Is a Premium Fee Private Practice Still Possible in 2025? A Conversation with Jenn.

Ready to set your fee? You choose the dream, we'll do the math. Download our FREE Fun with Fees Calculator here 👉🏽 https://www.leaninmakebank.com/free

 

In this eye-opening episode of The Money Sessions, Tiffany sits down with longtime colleague and LIMB Academy alum Jenn Fredette to talk about what it really takes to build a thriving premium fee private practice in 2025.

 From burnout to Big Macs, from Facebook ads to archetypal marketing, this conversation really cuts through the fear and noise therapists are feeling right now.  

Jenn shares powerful insights into how the marketing landscape has changed—and what has stayed the same—and why therapists must stop over-functioning and start getting strategic if they want to attract clients willing to pay premium fees.  

If you’ve been wondering whether a cash-pay, high-fee practice is still possible in 2025, this episode is a must-listen.

 

In this episode, Jenn shares: 

Why marketing is just another kind of relationship (and you already know how to do it);

How the myth of “I’ll raise my fees once I’m full” keeps therapists stuck in burnout;

The difference between lead generation, messaging, and conversion—and why it matters;

Why “nurture marketing” doesn’t convert (and what to do instead);

The timeless marketing principles that still work in the age of AI, BetterHelp, and SEO overload.

 

Resources mentioned: 

LIMB Academy 

FWF Calculator 

Jenn’s Website 

Jenn’s Instagram 

Find Your Marketing Attachment Style

 

More about Jenn:

Jenn Fredette is your business fairy godmother—if fairy godmothers swore a lot and specialized in high-impact marketing. She helps scrappy, exhausted healers transform into well-paid, legacy-building visionaries. No magic wands, no pumpkin carriages—just bold strategy, sharp storytelling, and the kind of messaging that makes clients say, “Hell yes.”

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Tiffany(00:01):

