these calls with and just listening to what her answers are. But in this particular conversation, I was like, wait, do you even believe that it's possible to be a chiropractor and not be burned out? Like, can you be a successful chiropractor and not be burned out? And she was like, Hmm, no. It was like, yes and no, she was like yes-ish, but no, not really. I don't really believe that we can prevent this. And I was like, oh, here's the problem. You think that this is the way that it has to be. Ouch!“Do you believe that it's possible to be a hands-on practitioner and not be burned out?”ERICKA: The interesting thing is that we kind of look around us, you know, like, who are we surrounded by? And if that is the norm in the industry where the chiropractors work in a solo practice, they're working all of the hours and they're in this place where they can't really grow in the way that they want to, because they don't have any time, it's finite, right! So they only have so many hours in the day, so they can't grow that way. But then they're like, well, nobody else does anything differently. So this is just the way that it is. All right. It's still important to have people in the pipeline because that's just the sequence or the lifecycle of a customer, even if you are in that one-on-one model. Not everybody is gonna be with you for the rest of their life, you know? Patients die, patients move, patients switch providers, patients don't need that care and support any longer because you've done what you set out to do and heal them and right now they're good. They come in maybe once in a while for maintenance, but then you get to this point where those people are leaving. If you don't have people that are in that pipeline that are getting to know you, to like you to trust you, to engage with you on some level beforehand, before they even have a need, they might just be curious, you know, like, so for myself, before I even entered into the wonderfulness of chiropractic care I was kind of just seeing what is this about. I have these friends that swear by the chiropractic and why, you know? Just engaging with practitioners online and I'm like, wait a second, okay, I think there's a thing here. So when I was ready at that point, I was already open to that okay, who am I gonna go see? Who am I gonna see locally? So you just have to think about it from a different perspective. It's like what I said earlier, if you want a different outcome, if you don't like feeling burnt out, you don't like being so stressed, you have to consider the opportunity of what trying something new could bring. “It's still important to have people in the pipeline because that's just the sequence or the lifecycle of a customer, even if you are in that one-on-one model.”“ if you want a different outcome, if you don't like feeling burnt out, you don't like being so stressed, you have to consider the opportunity of what trying something new could bring.”DR. DANIELLE: Awesome. Okay. So many good points. All right. So my other example, uh, or maybe not necessarily example, but scenario would be, um, the person who was like, just starting their practice and wondering do they need to have, or should they have a sales funnel? Um, what if they don't have any clients yet, and they don't have the results, they haven't had the testimonials to incorporate into that. Should they have a funnel?ERICKA: There is rarely a, I mean, I haven't come across a type of business that it wouldn't benefit. It's for the person that's just starting out. It's actually the best place to start incorporating some really solid marketing strategies, like utilizing a sales funnel, because you're kind of starting off with really good habits. You're understanding how to engage someone from the beginning rather than waiting until there's a problem in the business and then trying to fix it and work backwards. Right. So you're in a good place, as a new practitioner, to start and to create engagement and excitement and helping someone to get that quick win by utilizing a guide or mini training. I know a lot of your practitioners that are chiropractors, what could be five easy exercises to lessen hip pain? At the end of the day from sitting something like that, where someone's gonna take that because they have that problem at the end of the day and they think, oh, what are these five exercises and maybe this is what's gonna be the thing to help me feel better at the end of the day. You're creating that. Then as you continue to nurture them and show them things, um, I've come across some incredible chiropractors online that are just showing exercises. They're saying like, do you have this problem? Here's some exercises if you have this issue here, try this, or here's a way to do this without getting injured. I love that stuff so much because I feel like I'm learning every time I come to their profile. Then you just feel like when you said, when that offer comes through, like, I don't know what you're selling, but when I find out, I'm gonna buy it, right. That's what you want. You want people to get to that point. And if you are starting at the early stages of your practice, your business is going to just thrive.ELIMINATING MARKETING INCONSISTENCY WITH A SALES FUNNEL Dr. DANIELLE: I'm just gonna wrap up this conversation on this note in 2019, I, this happened by accident. So I don't have it documented in a really official and informal way accidentally. I surveyed over 900 chiropractors and I asked them, what is your biggest challenge when it comes to marketing? And they almost all, it was like 97% said their biggest challenge in regard to marketing was consistency. And I was like, oh, like, I, would've never, never guessed that. That would be the answer, nor would I have ever guessed. It would be a landslide answer. Um, so I'm, I'm just pointing this out because if you are struggling with consistency in marketing, and, and you're talking about having people in the pipeline, Ericka, like that's what consistency in marketing helps fix. Right? It's having that consistent stream of new people coming into your business, which every new business, not every new business, every business needs to have, then the sales funnel process, like creating that sales funnel and having it adjusted if you will. So that it's working, optimally helps you to eliminate the problem with consistency.