Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
(Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Go Unlimited to remove this message.) Hi, welcome to the Abundant Practice
Podcast.
I'm Allison from Abundance Practice Building.
I have a nearly diagnosable obsession with helping
therapists build sustainable, joy-filled private practices, just
like I've done for tens of thousands of
(00:21):
therapists across the world.
I'm excited to help you too.
If you wanna fill your practice with ideal
clients, we have loads of free resources and
paid support.
Go to abundancepracticebuilding.com slash links.
All right, onto the show.
So I've talked about therapy notes on here
for years.
I could talk about the features and the
(00:41):
benefits in my sleep, but there are a
couple of things I want you to know
about therapy notes that doesn't typically make it
into an ad script.
First is that they actually care if you
like their platform.
They don't only make themselves available on the
phone to troubleshoot so you don't pull your
hair out when you get stuck.
They also take member suggestions and implement those
that there's client demand for, like Therapy Search,
(01:02):
an included listing service that helps clients find
you, internal and external secure messaging, clinical outcome
measures to keep an eye on how your
clients are progressing, a super smooth super bill
process, real-time eligibility to check on your
client's insurance.
In my conversations with the employees there at
all levels, they all really believe in their
product and they want you to love it
too.
(01:23):
Second, they are proudly independently owned.
Why should you care about that?
Because as soon as venture capital becomes involved,
the focus shifts from making customers happy to
making investors happy.
Prices go way up, innovation plateaus, making more
money with as little output as possible becomes
the number one focus.
With over 100,000 therapists using their platform,
(01:45):
they've been able to stay incredibly successful and
they don't have to sacrifice your experience to
stay there.
You can try two months free at therapynotes
.com with the coupon code ABUNDANT.
Hi.
Hi Ariel.
Hi, nice to meet you.
Nice to meet you too.
I feel like I know you because I
(02:05):
followed you on social media for a long
time, but like real-life conversation.
This is- Yay, I'm real.
Amazing.
Well, what would be most helpful today?
Yes.
Sorry, I didn't put a lot of notes.
No reason.
It's hard to- Yeah.
So I currently have been in private practice
(02:27):
for a year, but I've been working with
the same agency for I think seven years.
And so in the last year, I'm trying
to kind of transition more to private practice
and scale down the agency work.
Right now I'm at about 80% agency,
20% private practice.
Primarily I've been doing private practice or I've
(02:48):
been getting my referrals just like through community,
like other therapists and people that I've known
for a long time.
And so I've been going through the program
and it's been so helpful.
And I feel like I'm at the place
where like, I've gone through the marketing foundations,
but I'm really trying to like implement them.
(03:09):
The ones that I feel like I've kind
of checked off is like I've built the
website, I've done my professional listings, I've like
niched down quite a bit and that's been
helpful.
And then I've done in the last couple
of months networking.
And the primary networking that I've done is
with like mostly individual therapists.
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I think mostly because I was nervous about
it.
I wanted to be felt kind of safe.
But I also kind of feel a little
bit like I'm getting, I feel a little
bit stuck because I haven't seen many results
from like the fruit of my efforts, which
I know it's a wild time right now.
Like this isn't just a me thing, but
(03:57):
it feels a little bit hard to like,
I don't know.
I think I'm just being hard on myself
and like it's kind of hard to have
the motivation.
I will also say I'm the primary breadwinner
for my family.
So like I have to see so many
clients and work a pretty full schedule.
So trying to do marketing and like really
build the private practice on the side feels
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like it's hard.
It takes a lot of extra work and
I'm some weeks, I'm like, I don't have
the energy, but I'm trying to like stay
consistent.
So where I feel like I really need
help though is trying to figure out kind
of like, I've got some questions about like
(04:38):
the networking stuff that I'm doing.
I also want to ask a little bit
about SEO and just kind of see like
where I can, because my time is so
limited, where I can like put my efforts
to give me the biggest bang for my
buck with my practice.