(00:01):
The state of marketing today, 2025 for licensed therapists and private practice who wanna have cash pay premium fee practices. What is working today? What's no longer working? What are our predictions for 2025? This is what we are diving into today in my interview with Jen Fette, therapist and private practice and creator of Attunement Distilled a marketing program for therapists. She's been running it for years. Jen is a previous Lean in Make bank student grad. You have probably heard her podcast episodes. I believe there were more than one. Actually. She might have been even the very first money sessions guest we recorded. Not the first we released, but the first we recorded. And Jen is filled with insight about what it actually takes to attract clients who are willing and eager to consistently pay premium fees. Cash in private practice. Jen and I go deep.
Tiffany(00:58):
We get a little bit wonky with like thinking about how marketing, the marketing landscape has changed. What are some of the timeless aspects of marketing that will remain in 2025? We're here in 2022, are gonna be here in 2027. What parts of marketing remain the same? And what things change? Strategies, tactics, what do we really need to do to show up fully and presently and do the work we love? Which means finding clients who wanna do that work with us. This is the conversation Jen and I are going to have today. You are gonna love it. It's gonna be very exciting. If you're new to the show, I highly encourage you to go to lean in, make bank.com/free. Download our free fun with fee, private practice calculator, get a sense of what your fee would need to be, and then Jen and I will talk about how you need to market in order to find the clients who are ready and eager to pay that fee.
Tiffany(01:55):
By the way, my name is Tiffany McLain. I'm the founder of the Lean In Make Bank Academy, which is all about helping therapists set up a practice that actually takes care of you so you can experience time freedom, show up as a parent, break the intergenerational cycles of burnout and martyrdom and working all the time, giving everything you have to your work and nothing to yourself and your family. We are done with that. This is what we talk about. You're gonna love this episode. It's a little bit different than what we typically do, but if you're curious about, okay, I wanna raise fees, I wanna earn more, I wanna get my time back. I wanna get off this hamster wheel of burnout and overwhelm in my clinical work. But where do I find the clients who are already and eager to pay? Are they still even out there? You're gonna love this episode. Let's go.
Intro (02:46):
I think there's a difference between saying what your fee is and like fully committing to it. I believe in this like law of attraction, but you also have to take action. I don't think I do enough to help other people despite being, despite being a therapist, I was worried that I'd end up only serving wealthy people. You know, I was being so delusional about my actual cost, right? I wasn't actually paying myself a real salary. Now that I am charging more, I'm not lying to myself. This is ridiculous. Completely broke man. If people knew who they were, do what she's doing, like she's doing this.
Tiffany(03:30):
Alright folks, as you know, we're here with Jen Fredette. Now, before we even get into kind of how you got to where you are now, Jen mm-hmm . Right before we, we hit record. We were talking about how up everything is right now. And I was telling you, I'm I'm, I am boycotting news. Mm-Hmm . New York time, everything. I'm not listening. But you're in it because you're, you have a full caseload, government workers, folks in the LGBT, lgbtq, LGBTQ community immigrants, and so mm-hmm . I I wanna start just off the top 'cause I know a lot of folks are feeling what you're feeling, paying attention, impacted. How do you not that you maintain calm, 'cause this crazy, but how I how do you continue to move forward because you have to make money, you have to help people, you have to parent mm-hmm . How do you keep going and maintain a sense of self and groundedness in an external environment like this?
Jen(04:27):
So we could talk maybe the whole time that we're together about that. For folks who are not familiar with me, I live, I actually live more Baltimore suburbs than DC Metro suburbs, but the majority of the people I work with are in the DC Metro. We're recording this February, 2025. So there's just a lot going on with the new administration's feelings about what government employees should be doing. There are some strong Christian nationalism ways of understanding LGBTQI plus people. So there's like a lot going on plus how heinous this administration treats immigrants. So there's a lot going on. I was just telling you that it feels a little bit like being in a natural disaster. And when it first started happening, I mentioned it to my atunement distilled students was like, guys, I'm having a rough time.
Jen(05:24):
It's been a really rough week and there's somebody who's local to me. I was like, yeah, I'm with you. And most of the people I was sitting with were where you're at. Like, I don't know what's going on. I don't, I was like, well, it's not good you guys. It's, it feels like a hurricane, but political. So that's the context of what's going on. What's interesting to me is I have a lot of privilege in that I'm not a federal employee. I work for myself. I don't have to worry about anybody firing me. I am not an immigrant, right? And I am, I'm straight as an a cisgender, monogamous, like all the things I joke with clients that white supremacy wants me to be except a free thinker and a feminist and a woman. But I, so I have some distance, but it has been a lot to have to hold.
Jen(06:13):
And so what I have found is I've been having to do a lot of, oh my god, this sounds so therapist, but like a lot of somatic releasing work of how much I'm carrying. So I have been doing some reiki. I have been watching fun shows on tv. I just have re-watched the Kendrick Lamar halftime show like 20 times is so good. Also really political, but in so many layered ways. So I've just been feeding myself that way. And I also, Uber Eats a Big Mac a couple weeks ago I was like, I gonna eat food that I know will make me feel a little sick after, but it will feel so comforting. And I'm gonna watch Matlock, which is my newest comfort show. Totally unrealistic, a
Tiffany(06:56):
New one. The old, the original,
Jen(06:57):
The new one. Kathy Bates is Matlock. Like, it's a whole like she's kind of running a scam. This is a show marketed to people like in their sixties. But like, it's for me in your heart, in my heart of hearts, yes, it's delightful. also work with a lot of lawyers. I'm like, you guys like Matt Locke is like basically what you do. And they're like, absolutely not John. Absolutely not. So that's what I've been doing to sort of regulate as much as I can. And I think at some point you just sort of become accustomed to the new normal, even if it's overarchingly traumatizing. Yeah.
Tiffany(07:35):
Thank you for sharing. It's always important to acknowledge the context. And I appreciate the, the clear tactical steps that therapists listening can take. Order yourself a Big Mac.

