Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
(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 want to fill your practice with
ideal clients, we have loads of free resources
and paid support.
Go to abundancepracticebuilding.com slash links.
All right, on to 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):
and 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
(01:22):
too.
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.
(01:42):
With over a hundred thousand therapists using their
platform, 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.
Welcome back to the Abundant Practice Podcast.
I'm your host, Alison Puryear, founder of Abundance
(02:02):
Practice Building, and I'm here with Nikki Drew.
We're going to be talking about outsourcing.
Nikki owns Couchside Coordinators, which we're going to
talk about, but can we first kind of
like talk about why you care about outsourcing
and maybe we'll define outsourcing as we talk
about that.
Yes, yes.
I would say outsourcing is very near and
(02:23):
dear to my heart because as a private
practice owner also, I did not outsource right
away.
And I think a lot of therapists don't
outsource right away because you're trying to keep
that overhead down.
But then you start wearing all of these
different hats and before you know it, you're
used to wearing different hats and you're in
(02:43):
the chaos.
I think then not outsourcing starts to hinder
progress for your business, for yourself.
It contributes to burnout.
And that's what actually led me into Couchside
Coordinators was my own burnout from not outsourcing
and not delegating.
It's interesting because I do feel like there
(03:04):
is this like tipping point where if you're
not outsourcing, like life feels significantly harder than
it needs to because it's not just your
practice.
It like starts to feel like your whole
life is hard.
And what's interesting is for most people that
I see like and work with in my
own experience is like when you do outsource,
(03:25):
it's scary because you're always at a point,
you're never at a point where like I
have all this extra money, what should I
do with it?
Right?
Like there's this pause of, I mean, I
could, it'd be tight, but I could pay
for some help.
But once you pay for the help, almost
everybody I've seen ever makes more money than
they made before.
Exactly.
(03:45):
Because then it opens up that time of,
okay, well now I just outsource, you know,
this task or these couple of tasks that
frees up five extra hours that I could
be doing something.
I could be seeing another client and now
it's not, oh, this money is going out.
It's money's going out, but money's coming in
now and I can grow a little bit
more.
(04:05):
Yeah, absolutely.
Can we talk about like some of the
things that therapists are doing that they don't
need to be doing?
Like what can be outsourced?
Yes.
And I will say too, speaking as, you
know, a psychologist, part of the difficulty with
outsourcing that I've seen aside from that money,
it's also like not wanting to give up
(04:27):
control, fearing that that trust piece in another
person.
You know, when we're in school, it's like,
okay, be in session, be there, hold space,
do your notes after.
It's like, okay.
But then running a private practice, it's, well,
there's all this other admin stuff of, I
need to respond to emails.
If I accept insurance, I need to follow
(04:48):
up on that.
If I don't accept insurance, I have to
follow up on billing.
I need to do scheduling.
Now social media is the way to go
with marketing.
So now I have to be a social
media manager.
Like there's all of this other stuff outside
of the therapy room that therapists are now
having to do.
And most of us weren't taught how to
do that.
(05:08):
No.
And some of us have a natural proclivity
towards those kinds of things, but so many
of us don't.
So many of us, it's just, you know,
it's like the laundry on the, on the
chair in your bedroom kind of a situation,
but in your practice.
Yes.
And the biggest thing I've seen is the
social media piece or, okay, I now need
a website.
And I don't know the first thing about
(05:29):
doing a website or, you know, I want
to do a newsletter.
I want to grow my email list, all
of these great things to do for our
practice and for our business.
But you only have so many hours in
the day and making sure you're not going
into that burnout mode, making sure you're there,
not just for your clients, but for yourself
and saying, I just want to be a
(05:50):
therapist and that's okay.
Let me give this to somebody else.
And it's like, it's kind of a way
that not entirely, but almost entirely, you can
have that the good parts of working for
someone else where you go, you do your
therapy, you do your note, you're mostly done.
It's the closest way to live.
(06:11):
That is by hiring somebody to help you.
Yeah, hiring somebody to help you.
Cause I talked to so many private practice
owners who were like, you couldn't pay me
to be an employee again.
Like I want to be able to set
my own schedule to see who I want
to see all of these things, which is
great.
And then add to your team.
(06:33):
So you can continue focusing on that.
It's interesting how the idea of working for
someone makes me like literally a little nauseous.
Like I can't imagine.
And also because somebody who outsources a lot,
the idea of doing everything that my team
does would be just panic attack city.
Like there's just no possible way.
(06:55):
So, okay.
We talked about some things that can be
outsourced.
We're not all good at everything, right?
You can be an amazing therapist and do
a really good job at so much, but
suck at tech, right?
Like you can, you can send emails and
you can get on social, but like there's,
you don't know how to upload a blog
post or do SEO or these kinds of
(07:15):
things.