The other thing it's kind of important to
know, and then I'll stop talking a little
bit, but like the other piece that's important
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is my husband and I are thinking about
relocating like in the next year, probably in
a year from now.
There's a part of me that's been a
little resistant of like doing such heavy local
marketing and local networking, even though I feel
like that's most natural for me and I've
been doing, but like I feel like I'm
like building all these connections here and then
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I'm just gonna like pick up and move
and have to start all over at a
different time.
Okay, I want to speak to that first
because it's a really reasonable concern.
Right.
And if you maintain those relationships via email
or text or, you know, Zoom or whatever,
so many therapists are virtual only that it
doesn't really matter if you live there or
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not.
If you have the relationship with people, you
stay licensed in that state, you're gonna still
get referrals from them.
Yeah.
So if you're open to doing virtual when
you move, then you should be solid.
Yeah, that is true.
That's very helpful.
Do you feel like it's helpful for folks
in my position to start doing networking in
the state that I'm not in yet as
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well?
I personally, because I've moved to different states
a few times in private practice, I usually
wait a month before I move Okay.
and start reaching out.
And then, and if you're already licensed, because
I moved before online therapy was a thing.
There was like talk of Skype therapy at
the time.
We still see how old, how long ago
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that was.
But- I think I saw this again.
Sounds weird to like, feel like I know
things about you and you just met me
10 seconds ago, but I think I knew
this because when I found you, I was
very excited because we're thinking about moving to
North Carolina.
Uh-huh.
And that's where we're at, right?
Yup, yup.
Calm down.
Oregon on the East or West Coast.
(06:47):
Yeah.
So, I think my biggest concern about that
is like the time change.
Like it works out for me here to
take North Carolina clients because they're here in
the day, but the opposite, I'm like, I'd
have to work evenings, which I don't want
to do because I've got little kids or
like later on.
So let's also challenge that.
I'm just here to challenge you.
(07:07):
You don't have to work evenings.
They can move to their mornings and your
afternoons or noon and three, you know, like
- Yeah.
It's all doable.
It's all doable.
It's doable.
And where in North Carolina are you planning
to move?
Do you know yet?
We're looking at Charlotte.
Awesome, yeah.
Yeah.
(07:27):
So, bigger city than where we live now
by quite a bit, but I don't know,
I'm hoping maybe, I know there's probably way
more therapists than personnel, but you know, if
I can practice here, I can build a
practice there.
A hundred percent.
And that's something when I moved from Seattle
to North Carolina, I was like, you know,
what if it was a fluke?
What if I just got lucky?
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And like, that's not the case.
What works in every state works in the
other states too.
Everybody worry that their location, whatever it is,
whether it's a big city or a small
town or a medium sized city, whether it's
rural or urban or Southern or Northern or
whatever, like everybody's worried that their place is
different.
It's not.
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I mean, like we've worked with people in
60 different countries now.
It's not different anywhere.
There are some cultural differences for sure, but
not based exclusively on location.
North Carolina is waiting for you.
It will be great.
Oh, lovely.
I'm excited about it.
So, okay.
Networking wise, then you feel like it's still
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okay to like go hard with the networking.
Yeah, yeah.
Start networking there a month or so before
I move.
Yeah, yeah.
Okay.
Yeah.
Right now, do you feel like it's, I
feel a little bit stuck, because again, I've
been working or networking a lot with individual
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therapists and I have tried to take like
the pieces that you've recommended as far as
like other people who are in my niche
or seeing like people adjacent to my niche
that we could refer back and forth, other
people who see my niche that are full.
But I, and I will say it's only
been like three months that I've been doing
this.
(09:12):
Gotten any referrals from any of those people.
Yeah.
A lot of work to not get like
even one call.
Yeah.
Are you following up with them?
Like, are you maintaining a relationship with them
over those three months?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Maintained.
But I also feel like they're kind of
slow right now.
That's it.