(00:22):
Jen(07:46):
Absolutely.
Tiffany(07:46):
Watch funny shows and Matlock at least do some way to take care of yourself.
Jen(07:51):
Well, and I would actually say even this is stuff I'm doing above and beyond and maybe we'll talk some about this, but like, I think we all need a baseline like system to hold us. So I've had supervision, I have therapy, I have my process group, I have the books that I'm reading, I have time that I spend with my kid. I'm going to Pilates. Like all of that's just part of my normal baseline. This is the extra I'm adding on top, which again, I have a lot of privilege 'cause I work for myself. I have space to add in this stuff. And I have the privilege to pay $20 for a Big Mac instead of driving to go get it right. But I think sometimes when we're going through really hard things, the impulse is to restrict and reduce and to pull back, which just heightens scarcity. At least that's been my experience. I
Tiffany(08:42):
Love talking to you. So, okay, so the Jen of, let's take us back to bef before you still when you worked for yourself but before you knew how to do it, right? Mm-Hmm . Jen in private practice, Jen, working for other people. Talk a little bit about who, where you have come from and where you are now so people can now situate you within your journey over this past five or six years.
Jen(09:06):
Yeah, it's fun too 'cause you are like a pivotal point in the beginning. You and I have known each other a long time, so I was working for a group practice, like a lot of people do. The split was actually pretty good, but we operated on sliding scale. I did not make very good money. Like I again, was really privileged. I had a partner who made decent money, but we live in a high cost of living area. And I got to this place of like, I need to be able to pull my weight. I need to make more than, I think it was like $23,000 a year which is not sustainable in the area that I live. And so I started on this kind of journey of like, okay, I gotta, they say you gotta learn marketing, I gotta learn marketing, let me go online and just see who is gonna teach me marketing.
Jen(09:53):
And I went through a couple different, ended up on Joe Sanex Facebook group. I took a blogging course of which I never used any of that information. I ended up working with Alison per year when she was still leading groups, which I was really lucky. And one of the course modules was like, you gotta raise your fee. And I think you maybe were on her podcast. I can't remember. You were doing something, you were just getting started. And I was like, oh, I'm gonna take Tiffany's course. So I gotta raise my fee before I take it. So she'll be so impressed with me, , that's what I'll do. And you and I ended up working together. I think you, I was so lucky. All this is another place of privilege. Like I got started with people when you all were just getting started and you all were able to be more available than when you have a more scaled business.
Jen(10:40):
So I got to do some one-on-ones with Allison and then I got a bonus and got to do a one-on-one with you. And I had this great plan. I was like, Tiffany, I'm gonna go out on my own. I know I need to, I'm starting to gain momentum. I'm starting to be able to bring in people at this fee. I'm gonna go out on my own. And this is in November, I think of 2018. I was like, I'm gonna go out on my own in, and I was going to say June. And you were like, yeah, January. I was like, no, that's not what I was gonna say. I was gonna say June. And then we had this conversation of like, why wait six months? And I had this whole bizarre like, but I owe my group practice $900 for reimbursing me for all of these courses that I've been taking.
Jen(11:22):
I had spent more than that, but this was the reimbursement that they had given me. And you're like, Jen, let's do the actual math. And we did. And I, I feel in a really loving way, you like peer pressured me to be like, okay, January, that's when I'm gonna go. Actually went out really in February and just decided at some point I also was really lucky 'cause you, I don't think you've done a lot of one-on-one with people, but I like talked you into it. And we did one-on-one for like three months. And I don't know that I did anything specifically that translated into me getting a lot of clients. But having the scaffolding and the support was so helpful. And you said at some point during that one-on-one you're like, Jen, the only way you're gonna fail is if you give up. I was like, oh, okay.
Jen(12:08):
If that's the rubric, that's no problem. I can grind until like I'm dust. Like I'm not gonna give up. And it was amazing sort of just that tiny mind shift mindset shift of like, is this ever gonna work? I don't know. Like I, it was like, oh this is, I'm only gonna fail if I give up. No problem. I can just keep the course. And over that course of that year, I worked February in my own practice, February to December. I made just shy of six figures. Then I was like, if I'd gone out in January, like Tiffany had been pressuring me to, I would've made six figures my first year on practice. And just like, so I actually, my therapist still tells me, she's like, you built really fast. I don't know if that was good for you. I'm like, I needed the money Cheryl. Like I needed to build fast. Clinically in retrospect, I wish I could have gone a little bit slower. I think I would've been okay financially. So that's where I started.
Tiffany(13:07):
Well tell me, tell us all a little bit about what your practice looks like today. What your business foundation looks like today. Share.
Jen(13:13):

