Tag Archive for massage business

Sales – that dreaded word for massage therapists

May 31, 2007 Julie Onofrio Start Your Massage Business

I have heard many massage therapists put off their sales/marketing efforts because they hate the word and the process that is equated with sales. When people think of sales they often think of it as having to be one of those used car salesman who dress up in wierd costumes for TV commercials.

Having to make sales or sell your clients on your service is not what creating a massage practice is about. All sales or marketing really means is that you tell people what you do and you go out and find people who need what you do. Simple- right?

Well even though it is simple – it does take time. What makes the difference in being successful in sales/marketking is really having the confidence in yourself. It requires being able to handle and deal with rejection by not taking it personally and learn to communicate what it is you do.

The best way to do this is to use the Sitebuildit! business building system and webdesign/hosting company. You can actually read all of their material for free – that’s how confident they are in their product. Once you take the time to really study what they are saying, I think you will understand what it is that they are teaching you to do through a website. All they are doing is helping you get clear about what it is that you do and helping you to find people who need your service. It’s simple marketing.

The best place to start is with their Service Sellers page or the complete Service Sellers Manual

For a limited time I am offering my website design services for reader of this blog and websites at a really reduced rate. I am offering to start a 8 page website for you for $300 (hosting and software are an additional $300 for a year of hosting.) An 8 page website is a great place to start. It gives you a website to start putting information for your potential clients. You will still have to market your practice and put your website address on everything. (If you are doing any kind of marketing or even have business cards printed – it is a waste of time to give them out without having your website address on them.)

Another article on Sales from Massage Today.
The Difference Between Sales and Marketing

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Building Your Ideal Practice

May 24, 2007 Julie Onofrio Peer Supervision, Start Your Massage Business

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

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4 Steps to a Successful Massage Practice

May 6, 2007 Julie Onofrio Build Your Massage Business, News, Start Your Massage Business

I have been doing some rewriting of my www.massagepracticebuilder.com site to include more of the information about using Sitebuildit!, the law of attraction, peer supervision and peer supervision groups to build a rewarding and successful practice. My format for building a practice focuses on the rewarding part because if you focus on that, everything else will fall into place.

A rewarding practice is one that brings you joy and comes to you easily because you know that you are responsible for everything you have created in your life.

My basic forumla for creating that is to build a website, practice the law of attraction or learning to become self aware, start or join a peer supervision group and find a peer supervisor and then when you have what you want, share it with others through the process of mentoring, becoming a peer supervisor and through starting/teaching in an apprenticeship program.

I recommend that people start with building a website using Sitebuildit! because it is way more than just building a website. It is about starting to really think about what it is that you do and learning to talk about it and write about it in a way that attracts your ideal client to you. Working on your ideal client you will feel nourished and they will respect you enough to pay you what you ask for because they value what you do. As you build a website, you will also get information about what type of clients are finding you and what they are looking for so that you can optimize on those things if you desire or you can rewrite to start attracting those you do want to work with. This is all done using the statistics that SBI! provides on keywords.
So starting a website for your massage practice is just not about the website. It is about really taking a look at what you want and learning to ask for just that. In that way you can become more ‘attractive’ to your ideal client.

Understanding and using the law of attraction is just about learning to focus on what you do want and stop focusing on what you don’t want. It is about becoming aware of all of those little unconscious thoughts that creep up when you say what you desire. These thoughts are coming from your unconscious false core beliefs that you have about yourself. They aren’t true even though at times it really does seem like they are. It is coming to an understanding that you are good enough and don’t have to work to please everyone. It is about accepting yourself where you are at right now. It is about learning to change your unconscious beliefs by becoming more aware of what you are feeling. Your feelings are what tell you if what you are thinking is in alignment with your true self.

Starting or joining a peer supervision group or finding a peer supervisor for one on one work will help you with the first two things and also help you learn to set boundaries. You boundaries are what set up the healing container for the client and allow you to be present with the process of healing and stop focus on fixing clients.