“97% said their biggest challenge in regard to marketing was consistency.”ERICKA:Yeah. It's definitely a big piece there because you have people that automatically come across your profile. They are seeing this landing page. They're seeing your ads that you have always going. And I think people kind of go into this in and out of promotion type. They've got something to offer, so they're gonna talk about it, right? Maybe you have an in-person workshop at your practice. Maybe you are offering a two for one, like, Hey, you and your spouse, whatever it is, you've got this promotion, you're gonna talk about it. And then it's radio silence after that. Then you've got something else that you wanna offer and you wanna talk about that. But instead, how can you connect with your audience just by educating them, by giving them something that helps them feel like they're getting smarter, like they're learning something that they can take something away and immediately go try it, implement it into their life and feel like they're getting a quick win. Because when you do come to that point where you have something to offer, it doesn't feel salesy because you have this automated funnel all already. So they're going through the process. But then as they may engage with you outside of the funnel on whatever platform you may be on, then they're like, oh my goodness, Dr. Danielle is so smart and I walk away with so much after listening to her podcast. I feel like I could run this practice so much smoother. That's what you want. You want people to walk away from your podcast, your YouTube video, whatever it is feeling like it's gonna be alright, I can build this practice, it's not gonna hurt, it doesn't have to be the way that I think it's supposed to look like, because that's just historically what I've seen around me.DR. DANIELLE: Yeah. Oh my gosh, Ericka, we could probably talk about this stuff all day.ERICKA: I know I could, I could, it's, it's probably a problem.DR. DANIELLE: But it is a good thing. It's really, it's a good thing because when you do something that's so specific and you can still talk about it all day, it obviously means that you're really good at it, but also that the energy that you bring to it makes it more fun.ERICKA: Right? Yeah.I come at like, how can I help someone, how can I help them to understand the power of sales and marketing and that it doesn't have to feel icky or like you're out of congruence with your values. You're just coming in from a place of giving and for the people that are listening to you, they are that helping profession, right. You are a practitioner. If you wanna help people, you've gotta show up. You've gotta be consistent. You've gotta have a way for people to engage with you.“You are a practitioner. If you wanna help people, you've gotta show up. You've gotta be consistent. You've gotta have a way for people to engage with you.”DR. DANIELLE: Awesome. Okay. So if people that are listening to what you're sharing today, want to learn more about the Foot Traffic Formula, where is the best place for them to go?ERICKA: We actually have a bootcamp monthly, it's the Drive More Traffic Bootcamp where we teach 10 low cost or free strategies to increase traffic to your business. So that's probably the best way to get started and learn, what is a funnel and how can you make it at the very basic level and get started within the week of the bootcamp. The website for that is drivemoretraffictoday.com and we run boot camps every single month. That's just one of my most favorite times because I get to connect with so many different types of business owners and help them to understand the importance of what marketing can do for their business.DR. DANIELLE: Awesome. Ericka, thank you so much. It's been really fun to connect with you and just really learn from you.ERICKA:Yeah. Thank you. I appreciate it.RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE: Learn more about the Drive More Traffic Bootcamp HERE Connect with Ericka at hello@erickaeller.com
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: * Overcoming The Fear Of Putting Yourself Out There * The Power Of Taking Action Instead Of Hoping Someone Else Will And The Work That Dr. Lindsey And The Team Are Doing To Foster Diversity & Inclusion For Women Of Color In Chiropractic * How To Protect The Number One Asset In Your Business Through Self-Care & Time Management * How To Thrive As a Wife & Mom In Chiropractic
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER: The Pivotal Shift From One Career In Health & Wellness To Another What Blu Room Therapy Is & It's Benefits Why Your Mindset Matters Setting Your Practice Fees Honoring Your Innate Intelligence Creating Value In Your Practice Why Many Health & Wellness Practitioners Lose Their Passion RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE: Learn More About Sara's Program HERE Learn More About The Blu Room & Connect with Sara HERE Follow The Blu Room on IG & Facebook @bluroomwellness