(00:43):
Yeah, so I still, I think of it as a small practice. I wanna also name like I have capacity to hold a bigger practice than some of the people I work with. I think for a variety of reasons. So I only see 15 people a week now, which I know for some people it's like, that's actually kind of a lot. I charge a premium rate. I charge 300 an hour, three 10 an hour. There's a little bit of variation 'cause I do long-term work with people and some people just have a slightly lower fee. 'cause I've been working with them for a while. And frankly I'm at the place that I'm like, I could raise your fee or raise your fee, but like, I'm fine financially. So there doesn't, I don't feel the need to be like, I gotta do that just to make an extra whatever, $25 an hour.
Jen(13:59):
So I mostly work with people who have relational trauma. They don't always recognize that they have relational trauma. They're very high functioning. Want to be able to have deeper, more connected relationships, but really struggle. 'cause I spend so much time in their head. They're very, very smart, very intellectual. And my tagline on my website is essentially like, you need somebody who can keep up with your brain in order to get them access to your heart. Which is really, that's a lot of what we do is like, can we get down to the feeling pretty eclectic? I grew up essentially in a cult. So I'm a little wary of getting like super trained in psychodynamic thought or IFS And on the other side of my business, I work with therapists on their marketing. So I sometimes feel like I get a taste of how a lot of people work and like get to hear about how they conceptualize clients and what IFS does compared to I have a poet therapist. So like what poetry would do, what a functional med doctor would do. So I get a lot of exposure, which is fun. But clinically I think I'm probably pretty relationally psychodynamic with, I have an MDiv as well. So I do a lot of like moral and spiritual development sort of woven in which politics has a lot of moral and spiritual development from my frame. I'm rambling a little bit though. I could talk about this all day. I can't
Tiffany(15:29):
Tell. I was gonna say, Jen is very smart if you don't know. Very smart and also very em empathetic. You have a lot of feelings. So that whole thing around your head and your heart, I'm like, that's Jen. Mm-Hmm. That's your superpower. So thank you for sharing your journey. So folks, Jen has not always charged $300 per session with ease. You went on a long, we've interviewed you on the money sessions before. So you people,
Jen(15:50):
I I was the technically not in the lineup. I was technically the first person who ever interviewed. Yeah. and you were like, I don't know what we're gonna do. We're just gonna talk. I was like, cool. I don't know what we're gonna do either. We'll just talk
Tiffany(16:01):
Back in the day. So folks, you can go back and hear what Jen's whole entire story mm-hmm . But today, no, because today I'm gonna talk about the thing you all wanna hear us talk about, which is marketing, marketing, marketing. Mm-Hmm . Marketing. We don't teach marketing a limb. We have marketing flavors here and there. But our, our thing is around your money mindset and fees. Jen pays attention to marketing. So we're gonna dive into this today and to kick us off, I hear this, you hear this, I hear it now, Tiffany actually, someone dmd me and said, you know, I don't think this premium fee practice, cash pay thing is possible anymore. It would've been possible two years ago, but the marketing landscape has changed. And maybe what that therapist doesn't know is that people were saying that in 2024 and 2023 and 2022. And there's always a reason why a, a premium fee cashflow practice won't work. The landscape is always working against us in people's minds. Yeah. But you're actually here to talk about what's real. So to this end, can you talk a little bit about this idea of thing the landscape is different now. So what I want for myself, it's just impossible. I won't even try. What's what's this thought about?
Jen(17:15):