What do you see therapists that you work
with struggle the most out of all the
things that could be outsourced?
What is it that you genuinely do better
than they do?
Because they just don't have the skillset.
I'm going to say SEO and social media
because SEO is, it's this annoying, lovely thing
(07:40):
that just constantly changes and keeping up with
it and understanding the little nuance pieces throughout
it.
People are like, I'm doing all of the
things, but like, I'm not ranking.
I'm like, yeah, because you're probably not doing
the thing that needs to work for your
practice.
Let a professional handle it.
Or same thing with social media of, I
(08:02):
think the pandemic changed this piece because so
many of us saw each other's homes during,
during that time of it's not enough now
to just post something for the sake of
posting it.
It's being authentic.
It's speaking to your audience.
It's knowing what your audience wants to see,
wants to hear, wants to view.
(08:22):
And I don't want to say manipulating it
because it's not manipulation, but like socially engineering
that to work to your advantage.
And then it helps with the SEO also.
It's not as simple of just posting something
like you would on like your personal Instagram
page.
It's way more in depth than that.
And most therapists don't have the time for
(08:43):
it.
And that's fine.
Give it to somebody who does it all
day, every day and they'll do it for
you.
Yeah.
So I think about social media growth hinges
so much on the person talking or the
person's face or things like that.
How do you work around that?
So our social media managers at Couchside really
start the very first month that we were
doing any social media management with, it doesn't
(09:05):
have to be just therapists, but I'll speak
to therapists.
It's really understanding their vision for the space
and what their brand is, what their tone
is.
You know, if their niche is working with
a certain population, but they don't have any
of that on social media, we need to
get that out there so that the algorithm
starts noticing, Hey, you work with this age
(09:26):
group, this population with this issue, let's start
getting content out there.
And then you'll start bringing in an audience
that wants to view that material.
Yeah.
So are you doing primarily carousels or are
you like helping them know what to record?
Like, how do you do it?
We do a little bit of both.
We have a couple of different packages.
And I always tell people who onboard with
(09:47):
us of do trial and error the first
month, because at the end of every month,
we're looking at the KPIs.
We're checking the account and saying like, what
posts did do well?
Was it reels?
Was it carousel posts?
And it's going to be different for everybody.
We have a client right now whose Instagram
took off and all she'll do is carousel
(10:07):
posts.
She doesn't want to touch reels, which is
totally fine.
Her stuff took off, but then we have
somebody else who carousel posts don't do great
for them.
So they went the real route and that
is what works for them.
So it's figuring out what works for their
audience, but also what works for that therapist,
because yes, you want to market yourself, but
(10:29):
do it authentically.
So if you don't want to get in
front of the camera and do reels or
videos, don't do them because that's not authentic.
So you're not going to be getting the
followers that you want.
Right.
Right.
Yeah.
It's interesting how our personalities, I was just
talking about this yesterday in a webinar, like
our personalities, you know, bring in the right
(10:51):
people, push away the other people.
And if you're not showing your personality in
any way, you're not really bringing anybody in.
No, exactly.
You're not.
So it's really of like, what is the
goal?
Some therapists are like, I just want something
on social media.
I am not necessarily trying to get clients
from my social media page.
Cool.
We're going to go a very different route
(11:11):
than, than if you're actually trying to recruit
clients that the page is going to look
very different.
The posts are going to look very different.
Right.
Right.
It just, it depends on those goals.
Exactly.
What are some signs that people are ready
to hire people to help them?
I would say when you start realizing that
(11:33):
it's never ending because everybody's to do list
is pretty much never ending, but like when
it feels that it really is never ending
and you just can't get to certain things,
you keep pushing certain things off, going back
to social media.
A lot of therapists are like, I know
I need a social media account.
I just haven't created it yet because I
don't like social media.
Cool.
(11:53):
If you don't like something that could be
a nice flag for you to say, maybe
this is something I should look into delegating
out or I'm trying to do the things
on my to-do list.
It's, you know, growing nonstop.
And what are the things I don't like
doing where I don't feel like making the
time for where they just don't fill my
(12:13):
cup.
I personally, I don't like social media and
I knew that was one of the very
first things that I was going to delegate
out because I didn't want to look at
it.
I hate opening the apps on my phone.
So something you really don't like doing something
that doesn't fill your cup, something you don't
have time to do because instead of spending,
(12:35):
I was talking about this with one of
our social media managers actually the other day,
she created a post in like under 10
minutes.
And I'm like, that would have taken me
like a good hour, hour and a half.
That's their strength.
It's not yours and that's okay.
So leave it to them to do.
Yeah.
I think about, I have this ADE is
(12:57):
always in my head.
There's like automate, delegate, eliminate.