Creating Work/Life Balance With Dr. Cindy HowardHello, everyone. I'm excited to bring a new guest to this show today. I have actually sat in her classes a couple of times over the last couple of years, Dr. Cindy Howard. Meet Dr. Cindy HowardDr. Cindy, I'm gonna ask you to just introduce yourself and share a bit about your family, your practice, and, um, you as an instructor as well.It's so great to be here and I was thrilled to receive the invitation. So thank you. My background actually goes back 22 years in chiropractic, but even beyond that, with a lot of history in sport, dance, and in the physical fitness field. Then I decided I wanted to go to school to become a chiropractor. I graduated and opened up a private practice in the Southwest suburbs of Chicago and I've been there ever since. I'm afforded some other opportunities to travel around the country lecturing. I teach for post-graduate programs and I also teach at a lot of the state organizations on different topics within the internal medicine and nutrition world, because I hold diplomas in both of those categories. Work Life BalanceI've been very, very fortunate to balance work within office practice as well as out of office, not only teaching, but also consulting and that's all while handling and raising three kids. So that's one of the challenges. I have three amazing kids, truly. My daughter is a freshman in college, she's in the aviation program in North Dakota. So she's gonna fly me around the country one day, which will be great. And then two boys that are still here at home, one in high school and one who's graduating eighth grade. You know, that balance of figuring out how to do what I love, which is both parenting and working within our field.Yeah. Well, and that was why I asked you to be on the show today because many people feel guilty when they take time off. They worry that their patients will be upset if they aren't in the office. You mentioned to me, the other day, that you take four weeks off every year and I want people to see that you're not only practicing in your own practice, but also like we said, traveling and teaching as well. So I'm curious to hear from you, knowing that you do take at least four weeks off a year, have you always done that or was there a certain part in your career that you started implementing that?Yeah, I never did it in the beginning. You know that was part of the problem. You graduate with all of this debt and you're scared. I opened my practice from scratch with zero income. My mindset truly was always, I can't afford to take a vacation. That was my mantra, “I cannot afford it”. I'll tell you what actually flipped the switch from me. It was very interesting. Eighteen and a half years ago my daughter was born premature at twenty-nine and a half weeks and she was in the NICU for a very long time But long story short, you know, I didn't really know if she would come home in the beginning. Every day was a gift and I literally spent anywhere from 16 to 20 hours in the hospital holding my child and I didn't go to work. I didn't pay a bill. I didn't treat a patient. And the one thing that I learned about that is that the world doesn't shut down just because you stop going into the office. Not that there aren't natural consequences for your choices and I definitely had some consequences showing up at all, but my priority wasn't that at the time. I think that that event for me was really life changing to where I realized that those moments that we take for ourselves, to nurture ourselves, to recoup, to recharge, to spend with family, whatever that is, is just it's essential.“…those moments that we take for ourselves, to nurture ourselves, to recoup, to recharge, to spend with family, whatever that is, is just it's essential.”I went from this mindset of, “I can't afford to take a vacation” to “ I can't afford not to take a vacation.” It isn't so much about the financial price, because it doesn't have to be Europe, where you drop twenty-grand and go on vacation. It could literally be visiting a friend and staying at their house for a very long weekend. It could be a staycation. It doesn't have to be expensive, but it's important for time with the people you care about and even myself. So, I think that was really my shift. And if I would not have had that life changing event, I'm not so sure I would've even realized how important it was, you know? Yeah! That's one of my beefs about the whole situation though. You and I are both chiropractors. When we're talking to our patients about wellness and preventative care, preventative health in general, and then we're not giving ourselves time to rest. We're not really practicing what we're preaching to our people. And if you wait until there's a crisis, it's just the same as when your patients come in to get adjusted because they can't stand up straight. It takes a lot of effort and a lot of energy from their care provider and also them as the patient, who's doing the healing to get better and to really heal.“When we're talking to our patients about wellness and preventative care, preventative health in general, and then we're not giving ourselves time to rest. We're not really practicing what we're preaching to our people.”And you know what, I think women are probably even more guilty of this, right? We take care of everybody else first and we're last on the list. You know, children/spouses come first and we don't really look at what we need in order to be the best us we can be. I think that's the dichotomy of, of where we get stuck. It's this, I wanna be present in my practice on whatever level that is to my max capability, but I can't do that if I'm tired or burned out or, or worn out. Exhausted. None of those things help me take better care of those that trust me to help them get to that same place. So we really have to take a step back, I think, to realize that if I'm gonna