Building Your Ideal Practice

As much as I talk about websites, there is only so much they can really do. If you have been following the blog or my other writings, you may have heard me say how much I hate billing insurance companies and working with them and I have been wanting to get back to a total cash practice.

I have two websites for my clinic. One my Sitebuilit! Site -www.massageseattle.net and the other my test site for massagelaunch.com - www.citycentermassage.com. I started getting a few calls from my citycentermassage.com site a few months ago but they never turned into appointments for some reason or another. I think I had 2 clients from that and one was someone traveling through Seattle and one was a person who only gets a massage 1x a year or so - still not my ideal clients. Part of the problem was that I was still taking the insurance clients because I was fearful of not being able to make a living and pay the bills. I finally just couldn’t take the insurance stuff anymore and I just went cold turkey - well almost. I talked to all of my insurance clients and basically sent them away for various reasons. I now am only taking insurance from one company who pays the most - almost $100 per hour.
I cleared my schedule up and made room for new clients and what do you think happens? My website finally started working for me. I have gotten 2 new cash clients from both of the sites in the last 2 weeks.
I didn’t do anything different and I haven’t even really been adding any content (which is the Sitebuildit ! way.) or doing any advertising or anything.
It is really all about creating the intention and walking the talk- following through with your intentions.
I also had some really amazing coincidental things happen this week. One of them being I was thinking of this exercise/weight lifting book that I used to have a very long time ago- probably 12-15 years ago. I hadn’t thought about it in ages and didn’t think I even had it anymore. I did a quick check of all my shelves and couldn’t find it. Today I go into the office and it is sitting on my desk with a note from one of my office mates telling me that so and so (her client) returned the book! I don’t even remember even loaning it out or anything let alone to this other persons client. Anyways - amazing things do happen when you start to get in sync - when your thoughts and actions are in alignment which is what the law of attraction is all about. I just started a site on that a few months ago and while it is still in it’s very early stages here it is www.learn-the-law-of-attraction-secret.com

Posted in Building Your Practice, Peer Supervision, Starting Your Practice | No Comments »

Massage Politics Update

From the Ramblemuse Keith Grant Massage Politics Sheet

Indiana’s SB 320 Likely Vulnerable to Free Speech Challenge

With the ink barely dry on Indiana’s SB 320, a massage certification act, it appears that part of the act’s stipulations may violate first amendment protections on commercial speech. SB 320 is a title act, restricting the use of specific titles to those who are certified under the law. The is in contrast to a practice act, which makes it illegal to practice unless licensed by the state. Unfortunately, SB 320 restricts use of the generic, descriptive term “massage therapist”, making it difficult for those who legally practice massage but don’t wish to certify or meet the qualifications to certify to truthfully describe their practices. The Institute of Justice is taking on a similar title act in Texas, that prohibits use of the generic term “interior designer”.

In Zauderer V. Office Of Disciplinary Counsel (471 U.S. 626, 1985), the U.S. Supreme Court summarized the protection of commercial speech.

The States and the Federal Government are free to prevent the dissemination of commercial speech that is false, deceptive, or misleading or that proposes an illegal transaction. Commercial speech that is not false or deceptive and does not concern unlawful activities, however, may be restricted only in the service of a substantial governmental interest, and only through means that directly advance that interest.

This Court reaffirmed this principle in Ibanez V. Florida Dept. Of Bus. & Prof. Reg. (No. 93-639 ,1994), a certiorari to the District Court Of Appeals of Florida, First District.

The State may ban such speech only if it is false, deceptive, or misleading. See, e.g., Zauderer v. Office of Disciplinary Counsel of Supreme Court of Ohio, 471 U.S. 626, 638 . If it is not, the State can restrict it, but only upon a showing that the restriction directly and materially advances a substantial state interest in a manner no more extensive than necessary to serve that interest.

The issues, including specificity of title protections an “narrowness of tailoring” a discussed further in Miller v Stuart (No. 96-2068, 11th Circuit District Court, 1997) and Passions Video v Jay Nixon (No. 05-4053, 8th Circuit Court of Appeals, 2006). The latter case notes:

The First Amendment provides that “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech.” U.S. Const. amend I. The amendment applies to state and local governments through the Fourteenth Amendment. Central Hudson Gas & Elec. Corp. v. Public Serv. Comm’n, 447 U.S. 557, 561 (1980).