When you have a solid practice set up using these paramters it is also important to start sharing what you know and have learned with others by becoming a peer supervisor yourself or teaching massage in an apprenticeship program or other type of mentoring program. When we can begin to share what we know and have experienced it is another way of learning even more about yourself and helping others to see themselves more clearly is necessary for promoting the massage profession and making it into the profession that we dream about.

Everything that is on my other site www.thebodyworker.com was meant to start an apprenticeship program and help pass on the art of massage to others as well as supporting other massage therapists through the process of becoming a massage therapist.

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Dealing with cancellations

December 1, 2006 Julie Onofrio Ethics, Start Your Massage Business

As massage therapists we will all be faced with a client canceling their session at the last minute some time or another. How we deal with this will affect the whole profession. We teach people how to treat us as Dr. Phil says. When we allow clients to cancel at the last minute without paying for a session we are telling them that our time is not valuable.

The big struggle with charging for last minute cancellations has to do with our fear of losing that client. The real question is do we even really want that client at all as it appears that they don’t respect our work or time enough to be responsible for their actions.

When we say things like we will let that one go because they are a good client or tell them we won’t charge them if they rebook we in a sense are trying to “caretake” them and take responsibility for their life. We don’t want them to not like us because we ask them for money.

But when you took the time and energy to be there for the appointment and you locked them into your schedule so that no one else could take that time – what you are saying when you just let that slide is “I don’t value myself enough so why should you”.

Afterall it is a business we are running. A business is built on a strong framework of policies and procedures and compassion. But is letting people slide and not pay for a last minute cancellation really compassionate or is it “caretaking” ( when we try to take responsiblity for others. You can read more about caretaking at www.thebodyworker.com and the highly recommended reading section and at Jack Blackburns website -see “Caretaking” )

Now if you are reading this and saying what about a death in the family can’t you excuse that? While that is a serious situation I still believe that anyone who respects your time will still want to pay you for it.

Now don’t get me wrong. I have struggled with this for the last 17 years and there is no easy answer. But the more I learn about myself, the more I see how everytime I make excuses for the client not to pay me for my time, I give up a little piece of myself.

Now I try to be more up front with people and inform new clients of my cancellation policy right in the first phone call and then have them sign a statement on their first visit at the end of the intake form. What this does is establish the ground rules.

There are many ways to handle cancellations – charge the whole amount or charge a $25-$35 fee or even charge depending on how much notice they have given you.

Do you want to allow for people being sick, for family emergencies, for them getting stuck at work? What about those who just plain forgot?

What you do with each client does reflect on the profession.

Ethically Speaking

How To Handle “No Shows”

These suggestions can help you be more effective in ethically managing clients who push your scheduling and time management limits. BY DIANNE POLSENO

Increase Your Income by Reducing “No Shows”

By Colleen (Steigerwald) Holloway, LMT

 

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SOAP Charting

November 19, 2006 Julie Onofrio Massage Insurance Billing, News, Start Your Massage Business

One of the jobs I hate as a massage therapist is SOAP charting. I have taken a class in it and have read a few books on it and I still never really know what to say.

The reason why SOAP charting is so important is because it is the only way to communicate with the medical profession. They will understand massage better when they can see the improvement that massage brings each session.

Diana Thompson is the “Queen” of SOAP charting with her book “Hands Heal” and her classes on soap charting.

I have some basic information on my website:

SOAP charting for Massage Therapists

What should SOAP charts say?

Functional reporting.

One of the things that Diana said in her class on charting is that we need to be charting for every client even if they are not going through their insurance. She said that since we are considered “health care providers” here in WA state that it makes it be required for our profession.

SOAP charting can also be helpful in your learning process and understanding the process that each client goes through. As a profession we also need to be writing up more case studies about our work so that everyone – medical professionals and general population can also see what massage can do. Charting is at the center of case studies.

I hope to be having a section on the website soon that will allow people to start posting their case studies. If anyone has any to post now, please send them to me!

Other resources:

WinCity Soap charting software – also has some articles and lists Diana Thompsons classes. I haven’t tried the software. Has anyone?

Some simple samples

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