bring my a game, that actually means sometimes I'm putting myself first. I don't look at that as a selfish act. I look at it as an important act for my self care, just as I would ask my patients to participate in as well.Yeah, absolutely! It's just being congruent with what we're prescribing for everyone else and doing that in our own lives. It's just being congruent with what we're prescribing for everyone else and doing that in our own lives.What Does Work/Life Balance Look Like?So talk to me a bit about what your schedule looks like in regard to how you set your office hours so you're able to take time off, make sure that you're present with your kids, but also to be able to be present in your office with your patients and then be away when you're away teaching.There are a lot of components to go into that. After I had my first daughter I actually made a very conscious decision that I didn't want somebody else to raise my daughter five, six days a week. Now, I was also fortunate at the time I was married to another chiropractor. So we wound up actually splitting hours. You know, he did Monday, Wednesday, Friday. I did Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, which was beautiful because one of us was always home taking care of the kids. So we were very fortunate in that regard. Fast forward and we're now divorced and now I'm in solo practice. But I didn't change my hours that drastically in terms of that practice. I figured out how to be more efficient within the hours that I was there. It wasn't about 40, 60, 78 hours a week in the practice and wondering what my kids were up to with a sitter or at home. It was really, how do I maximize my time so that financially I can afford to be away and emotionally I can afford to separate when I'm not there and then really truly be present. So my office schedule has actually gotten a little bit busier, by choice. I've always seen patients Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays routinely because of what's transpired in the world. I see patients through telehealth from all over the world. So I actually dedicate one day a week now just to telehealth. So that's how I schedule the office hours and my speaking is typically on the weekends and my consulting is done whenever I have time. Some morning, some evenings, some weekends. It's based on availability, but what's great is I try to balance time that I really need to be present for other people while my kids are in school. I don't have to be concerned, so to speak or pay attention to them. And then when they're home, I definitely schedule time where I don't allow other appointments or other commitments to creep in, so that I'm present for them too. It's not just that they're in the house and mommy's on a call all day long, but it's really good quality time whether it's sitting down for a meal or how was your day or, what are our plans for the weekends. It's about giving them that quality so that it isn't about quantity. I have very dedicated time to my kids as well and then they're actually okay, when I'm on a consulting call or at the office. It's very challenging. There's no doubt about it, but I think it's about being present in the moments that you choose to be present in versus kind of walking through those moments halfway there, just to get to the next appointment or the next patient or the next sporting event for the kids.It's also about having boundaries. So that when you are with your kids, you're with your kids, you're not maybe checking your cell phone, answering emails, and that is a discipline. It's sort of also an art. You have to practice the skillset of setting those boundaries. There are not a lot of great examples for us in the world right now of those kinds of boundaries, because most people are attached to their cell phone and looking at it all the time. Well, I don't know about you, but I go to family events and hopefully none of my family is listening to this podcast, but uh, I'm like put down your cell phones we're here with you. We live at least an hour away in multiple directions and then we get together and everyone's on their phones and they don't really realize that's what's happening. It's almost like setting an appointment to be present. Right. You know and I know that we tend to eat out a lot, but even if we sit down at the dinner table at home there are no phones. At the end of the day, the only people that are really that important that I need to be able to reach out to in case something happens are my kids. So if I'm already with them, then the phone can go away, it can be turned off. I know that you know, I am old enough that we grew up without phones. You know, somehow we went to school and our parents couldn't reach us all day. If we were at a friend's house they had no idea what was going on and we all survived. I think consciously setting an appointment to get away from electronics may help some people too. There's the time I check emails and here's the time that the emails can absolutely wait until tomorrow. “I think consciously setting an appointment to get away from electronics may help some people too. There's the time I check emails and here's the time that the emails can absolutely wait until tomorrow.”Yeah. Yeah. We have a no cell phone rule in our family that when we're at the dinner table, whether it's at home or in a restaurant, if we're at dinner, the cell phones have to be put away. There are very, very few exceptions to that rule and my kids are actually usually the ones that are like, um, hello, dad, or mom put your cell phone away, we're at dinner at a table. I'm like, thank you.Isn't that interesting? It's almost like the kids, they need that attention from us. They want that attention and when they don't