Well, so first, I mean, I I I'm gonna jump into your area just a little bit to talk about how I think about money. And money is ultimately the archetype of resource. Is there enough resource for me to get my needs met, nevermind my wants met. And marketing is an avenue to help us get our needs met. It's a tool. And so whenever, if somebody says, eh, it's just not possible for me to get paid what I wanna get paid, almost always, if I ask people, what is it that you wanna get paid? Nobody's ever saying to me like, well I wanna charge $2,000 an hour, required them to come three times a week. They have to pay completely in cash. I'm not going to provide super bills. That might be hard. Like I think we could still market and fill somebody up that way, but like, we'd have to be much more strategic about it and probably take a little bit longer.
Jen(18:05):
But almost always what people wanna charge, I'm like, I think you could probably charge more than that. Like I, especially when I work with people who are more seasoned, who are charging half of what I charge in this area or in other areas, I'm like, I think you could charge more if you wanted to, but yes, I can help you fill up at 2 25 an hour or whatever. But it almost always is some replication of old stuff. I can't have what I want because I didn't get what I needed. And I'm not their therapist. You're not their therapist. So like that's work for them to do in therapy of like, how is this getting replicated? But often I think the reason people struggle with marketing just from a mindset perspective or a psychic perspective is I have to show up and put myself out there and I have to be seen and recognized for my expertise, what I'm good at, what I'm able to do.
Jen(19:03):
And I have to ask, this is the selling piece. I have to say, this is what I need. I can give this to you, but there is, there's some mutuality here. Like, I'm not just gonna see you for free. And I think those places are where people get really tripped up. 'cause They haven't had good modeling of how to do that either in their personal life or certainly in their marketing ecosphere. Because healers in general really took to heart and gotta overdeliver. You gotta provide a lot of value, you gotta nurture. And we're like, oh great, I can do that in my sleep. That is my favorite defense mechanism. Overdeliver over function, nurture the hell out of everybody. I can do that. But like that kind of marketing doesn't really convert. Yeah.
Tiffany(19:48):
So for folks listening right now, even even this idea of oh, converting. So if, if I'm a therapist and I'm like, I, I can be on insurance panels and I have my 10 cash pay people paying me, you know, 125, I could do this forever. And I'm, and I'll raise my fee or I will get off insurance panels once I have, you know, clients who are paying me $300 per hour. Can you talk about why the, I'm just gonna give, give, give doesn't convert. I'm gonna over-function. And why, why clients don't just say, okay, I'll pay $300 then.
Jen(20:24):
So my kid right now, every Amazon package that comes, she's like, it's a present for me. And like, I don't know, 90% of the time is something for her. But her assumption is like, that's for me and we're getting to this place where I'm having this isn't great parenting. And I realize this is sort of an aside, but I'm gonna come back to your question. We're getting to this place where I'm having to do a little bit more bribing of her to get things done. So like stickers, I bought a like five pound thing of lollipops that we use for like potty training stuff. And like if she's having a hard time getting outta the house and she knows and she's so smart, she's like, no, no, no, I just have that. You just give it to me because she's accustomed to us giving her a lot.
Jen(21:10):
Right? And if she knows she can get something for free, it's just not gonna like enter into negotiations with me. Right? And often when we're giving people a lot of stuff for free first, why am I gonna pay you for it if it's free? Like, I'm not gonna do that. Most people won't do that. And second, we're actually not giving people what they need when we're giving them the thing for free. We're giving them maybe what they want. I would actually say with healers, we're often giving them stuff that they're like, I've not, like I don't understand what you're saying because we are marketing to people who are solution aware as opposed to where most of our people actually are, which is just barely aware that they have a problem. They're aware of symptoms, right? Like, here are all the things that are painting me and we wanna be like, Hey, let me tell you all about IFS and your inner child and your protectors and blah blah blah blah blah.