Yep.
A lot of like extra excess.
(09:32):
Mm-hmm.
And I think that's the tricky part.
I mean, that's always a tricky part when
you're networking like within your niche, for instance,
that like if you're networking with a bunch
of other people who are trying to fill
their practice, you're not gonna get anywhere now.
If you maintain that relationship when one or
both of you are full, you're, you know,
it'll be great.
But that's a long game.
And what it sounds like you need right
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now is the short game.
And because 2025 is just really weird.
And because it's the summer, it's just a
slower time for referrals right now.
That doesn't mean it's gonna be like this
in September.
I really expect and anticipate more of a
flood and I shouldn't say flood having just
lived through this hurricane, more of a rush
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of people in the fall because I keep
comparing it to how it felt in COVID.
It's like everybody held their breath.
I think right now, like the economy is
so unstable.
I think there's a breath holding that there's
an like, I'll deal with it myself that
happened in the first part of this year.
And then the weather gets nicer and that's
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part of what happens with the summer slump
every time.
And people are like, people who quote unquote
didn't have the money for therapy are going
on vacations or doing, you know, these kinds
of things.
And so it's less stable now.
But I think that after putting off the
care that they need for eight months, I
think that the fall is gonna be, this
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is a prediction and I am not a
futurist, but I think that it's gonna be
good for a lot of us in the
way that everybody held their breath for a
month or two when COVID first hit.
And then it was such an intense experience
of people calling all the time.
That's what I'm hoping.
There is more competition now with big therapy
tech than there was back then.
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So that also makes it harder, but definitely
not impossible.
It's just taking people a little longer.
Do you feel like for the more immediate
stuff, networking at like doctor's offices or places
like that, it's kind of the bigger?
Yeah, if you can get in with a
doctor's office, I mean, you're not gonna like
sit down for tea with a doctor or
anything, but if you can get in with
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their referral coordinator and even a phone conversation
and can I send you some stuff?
And it also depends on your niche.
Tell me more about your niche so I
can guide better.
So I feel like this is a very
common one I'm seeing online right now, but
basically women, working women, 25 to 45 dealing
with stress, burnout, anxiety, high functioning anxiety.
(12:01):
Yeah, yeah.
So these women are coming into their doctors.
They've got like high blood pressure when they've
never had a high blood pressure, maybe high
cholesterol when they've never had a high cholesterol.
They're pissed off, but they can't express their
piss offedness.
Especially as you get up to the 45
range, you've also got perimenopause on board.
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And so people are like, they're not able
to mask in the way that we have
all been taught to mask our emotions.
I'm also getting a lot of folks who
are getting diagnosed with like autoimmune diseases.
Yep, yep.
Other ways where it's like we've carried the
stress in our body for too long.
Yeah.
And now we can't deal with it.
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So it's like they're dealing with medical stuff,
but they recognize part of it as psychosocial
as well.
Yeah.
The Venn diagram of type A's, type A
women and held as daughters and like the
autoimmune stuff is like nearly just a big
circle.
So talking to doctors about that, right?
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Saying like, I've worked with type A stressed
out women, many of whom have autoimmune disorders
and I'm helping them reduce their stress in
hopes that it's gonna reduce everything, including flare
-ups.
Any good doctor is gonna understand the dynamics
there.
And basically selling what you do to the
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doctors from the perspective of like, how does
it help them?
Why do they give a shit about a
type A woman?
They give a shit because those women are
landing in their office, not necessarily for antidepressants,
but for exactly what you're saying, like the
autoimmune issue.
And then there's the grief as a type
A woman, eldest daughter type with an autoimmune
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disease.
Like there is a grief that goes along
with like, my body won't let me do
what I wanna do.
And I'm pissed.
A coping strategy that I've always done.
Yes, right?
Now do I have to deal with emotions?
So to just, you know, to be able
to address, I work with a lot of
women who are like newly diagnosed.
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They're having a really hard time.