get it they don't have as much of a filter as we do to call us out on that which is great.Do you really have more time when your kids are older?Your kids are a bit older than the majority of our listeners to this podcast. I think that there's this notion that, well, when my kids go to school, then I'll have plenty of time or when my kids aren't little I'll have all this time. What are your thoughts about that?No, not true! You've probably heard the saying “little kids, little problems; big kids, bigger problems.” I like the word challenges a little bit better, but you know, I think it's just different. I make this joke that when my kids were little, I of course had to be there. They needed help getting dressed. I needed to make them lunches. Now that I have teenage kids and they can actually do everything on their own I realize that's when they get into trouble. So now I have to be present because otherwise then the parties start.. I don't probably have to go into any details for anybody who does have teenage kids, but there are so many challenges socially when they get into that stage that really, you know, we may not be playing with blocks on the floor anymore or doing puzzles together, but I need to be in the house and I need to hear what's going on. I need to be available to check on them and jump in. So I think time doesn't really shift that way. It's just different, you know? It's still about prioritizing when you can get the things done that you need. And really, again, that's efficiency, right? I can fill 24 hours of a day and not sleep and still not have enough time. My to-do list has to-do lists. My to-do list always is gonna have to-do lists, but it's really about figuring out what the things are that are essential to accomplish today in balance, and then allowing everything else to be okay. Creating your own treatment protocolDo you have specific routines that you've implemented that help you to feel clear about what it is that you need to do right now when your to-do list is so long?Yeah. You know, I think it's interesting. I actually schedule blocks of time. So I'm not the most perfect routine person. I joke with some friends that you know exactly what they're doing at the exact moment of the day. I do this at eight and this at nine, and this is 10. I'm not quite that regimented. That makes me a smidge uncomfortable. But, what I do like to do for the week is actually schedule those things thatI know I wanna accomplish. For example, I'm finishing up a book. I schedule blocks of time, 2, 3, 4 hours in my calendar where I won't take an appointment. I won't see a patient so I know that's completely dedicated and the phone even goes away because I'm not gonna answer the phone in the middle of that chunk either.I'm really big on setting my own appointments. Same thing with exercise, I will literally write my calendar. I'm gonna workout at 8:00 AM today or I'm gonna workout with my son in the basement at nine o'clock tonight so that nothing else gets in the way of that schedule. So for me, I think that's been the most successful versus having the two do-lists that just sit there and now it's Sunday and I went shoot, you know, didn't get those things done. Going back to talk about having bigger kids and bigger challenges. I like to make this point very clear for people, because if you are in this phase of life where your kids are little, and you're thinking like this is all gonna get easier, I'll figure this all out later. I think it's actually an avoidance strategy. When people say, when my kids are older, then I'll make better systems and procedures in my practice because I'll have more time. So I don't say that to scare anyone, but to also help you see that you might just be delaying what you're gonna have to do at some point. And why not just go ahead and do it now.Correct. And taking action now builds better habits. So by establishing that early on you'll then do whatever that routine is, that's comfortable for you. So it becomes second nature instead of always the, I want, I wish I hope and then it doesn't happen. Or even if it does, then there's those of us that look back and go, why didn't we do this 10 years ago? This actually, isn't that complicated. I think it's the commitment to do it. That's scary. There's a lot of fear, especially for women out there of that failure because you know, we wanna do it all. We wanna be excellent moms. We wanna be excellent practitioners. We wanna Excel. We wanna be financially successful. And what if we screw it up …what if, we do something and it goes horribly wrong. I actually sort of love the failures because I always joke that if you read some of the books from some of the most successful people out there in any category whether it's finance, business or healthcare, most of them failed on some level pretty dramatically. They learned these amazing lessons to turn it around and that's why they're writing the books. They get to teach all of those people that it's okay to fail. I would challenge everybody to pick something, do something, take that vacation, set a schedule and if you screwed it up, okay. Then use that as an opportunity to evaluate why it didn't work and then you'll know what doesn't work and you try something different until you get it right. No system is perfect, but it's those challenges that allow me to tweak it, to make it even better and find the confidence in that and slowing down long enough to actually acknowledge and learn from the mistakes. To really implement those lessons. To integrate them so that you can do things differently. No system is perfect, but it's those challenges that allow me to tweak it, to make it even better and find the confidence in that and slowing down long enough to actually