And this is something I do every quarter
where I look at everything I am doing.
And I start with like, what am I
doing?
That's not actually moving the needle because as
any business owner knows in any industry, you
can add stuff to your plate for the
rest of your life.
Exactly.
That never ending to do list.
Yeah.
(13:17):
There's always more you could be doing, but
you really have to assess whether or not
what you're doing is working.
I know most of us get really intrigued
by the silver bullet that like is going
to fix everything.
Most of those are the things that get
eliminated three months later when I fall for
it.
And so I always look every quarter, what
(13:39):
needs to be eliminated?
What's not actually moving the needle?
What can be automated?
I love many chat and social where I
don't have to, if I'm just like, if
you want the link, say this instead of
having to go in and manually write a
link.
Yes.
We have it where it's automated and then
delegating.
There is so much.
I mean, I own three businesses, so of
(14:01):
course there's so much I delegate, but there
is so much that gets delegated that other
people are so much better at than me.
That gives me time freedom.
It gives me more confidence in the businesses.
Like it's delegating is my favorite thing.
It's not something I used to be good
at, but now I would like to say
I'm a pro.
So many people struggle with delegating.
(14:22):
And that's why I think social media is
one of those things that when we were
with a lot of therapists who have never
had an employee who've never had a virtual
assistant, and they typically start with social media.
Cause I say, it's one of those things
that is attached to your practice, but isn't
you as a practice, unless you want to
make it that way.
(14:43):
So this is the perfect time to practice
giving up some of that control, delegating some
things out and then building that trust and
then saying, Oh, okay.
Like in the future.
Now I do feel a little bit more
comfortable delegating out more stuff.
Maybe I'll move into delegating admin stuff in
a couple of months.
And you slowly start there to see like
(15:04):
what works for you and what doesn't.
What I hear a lot of therapists say
is going back to like that money piece
that you were talking about.
Like this is money coming out.
Yes.
But how many hours were you spending on
this and figure out what your hourly rate
is then?
Because I can assure you it is probably
not what you were paying somebody else to
(15:24):
do for you.
Okay.
Well, I can now fill this with something
else, whether it's a paying client, whether it's
self-care time and time for myself, like
not looking at that dollar value and cringing
when you see the money going out.
Right.
Because if you're, if you're hiring people for
marketing assistance, money should be coming in.
(15:46):
And if you're not getting a return on
your investment, then that's another thing to eliminate.
But if they're doing their job, then it
gets done.
Like you're in clients and you're going to
make way more than whatever it is you're
spending.
And just having realistic goals too.
Uh, when you're delegating out for the first
time or trying somebody new, it's not going
(16:06):
to happen overnight.
You know, what's going to be that benchmark
in a month, in three months, you don't
have the end of the quarter, whatever it
is reevaluating and saying, do I want to
keep moving forward with this?
Do I eliminate it?
Or do I pivot towards somebody else to
be doing this for me?
And on average for your clients, what's realistic,
(16:28):
how long should they wait before deciding whether
or not it's working?
So I always say with SEO rule of
thumb for SEO is four to six months
and people then look at the price tag
and they're like, Oh my gosh, for couchside
coordinators, when I designed couchside coordinators coming from
a private practice, I designed it to be
(16:49):
as flexible as possible with therapists.
So I always tell people, we don't trap
you into a long-term contracts.
Our contracts are month to month.
So if you don't want to wait four
to six months, you don't have to, I'm
giving you the opportunity to back out, but
you should start to see in terms of
SEO, you should start to see some growth
within that first month, if it's being done
(17:11):
correctly and it should be being done correctly.
Same thing with social media of that first
month or two, you should start to see
growth.
You're not, then we say, okay, let let's
look at the KPIs.
What's working, what's not working.
If carousel posts are working, let's stop doing
all of this other stuff.
And let's only focus on carousel posts for
(17:32):
the next month.
And then see if the numbers are where
you want it a little bit more.
So that piece of like collaborating with that
other person, knowing what your expectations are, making
sure they're realistic and having those benchmarks in
place.
Cause there, there are people who come in
and in my discovery calls, they'll say something
about SEO or social media.
(17:53):
And I'll say to them, great point, not
realistic.
So I'm not going to sugar coat it
for you.
Like don't onboard with us.
If that's what you're looking for, because I
cannot guarantee that.
And it's most likely not going to happen.
Yeah.
And I think that that's so important because
we all want it yesterday.
There's like a natural impatience that goes along
(18:14):
with just being a human being, I think.
And then you add in being a business
owner, especially if you're in a space where
you really need more clients, there's this desperation
that can have you coping for things that
aren't really possible.
So people often ask me like, how long
is it going to take to get full?
And I'm like, well, there are a thousand
factors that are going to impact that, but
(18:35):
it's not going to be as soon as
you want.