They've always denied listening to their body.
They always kind of shut it down and
pushed just a little harder.
And now they can't.
And they don't know what to do with
themselves and they don't know how to sit
still.
And they don't know who they are without
achievement.
And they feel guilty for not being productive.
Lay out all the things that the doctor
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is gonna see or intuit about that woman.
And maybe they are that woman too.
And you will become their go-to for
their folks who are diagnosed with like.
I'm good at like knowing the words for
all these niches.
A long time.
That's how my brain works.
Do you know how long it took me
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to like make coffee to just find those
words that you just like rattled off in
a few minutes?
Well, I'm glad it's helpful.
Cause that's exactly, those are like exactly the
pain points.
Yeah.
Really speaking to, speaking to your ideal client
too.
Cause there are a lot of therapists who
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work with women with anxiety, but they don't
include the autoimmune piece.
So that's another thing to talk to therapists
about.
It's like, I mean, if you made that
like stressed out type A women with autoimmune
diseases, like that's, that sounds so specific and
so small, but that is such a huge
number of women.
Okay.
Okay.
Stressed out type A women with autoimmune.
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That's just gonna be like the header on
my website.
Yeah.
What's funny is if you just said women
with autoimmune, it's the same exact woman.
But when you put stressed out type A,
they're like, Oh, she, she really knows me.
Like it feels very, yeah.
Okay.
And though still, still do the networking with
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other therapists as well.
That's still helpful.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's still helpful.
It will be, if you can find the
ones that are already full, then that's going
to help.
And I would go with couples therapists.
Cause that's also like a big relationship shift
and dynamic of like, she doesn't want to
be taken care of.
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The partner may or may not want to
take care of because they partnered with this
very independent, very capable person.
And so when somebody can't fully take care
of themselves sometimes, that's a, that's a hard
thing for a couple.
I was also wondering about SEO.
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Done any specific SEO, but I started the
training online and I guess I'm just wondering
if that, when I was thinking before what
you said about the networking here and there,
if I'm thinking about moving, I'm wondering if
that's like another, a better way for someone
who's kind of in transition to be getting
clients.
(17:01):
Potentially.
Yeah.
I mean, I'm not sure how competitive the
Charlotte SEO market is.
You know, the bigger the city, the harder
it is to get on page one.
If you're not on page one, it's pointless.
And not like for all search terms, but
for the search terms that matter most for
your people.
So I would Google around and see if
it's a bunch of, if it's all like
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psychology today and better help and Alma and
these big platforms, you're not going to be
able to push them off of page one
most likely.
But if it's like a third that, and
then the rest are real people, you might
have a shot.
Okay.
And I really like simplified SEO consulting.
(17:43):
That's who does that training.
They have a whole, like they'll do it
for you or they have courses to teach
you how to do it that are a
lot more in depth than the training they
did for us.
So you can also play with that.
They're the SEO company I trust most because
I've paid a few of them and they're
the only ones who ever got me results.
And a lot of my students have used
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them and love them.
Okay.
But even then, like if it's just the
big, the big tech companies on page one,
even using them probably wouldn't be.
Because they can't guarantee results, right?
And if you can't guarantee results, I don't
know, they don't want to spend thousands and
thousands of dollars on something like SEO, you
know?
(18:24):
Right.
Yeah.
Blog writing, I'm working in the thing.
Great, necessary for SEO.
So that's a good pairing.
How do we feel about using ChatGPT for
blogs?
Not wholeheartedly positive.
I think if you write the blog and
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then you've put it into ChatGPT and you
say, like you use it as an editing
tool essentially of like, please keep the tone,
please like maintain my candor.
You could say, you know, read this blog
and tell me things I could improve upon
it.
And then they'll give you some tips or
please edit this to 800 words because all
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blogs need to be at least 800 words
for SEO.
If it's currently like 500 or 600, like
please, you know, maintain my tone and make
this blog post 800 words.