acknowledge and learn from the mistakes. To really implement those lessons. To integrate them so that you can do things differently. That's also challenging for a lot of people because our culture is moving at such a fast pace all the time. And you know, last year, a year ago at this time, everyone was talking about how they were enjoying and embracing the slowdown. And now here we are a year later and I don't think we learned any lessons. It feels like everyone is just back to being busy.Yeah. I always appreciate the slowdown, but I also love the chaos. I actually thrive on the chaos and I love the busy, but I know for me it cycles. So, a great example, I'll go away for a weekend and I'll definitely overcommit myself and speak a bunch of times and have this meeting and that meeting. But then I'll tack on an extra day at the end where I'll go sit by the water and do nothing. I'll go read a book or just sit in a hotel room by myself for an extra half a day or a day to decompress. I actually love both and I do thrive on both. But there is a burnout point that I think you get to, if you don't appreciate the quiet and the stillness. That quiet and stillness could be moments for people but it could be days for others. I think we're all wired a little bit differently, but I do agree with you. I think there was so much to learn from the shutdown that some of us got and some of us probably just complained about and went right back to the routine that we have without learning the lesson.“But there is a burnout point that I think you get to, if you don't appreciate the quiet and the stillness.”Life CyclesYeah, for sure. On the notes of cycles, um, this is getting into Kate Northrop's work. She writes a lot about cycles and seasons and it also correlates to what you teach in continuing education in regard to physiology and normal human physiology. It's normal for us to have those cycles. It's normal for us to just look at nature. Like there's a winter, there's a spring, there's a summer and, and there's a fall. And yet many of us try to be a summer all the time. We forget that we actually are humans and we have cycles too. As females, we have an even more intricate and delicate cycle to consider and potentially embrace in our work lives. I think listening to that is important and learning about the cycles. I mean really intuitively listening to our bodies and our mental health to understand where it's okay to maybe operate in the busy and the chaos and where we really need to learn to say, no. I'm not sure that we're really good at that, as mom's especially. We're only good at the word “No” when the kids are climbing on the stove. But, I think that the word “no” is really important from a commitment standpoint and we need to practice that. It's that internal ear that we need to turn on to say, “no, you know, it's time to turn down that opportunity or change the path a little bit.”“It's normal for us to have those cycles. It's normal for us to just look at nature. Like there's a winter, there's a spring, there's a summer and, and there's a fall. And yet many of us try to be a summer all the time.”How I self-diagnosed the Hodgkin's Lymphoma I wanted to ask more about the book that you're writing. Are you open to talking about that? So what is the book about?Yes! This August 27th will be seven years of my last treatment for Hodgkin's lymphoma. During that six months of treatment I kept a really detailed journal of my experience. I'm gonna anger a lot of people when I say this out loud, but I actually made it fun. It was really fascinating to me because I self-diagnosed. So it's my story of how I actually self-diagnosed the Hodgkin's lymphoma and how to this day, I will tell you I never had cancer. I experienced cancer and how I walked through that journey. It was a speed bump and I tried to find as many gifts in it as I could. Now, as much as I'll tell you, I made it fun, yes, there were miserable moments and pity parties and all that stuff that goes along with that scary diagnosis. But when I got done, I found a couple of purposes for the book. One was that I really wanna show people that just because you get diagnosed with a scary word, doesn't really mean it has to be scary. We really can walk through some of these things with a much better attitude instead of that sort of like, we feel sorry for you and we hope you make it attitude that I think goes along with a lot of serious diseases. So I wanted to share that, with full transparency, my bigger goal outside of our lovely world and I do really, really enjoy our profession, but I really would love to be on a stage. I always joke that I wanna be the funny Tony Robbins of healthcare, and I really don't wanna be Tony Robbins, I still wanna be Cindy Howard, but I wanna stand up on a stage where there's 50,000 people and share my story and really inspire and motivate, but also share about natural healthcare and the fact that there are alternatives out there in different ways.We can walk through different health challenges and it doesn't have to be just the way one doctor says to do it. You really do have a choice in your body and your health. So, the book is really my journey through that.There's a lot of funny and a little bit of healthcare and hopefully a lot of inspiration. If this book touches one person in a way that just helps 'em walk through cancer or diabetes or whatever, in a way that is a little bit better, then it was worth publishing the story. So I'm in the final stages. I actually have a ghostwriter who is helping me clean it up, because I am not a writer. I love to tell the story and love to speak, but he's just helping me clean up the book a little bit so that it's publishable versus, you know, journal entry level. then I