Most likely.
Exactly.
Most of the time it's just not exactly.
And it's finding out what works for you
again.
Like I know plenty of therapists who got
full within a certain timeframe and somebody else
did similar tactics and it did not work
for them.
Yes.
It doesn't mean you're failing.
That just might not be your authentic business
(18:55):
self.
What is your authentic business self?
And let's take that and run with it.
Yeah, absolutely.
The need for control.
I can relate to that.
I remember early on thinking like, nobody's going
to love my practice the way I love
my practice.
Like it feels like a little baby that
I'm just, I can't just like chuck it
(19:16):
out there to just anybody.
Right.
And so I had a lot of reticence
about delegating anything.
And then I made a bad mistake and
I hired somebody who I shouldn't have hired.
Like it was not a good choice as
my first virtual assistant.
And then I had to fire her way
(19:37):
later than I should have, of course.
And it made me want to keep clutching,
like see if I'm the only one I
can trust.
But then luckily I got to a point
where like that just wasn't possible anymore.
Like I just couldn't with everything I had
going on, do everything.
And then like landed some really amazing support.
(19:58):
Yes.
So I share that because I think other
people, I know that other people have that
worry about the control piece.
And I also don't want the one bad
experience you might've had to stop you from
getting the support you need.
Yes.
And I had a similar experience before I
started I went through three different VAs in
my private practice and it didn't work.
(20:22):
And I got to the point similar to
what you just said of like, I need
to do all of this on my own
and realize that wasn't possible.
That wasn't sustainable.
And that's when I was like, it shouldn't
be this difficult to find VAs who understand
the field and who come in to my
(20:42):
baby practice and treat it like their own
baby.
And that was part of the process of
me building Couchside was like, it shouldn't be
this difficult.
And I had horrible experiences and pulled back
and I don't want other people to have
to go through that.
Exactly.
Amazing.
Well, is there anything else about delegating that
(21:04):
you want to make sure people know and
understand?
They figure out what you want to delegate
to that comes up a lot on the
discovery calls where people will say like, I
know I need to delegate out.
And similar to what I said a few
minutes ago, like, but I don't know what,
or like, I don't know how many hours
I will need.
And I always say to them, take, take
(21:25):
a couple of weeks, take a month, start
writing out everything you are doing for this
business and how much time you are spending
doing it.
And then go back to that list, find
the things you don't like, find the things
you don't want to do and figure out
how many hours you were devoting to that
and make that your starting point of I
was doing social media for X amount of
(21:47):
hours a week or X amount of hours
a month.
I returned phone calls for two hours every
day.
And I don't want to have to do
that.
Okay.
That's a good starting point to say, this
is, you know, the hourly package I want.
These are the things I want to start
delegating.
And once you build up that trust, then
you can start adding more to, to the
mix.
I don't, I don't recommend people coming in
(22:10):
and saying like, here's everything with my practice.
You know, you can do all of it.
That's not going to end well, start small,
build the rapport like you would with any
client and then build up from there.
Yeah.
Sounds good.
Yeah.
Well, thank you so much, Nikki.
I hope that people are thinking about what
(22:30):
they can delegate in a different way, like
maybe calling themselves on some of the clutching
and holding trust issues and yeah, that doing
that time study where you write down everything
you do, it's so tedious y'all, but
it's really illuminating.
Yeah.
And it's a nice, it's a nice way
to then go back.
Once you do decide to hire somebody, go
(22:51):
back and reevaluate of, I was spending this
amount of time.
I delegated out.
Is it better?
Is it worse?
What else do I, do I need to
do and what else might I need to
fix?
Yeah.
Amazing.
Awesome.
Couchsidecoordinators.com is how folks can get in
touch with you.
Is that the best way?
That is the best way.
If you go on there, it shows all
(23:12):
of our current service offerings.
It links you out to create an interest
form and then somebody on the team will
reach out.
We do complimentary discovery calls to make sure
we're the right fit for you to figure
out, you know, where we can help you.
And like I said earlier, we don't do
long-term contracts.
We just do month-to-month contracts.
So you feel comfortable delegating out and adding
(23:34):
some, adding some overhead, but in a good
way to your practice.
Yeah, absolutely.
Awesome.
Well, thank you so much, Nikki.
Thank you.
Take care.
You too.
If you're ready for a much easier practice,
TherapyNotes is the way to go.
Go to TherapyNotes.com and use the promo
code ABUNDANT for two months free.
(23:57):
If you're listening, you probably need some support
building your practice.
If you're a super newbie, grab our free
checklist using the link in the show notes.
I'd love for you to follow, rate, and
review, but I really want you to share
this episode with a therapist friend.
Let's help all our colleagues build what they
want.