Indiana had the choice of passing a practice act, making the practice of massage illegal except for those licensed. By making the practice of massage otherwise illegal, a practice act would have fulfilled the “not false, deceptive, misleading, or illegal” requirements for regulating the generic title. In forgoing a practice act but then regulating the generic title, IN SB 320 set up an unnecessary conflict with the first amendment protections of commercial speech. SB 320 should have stuck with defining and protecting a recognizable title not in generic use — in short, a title that, in the commercial world, could have been trademarked. Legally consistent occupational regulation is clearly a still evolving art.

Posted in Licensing and Legislation | No Comments »

Great Resource

I just found this great resource for massage therapists on the UCMT College Website.

There is a great Resource section with some great ideas for marketing, help for creating a budget, forms for doing business, and much more.

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Making assumptions

One of the four agreements sited by Don Miguel Ruiz in his book of the same name is

Don’t make assumptions

In the book he explains that when we make assumptions itis usually based on our own perceptions that may seem true in the moment, but they end up causing the problems in our lives. When we make assumptions we end up taking things personally.
We assume that we know what kind of massage is best for a client. We assume that everyone sees life the same way we do and that what we feel with our hands is what they feel inside. We assume that we know how much pressure needs to be applied without asking the client. We assume that they may want our advice on stretching or other health care tips and ideas.

He says in his book “The way to avoid making assumptions is to ask questions. Ask until you are clear and then even don’t assume that you know all there is to know about a situation.”

You can never really know anyone or what they are thinking or feeling.

Posted in Ethics, Recommended Reading | No Comments »

Is the pressure ok?

One of the things that will make or break your massage is learning to give the right amount of pressure to each individual client. Since each persons needs and perspective are different, it is important that you learn to communicate with the client to find out what they need.

Just asking “Is the pressure ok” does not tell you anything. Is is ok for what?

I just had the experience of having such a massage at a local spa by a fairly new massage therapist. It is my once or twice a year experience where I just get it in my head that I need a massage and I go off looking for one. Actually even more interesting is that she asked if the pressure was ok when she was digging her knuckle into my Achilles tendon - which gave me little or no sensation but pressure. She applied deeper pressure there but no where else or at any time during my massage.I did go in knowing that it was a spa and that I would be getting a spa massage, but this place actually offered deep tissue massage. One of the other things that really amazed me is the amount of time she wasted doing the fluffy massage stuff even after I asked her to do deep tissue work. Do people at spas really like this? Or do people who go to spas not know any better and don’t ask for much more?

Now how they define deep tissue massage is still a mystery to me and they don’t have a clue what deep tissue means to me as they never asked or tried to communicate about the pressure in a way that could determine just how much pressure would feel good and do the job of loosening up some tight muscles that I have from working out and gardening a lot lately.

It really gives me some new insights everytime I go off and get a massage from someone I don’t know. It really helps give me some perspective about how to better serve my clients - something I still am always striving for after 18 years in the business.

How do you find out if the pressure of the massage is meeting the needs of your client? Just asking is the pressure ok one time really does nothing. How do you engage the client in the process of getting their needs met?

A better way to ask is to ask a series of questions as you work on various parts of the body. Does this pressure feel deep enough? On a scale of 1-10, how deep does this pressure feel? What number would you like it to feel like?
You could basically be asking that question every 3 or 4 minutes or everytime you move to another muscle or area.

The other thing that happened is that after I asked for deep tissue and I was met with confusion and no interest in whether she had adapted adequately, I gave up asking and just put up with the massage hoping to get something out of it at least and waiting to be able to tell the people at the desk that it was an awful experience. I knew the gal was new and it wasn’t really her fault but she didn’t even try or know how to try. How often do your clients give up or hide what they really want thinking that they will hurt your feelings?

They of course had no interest in knowing how I liked their service. Is it no wonder the massage therapist didn’t have any interest? Is it the nature of the spa business that you think that most people don’t come back and they are only coming for their once a year or whatever spa adventure?

I guess I always seem to find the ones to write about!

What do you do to communicate with your clients about how the pressure feels to them?

Posted in Building Your Practice, Starting Your Practice | 6 Comments »