(01:04):
Jen(22:11):
And unless you are aware that you are I don't even know what if FS like that top level problem would be solving but like disconnected from self or like overly identified with protector parts or whatever. Unless you are aware of that, that's, that's nice content. You should probably use it in your session with your client you've been working with for a year and a half. That would probably be really helpful for them. But not for somebody who's like, I am scared I'm gonna get a divorce. Like that's what I'm scared of. Like I, I wanna maybe murder my husband. Is that okay? Like that's where they're at and that's where we need to meet them.
Tiffany(22:48):
This is wonderful. Alright, so for folks listening who are thinking I just gotta market I-I-I-S-E-O, that's a market envelopes at the doctor's office. Is that marketing? How do you even those against the agenda is just shaking her head no. So even for somebody with those therapists out there who are broadly like, I just need to market somebody take $5,000. So I don't know market, they don't even know what that means. How do you talk about what is marketing even what what even is marketing?
Jen(23:21):
So I, I actually wanna use this example we were just using, right? That I want us to start where you are symptom aware, like you're a listener. Where are we symptom aware? And sometimes we jump to the solution just like clients will jump to, I guess I gotta go to therapy. I, years ago I was talking with somebody about them finding a therapist and I was like, send me the people you're looking at. I'll tell you if they look good to me, they're like, Jen, I found this person who's person centered. And I was like, yeah. And they're like, that's who I need to go to. They're person centered. I was like, well, like pretty much everybody is person centered. Like that's a pretty core tenant. Even social work and psychologists. But like LPC is definitely person centered. Like that's, we all do that. What else do they say that they do?
Jen(24:07):
And sometimes with marketing what we look at is we, we gotta market and it's like saying I gotta go to therapy. But what therapy? What is the actual problem we're trying to solve? Like where, where are you wanting to go? Because my recommendation to you is going to be different. So like coming back to your insurance panel person like, okay, I gotta like get my private pay people before I get off insurance panels. That's really tricky because you might be getting private pay people who are on your insurance panels. And so the advice I'm gonna give to you is not necessarily let's build up a huge marketing stream of private pay people, but let's start first building threading that you're gonna get off insurance panels with your current people starting to assess who could like legitimately afford to continue with you. Let's get clear about what your boundaries will be.
Jen(25:02):
If you want to keep some of these people, are you suddenly, is your schedule gonna be a because they can only afford to come every three weeks and this person can only come every two weeks. Like what are you gonna hold and what is clinically appropriate and can you tolerate referring out even if you really like this person, can you tolerate getting your needs met before putting everybody else's needs before yours? And then also let's start building up the foundation so you can start doing some of the prep work before you get off of those insurance panels. So you networking, you have a really strong messaging on your website that really we wanna get to the place that people read your website and they're like, oh great, I gotta work with you. Oh cool, you take insurance. That's, that's a great bonus, great bonus for me that it's not I need you because you take insurance and we can do that while you're on insurance panels, but at some point you're gonna probably have to double up in your own therapy and tolerate what it means to get off insurance panels. 'cause It can be painful. I think. It's sort of like this differentiation piece of like having to go out on your own and you no longer have this kind of like overarching net that will keep you safe. Yeah. Does that get at your question?
Tiffany(26:21):
Absolutely. And it brings up the next one. Let me, let me go back and say, so folks Jen is talking about the idea of making what you currently have efficient, actually making what you currently have work. You, you can't start going out and investing in marketing when you're seeing 32 clients a week and they're paying you 28 cents per session. You, you don't have time space for mental energy to make any decisions about marketing. Actually we have a I always forget to mention this. Our fun with fee calculator. Go to the link in our show notes and see like, okay, what would my fee actually have to be to have space for marketing? What would my schedule have to be so I could actually show up for my clients? We're also learning how to get my next level clients. We do that in limb.
Tiffany(27:05):
So now let's say we have folks who are like, okay, I've done it. I'm ready to make the change. I've done the hard work. I have the community of premium fee therapists now to support me as I go through this journey. And then they're like, alright Jen, I'm ready to learn how to market or what that even means. Thinking about problem aware, what are some of the problems you see therapists facing at this phase when they've only ever maybe gotten people off insurance panels or kind of by the skin of their teeth and they don't know how and they're actually ready to be intentional about finding people who wanna work with them at their fee because those people trust them, not just because they're on an insurance panel network or because they randomly came to a site and they saw that person is person centered. Okay, whatever. What, what are some of the problems folks come in with at this stage?
Jen(27:53):
So there's a number. The first is I think a lot of people don't believe that they know how to market. And I, I really want to say people take nothing else from this conversation that we're having. There's a TikTok meme that was going around for a while. It was like, how hard can it be boys do it. And then I said to myself, how hard could it be? Boys do it. Which, how hard can marketing be? Like marketing at its core is a relationship in which you are wanting to help somebody move towards not just a goal, but like a new way of being in the world, which is literally what we do in therapy. I say sometimes to my students, I'm like, you guys can do market research, I guess if you want, but like, you have it, it's in your clinical consults.
Jen(28:45):
Like you don't, you can go do extra if you want, but you're already doing this. That marketing at its core is just a relationship. And we have to not just have to, we get to decide how we want to be in relationship. And so sometimes I'll have people like, I guess I gotta get on social media, or I gotta do SEO or I gotta like, they'll come up with all of these like modalities of marketing and I'll say, well, I, if you want to do you wanna be on social media, you let me know. Do you wanna be on video? They're like, no, but I have to. I was like, no, we, we get, you have to do something. Like you can't just not market, but you could do SEO if you wanted. You could do networking if you wanted. You could do ads. That was my preferred Oh, way to build.
Jen(29:32):
And you can do ads and actually I'll put in a little pitch for ads. They cost some money, but you do it once. You pay attention to it, you make sure it's working and then you discover it's really hard for you to relax. And so you try to complicate things. But like ads are the simplest way I think really Google or Facebook for you. I like Facebook ads better. Google ads. Google ads work better I think for group practices because Google ads are frankly just more generic. You don't have as much space and they don't have the same sort of targeting that Facebook ads do. Facebook ads, I can write an ad and target it to somebody who watches this is us likes to shop at Anthropology and who follows Brene Brown, which you and I know dozens of people that that fits, right? Like it can be real niche Google ads, you can't do that.
Jen(30:23):