And the thing about ChatGPT and writing, you
have to give it really specific, really good
prompts for it to be anything other than
like, hey, are you feeling depressed and down
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in the dumps?
You know, like it's so cheesy.
So if you can infuse more of you
in it, whether that's on the front end
or the back end, it's usually faster if
you write the majority of it and then
have it edit and then you edit.
But most of the time, like you can
tell a ChatGPT written blog, you know, like
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if you look at therapist blogs, it's pretty
obvious.
And you can say like, I've written this
blog, keep my tone.
Will you please optimize it for SEO for
these search terms?
Oh, right, right, right, right, right.
So that can help with that piece too.
But again, you gotta edit.
And this is the same, like all the
copy on your website, you know, it's the
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same thing for that.
Okay.
Other than for SEO, like do clients really
read the blogs?
Are clients reading the blogs?
Yeah, so I think about like, you've got
your website.
Yes.
And you've got networking and the purpose of
everything else that you do from a marketing
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perspective is to bring people to your website.
So blogging on its own typically doesn't unless
you've got, cause that's, you know, that's on
the website, unless you're doing search engine optimization
or you've got like a social media channel
that's pretty active that you can link to
it.
(20:52):
The age of your people, you've still got
some readers in there.
Like the younger folks slant towards video.
The media, I would say most millennials are
in the video realm.
And then Gen Xers like myself, we can
kind of be split between video and reading.
So I love a twofer.
(21:13):
I make videos like all the time, but
I'm much more of a reader when I'm
consuming other people's content.
I'll do like, I love a twofer where
it's, you do a video of it.
And this is another way you can use
ChatGPT.
You can write a, you can have chat
or you can write a script for a
video.
You can do the video, or if you're
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better the opposite way, like you do a
video and then you have it transcribed.
And then you can put that into ChatGPT
and say, this is a video script.
Will you please turn this into an 800
page or 800 word blog that's optimized for
SEO.
Please maintain the tone, keep it friendly and
warm.
And you will still have to edit the
hell out of it, but it shaves off
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probably 30 minutes worth of work.
Okay, fair enough.
So you're thinking video and blog is probably
like the combination of the two.
Yeah, I really love the combo of like
video blog SEO, because I feel like the
main purpose of blogging in 2025 is for
SEO.
And I think that your niche is specific
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enough and the things that your ideal clients
come in with, like that's specific, things they
say are specific enough.
Like if you wrote a blog post on
something about like the frustration of not being
able to do all the things you're capable
of because your stupid body won't let you.
If you can come up with a great
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title that explains that more concisely than I
just did, and it's something that your ideal
clients would search, then even like coping with
autoimmune for a type A, well, like there
are ways that you can hit a bunch
of those search terms, but you've got to
think through really carefully the keywords that your
(22:59):
ideal clients would use.
And you can use Google's keyword planner and
you're gonna probably ask chat GPT, like here's
the way, like this is my ideal client,
describe it in as much detail as humanly
possible.
And then say like, what search terms would
my ideal client use to find therapy?
(23:21):
Right, and give you an idea.
Okay.
And then plug those into Google's keyword planner,
you'll have to create a free account, but
that'll tell you how often that search term
is used, how kind of expensive it is,
like if you were to run ads to
it or something like that, like if it's
(23:42):
more in demand versus less in demand.
What was that?
My husband does some marketing, so he's kind
of tried to show me the keyword thing,
but it didn't really make sense until I
did this side of it.
Now I'm like, oh, that's what he was
trying to show me.
Like it's like 20 cents per click for
this keyword or that thing, that website shows
all the keywords and how searchable they are,
(24:04):
how much you have to pay in like
ads to get them.
Is that what you're talking about?
Yeah, so like that'd be Google AdWords or
Google Ads, which I really hit and miss
for therapists.
Okay.