just wanna bring it to the masses and let people enjoy it.Was there something that happened that sparked the idea for, or the book? Was it something you had been thinking about doing for a while?Yeah, I've always wanted to write a book. You know, it was one of those, I hate to say bucket list because I don't really live that way, but you know, there's a couple things you just hope to accomplish. I wrote a children's book years ago about how eating carrots is really cool. It's really weird, I can't find it, I don't know what I did with it. I never published it. It was one of those things that I just thought, “oh, that would be great to check the item off the list”. I wrote a book. I just sort of felt compelled to share my story. A lot of people contributed to this book in a way of different messages and different insights and ways to look at things that I just think can be so valuable. So it's part of that inner teacher in me that would love to run around the country and teach. I also think I could teach through the written word of the book and probably get to more people than I do currently through programs.Connect With Dr. CindyWell, Dr. Cindy, thank you so much for everything that you have shared. This is a really valuable, inspiring conversation. So if people that are listening to this episode want to learn more about you and what you do, where's the best place for them to go?My business website is just innovativehwc.com but I'm happy to give out my personal information. My personal email is Dr.CindyHoward@msn.com my cell phone is fine. (708) 646-6561. If anybody out there has any questions or I can help them with anything the best way is to text me. You'll get the fastest answer from me that way. I can't stand email. I will answer eventually, but it'll take me longer, but really just reach out because my end goal is to help whoever I can and teach about what we do and how to improve our lives.
The risk of burnout is very high for those of us who work in helping professions. The risk is even higher if you work in a healthcare setting. Most of the research available in Pubmed is limited to people who work in medicine as the subjects of the studies. But we know through lived experience that burnout can effect, educators, parents, and more. So basically, it's up to US to find ways to recover from burnout. Better yet, let's pass on what we learn to others so that they can hopefully build more sustainable lives and practices and PREVENT burnout. In this episode, Leslie Cornwell returns to the show to discuss what people like you and I can do to prevent burnout. IN THIS EPISODE, WE COVER: The Power of Choice What The Research Says About The Link Between Burnout Prevention and Social Support Time & Energy Strategies That Help Prevent Burnout How To Make Change Stick RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE: Visit Leslie's Website HERE Join Leslie's Free Facebook Group HERE If you're a hands-on practitioner who wants to make $5K+/month more with an online course or program so you can stop squeezing appointments on your schedule, take my free class HERE.
IN THIS EPISODE, WE COVER: The effects of the energy that we create around our money and finances Mindset patterns that come up when we think about tax season and how these feelings may be limiting you financially The Drama Triangle and its relationship to your taxes and money Tips for shifting the next tax season from chaos to calm How Entrepreneurship shifts your wealth trajectory RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE: Visit Michelle's Website HERE Connect With Michelle Online at Facebook or Instagram @_michellebcooper Check Out Episode 191 of The Business Of Being Well To Hear More From Michelle If you're a hands-on practitioner who wants to make $5K+/month more with an online course or program so you can stop squeezing appointments on your schedule, take my free class HERE.
Can you imagine what it would be like to practice because you want to, not because you have to? How would you show up differently for your patients or clients? Would you be less in a rush and more present with them? Would they feel more heard in your office? Even if you can't imagine what it would be like to practice because you want to (instead of needing the money), I want you to know it's possible for you! And I firmly believe that we can be the best doctors and care providers when we aren't seeing patients as dollar signs. In Episode 199 of The Business Of Being Well, you'll hear from Kathleen Faris, a physical therapist in the DC area. Kathleen shares the story of how she went from working in a busy practice seeing lots of patients, to taking time off of practice to raise her kids, to then building a network marketing empire and later deciding to start treating patients again. Kathleen's story is amazingly inspiring, so if it's time for you to dream bigger about what's possible in your life and business this conversation is going to light you up.IN THIS EPISODE, WE COVER: What perspective allowed Kathleen to have both time freedom and financial freedom Thinking outside of the box allows you to expand your budget to reach your dreams The liberation that multiple streams of income provides Tips for reframing your belief system What has changed for Kathleen since she has transitioned to practicing because she wants to, not because she has to RESOURCES AND LINKS MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE: Connect with Kathleen at quantumptwellness.com or on Facebook @KathleenFaris If you're a hands-on practitioner who wants to make $5K+/month more with an online course or program so you can stop squeezing appointments on your schedule, take my free class HERE.
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