(01:25):
And Facebook ads, you have more ways to qualify the lead, which just means somebody looks at what you have to say and like, that's me. You have more ways to do that in copy and the creative, like the video or image in like a Facebook or Instagram ad or TikTok ads. But I've got myself a little bit lost. You get to choose what avenue you wanna follow and you need to choose one that actually suits how you'd like to show up. And so if you're somebody who's really good at consistently taking small, tiny steps, social media actually could be a really good fit because it requires a consistent presence. If you're somebody who likes figuring out complicated problems and like figuring out how to kind of like cheat the system, SEO is a really good way to show up. It's all about like making sure all the things fit together.
Jen(31:18):
If you're somebody who wants to be a little lazy, ads can be really helpful. And as you are growing beyond a one-to-one practice, if you want to scale, you wanna build a group practice, you just start to add on layers of how you market. They're just adding, it's like adding lanes to a road of how people can get to you. So again, marketing is just a relationship and I think people don't always hold in mind like, you already know how to do this. The other thing I see people really struggle with is how do you sell if you're not face to face? Mm-Hmm . If, if we're together like on a consult call, most therapists that I work with and I bet it's true for you too, they're really good. Like their conversion rates on consult calls would make coaches like so jealous. 'cause They're like 98%.
Jen(32:09):
Like occasionally one person gets through and it's like, ah, that's not a good fit. Right? Because we know how to intervene. If somebody's telling us like, here's what's going on, we can say, oh, I can help you with that. Here's how I would do that. Right? It's harder for people to translate that before. And I think part of it's because people don't wanna be salesy and don't take into most sales is just intervention and just wanting to intervene for you and help you pick the right product, pick the right service. And again, part of this is 'cause we're exposed to really bad sales. Mm-Hmm . Most sales doesn't really have a lot of depth to it. And so we look at it and like, oh my God, I have to, this is such a cliche, but we rent, we leased a car this past summer.
Jen(33:01):
And so I was like doing my research and reaching out to people and I talked to people, I'm like, oh my God, you guys, the sales process is terrible, terrible. Like, this is not effective. And the person we ended up finally leasing it from, I was like, you know what you're doing? Like I can feel it. And he was attuned, like he had a toy for my toddler to play with while we were signing the paperwork. He, like, they had snacks. He was like, we're gonna make this really quick. I know you guys have things to do. I bet she has to go to bed soon. Like, he was attuned and he changed how he intervened for us based on that. And I was like, oh, this is where we are just gonna get our cars from now on. This guy's great and you
Tiffany(33:40):
Love him too. I already love this guy.
Jen(33:42):
He was great and, and he knew how to sell. Like, it's not that complicated. It's just attuning to the person in front of you and giving them what they need, which is literally our job. We get paid to do that. We just don't always do it in our marketing and sales.
Tiffany(33:57):
So what I'm hearing you talk about speaking of depth and someone who thinks mm-hmm . Deeply, which you absolutely clearly do mm-hmm . There. So the, you know, Molly who's sitting in her office right now, shoving some kettle chips in her mouth between sessions. Like, I got a market. What what we're helping distinguish here is kind of the orientation or like the, what's the tactic? So it could be SEO, it could be Facebook ads, it could be Google ads, it could be networking and a part you get away. There are ways we can go about. And you, you're gonna have good language for this so you can give us a language. Mm-Hmm . Like that is one thing. But you're talking about something underneath that precedes whatever it's gonna be TikTok or Facebook or, but you're talking about something that precedes that. So can you talk about, what is it called when you're like SEO versus Facebook ads, like that distinction and then what are you talking about that goes deeper than that? That has to be, that someone has to be doing before they even choose what, what avenue they're gonna take.
Jen(34:54):
Yeah. I wish there was a way for us to like visually depict this. I know. So for your viewers, I'm making like a triangle, like an inverted pyramid. With my hands, what we were just talking about is top of funnel, it's lead generation and we need leads to be able to have customers, right? No leads, no customers, no clients underneath that the things that actually provide a solid foundation are bottom of funnel and middle of funnel. Bottom of funnel is where we're actually selling, right? So we were just, I talked about top of funnel and bottom of funnel. I left out middle of funnel and middle of funnel is really the core of what it is that we have to offer people. Where I see people get tripped up a lot is people don't want to be exclusionary. And then because we understand people at a real depth, our exclusion is like, I can't even name this whatever like demographic.
Jen(35:53):
It's like, I don't know because sometimes I work with men and sometimes I do this and sometimes I do that. And what I have found over the years has been really helpful is to change the idea that you have just one person that you're marketing to and to think more about, I'm marketing to an archetype. Here's the archetype of a person that I wanna work with. I have a student in my flagship program at two distilled right now. And her ICA is the very hungry caterpillar, right? That here's this person who's really wanting to grow and is just like ingesting, ingesting, ingesting, but is also scared to go through that chrysalis period. And how can she be with this person? How can she meet them before they've gotten there before they eat the lollipop and the sausage and the whatever. You have small children, you probably have this memorized too on some level.
Jen(36:44):
And so then we can talk about like, okay, who is this person? Here's the archetypal figure, the very hungry caterpillar, where are they in terms of an event? And then what are the motifs, right? This is straight up young archetypal stuff, but what are the motifs that show up? Which then allows us in all of our messaging, yes. Can you use another word other than motif? From all like accents, accessories. I, I am trying to think of, let me give you an example. Yeah, great. I i let me use my ICA, right? So my ICA is a healer who's pretty decent at marketing, like has gotten their feet, his or her feet under them and wanting to do more. They're wanting to scale beyond where they are right now, right? And not just scale to make more money, but they wanna scale their impact.
Jen(37:37):
There's a, a visionary that's sort of hidden underneath the quiet compassionate healer, right? That's the figure. What is the event that they're going through? They're starting to freak out. 'cause There's a lot going on politically. Like I need to maybe make more money. Like maybe like for me, like maybe my husband might lose his job because of all the craziness. Like, what's going on? I need to make more money for my kids. Maybe I want to have a third kid and I need to figure out how am I gonna pay for maternity leave. I want to grow my income but not at the expense of my depth. I want to be able to also scale my impact. I have a lot to offer even though I experience imposter syndrome. I have a lot to offer and I want to be able to offer it to more people.