I've hired three different companies and never had
any luck with it because as an eating
disorder therapist, I'm up against the treatment centers
(24:26):
and they're happy to pay hundreds of dollars
per click because they're gonna make so much
money.
I am not happy to pay hundreds of
dollars per click, but there are people who
have different specialties that do have some success.
Okay.
But I would lean on your husband for
the Google Ads thing because it's pretty complicated.
Okay, but what was the, sorry, what was
the one that you said that was not
(24:47):
Google Ads then?
Oh, so just like the keyword planner.
So that can help you know what you're
wanting to get ranked for SEO.
Okay.
Okay, this is all gonna make sense.
At some point, it's not gonna sound like
foreign language.
Yeah, it's really not.
You're putting things, you're like, oh, wait, I
(25:08):
know about Google Keyword Planner.
Like it's all coalescing.
Yeah, exactly.
Okay, to do videos, I need to have
social media.
Not necessarily, but it doesn't hurt.
You could put videos on YouTube because they
have to be hosted on something like YouTube
or Vimeo, I would recommend YouTube for them
(25:28):
to even be put on your website typically.
So I would have them on YouTube.
If you want to do social media, I
feel like your niche is really primed for
it.
If you don't want to do social media,
I want you to save yourself the time
suckage and- I really don't want to
do social media.
I feel like I'm supposed to because I'm
(25:49):
a millennial.
Don't do it.
I don't even do it in my personal
life.
I hate it so much.
Yeah, don't do it, don't do it.
Not that I love following other people, like
your page is wonderful, but I don't want
to do it.
Yeah, then don't.
Permission to not do it as- Permission
to not do it granted.
Okay.
(26:10):
So I can still though, the video will
still be helpful to do videos and put
them on YouTube.
Yeah.
Okay.
I mean, it's unlikely you're going to get
a bunch of people seeing it, but with
a combination of like video and blogging and
SEO, if we kind of made those all
one thing, like one strategy, then you're hitting
(26:30):
it a few things because you know, like
Google owns YouTube.
And so while written content is much more
likely to be at the top of Google,
like on the first page of Google, it's
also giving you some options there.
Okay.
With video, yeah.
Okay.
Okay.
I have time for one more question.
Yeah, yeah.
Any other places for professional listings, online listings
(26:54):
other than Psych Today that you feel like
are fruitful?
So I would test a bunch, like I
would do probably three to six months.
If you get even one client that sticks
around for a while, then it's worth the
cost.
But I would look at Therapy Den, I
would look at Inclusive Therapists.
If there's anything modality specific that you do,
(27:17):
like, you know, the IFS folks have their
IFS one, EMDR folks have the EMDR one,
then I would go on that modalities as
well.
Okay.
But for your niche, there isn't an obvious,
you know, sometimes there will be like an
OCD one or something like that.
There might be an autoimmune directory somewhere with
like different professionals that understand and, you know,
(27:42):
get it.
Okay.
I would Google what your ideal clients would
Google and see what they find.
Okay.
And then try it for three to six
months.
If I get one or two, great.
If not, probably not for me.
Yeah.
Yeah.
All right.
Amazing.
Thank you.
Absolutely.
(28:02):
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's, you've got a lot on your plate
if you're also thinking about moving, even if
it is a year away, there's still just,
it takes up a lot of brain space.
It does.
Yeah.
We're going to keep trekking along slowly and
surely.
Good.
Amazing.
Well, let us know in the Facebook group
if you're in there.
I don't know if you're in there or
not.
(28:23):
I'm just thinking about you hating social media.
You can do Facebook, it's smaller.
Yeah, okay, good.
Well, and that group is sweet, so it's
never a bunch of drama.
So let us know how it's going in
there.
And yeah, I'm around.
Sounds good.
Thank you.
Sure, take care.
Bye.
Bye.
(28:43):
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If you're a super newbie, grab our free
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I'd love for you to follow, rate, and
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(29:04):
this episode with a therapist friend.
Let's help all our colleagues build what they
want.