(01:46):
Jen(38:23):
That's the event. The motifs are, you spend hours in Canva trying to create an Instagram reel and match the text exactly to what happens on Instagram. 'cause You don't like to edit in Instagram. You don't know if you should do Kajabi or lead funnels or WordPress. You don't know where that it should house this. You keep worrying that you don't actually have that much to offer. And so you're way overdelivering. It's sort of like all of these I have a student who talks about them as a se secret handshakes. So what are your secret handshakes? Like things that only you and your ICA know, like we were talking before we hit record that I love Kendrick Lamar. And part of what I love about Kendrick Lamar is this is not my dialect. Like I am a white person. Like I don't catch all of the references.
Jen(39:20):
I also grew up very conservative and not a great education K through 12. And so at the Super Bowl halftime, he referenced 40 acres and a mule. And I was like, I don't, I don't know what that's about, but like I wanna know, like, here's the secret handshake of something. I don't know. That is really significant in history. Side note for your viewers at the end of the Civil War, really not at the end, but the union, a union general promised freed black men, if you fight with us, you'll get 40 acres of mule at the end. And
Tiffany(39:55):
Then guess what?
Jen(39:56):
Unsurprisingly, they reneged on that. And and then we have Jim Crow White South, but I didn't know the reference. And it's a secret handshake, right? I want to know what it means, but for who it's for. Like people know, right? Nobody, lots of people didn't have to look that up. And in our messaging, that's what we want to do is to have these secret handshakes to be like, you're one of us, right? I'm one of you. And it helps people feel seen in a way that is really actually pretty simple to do. And people just don't do it enough because again, they're afraid of excluding. So I rambled a little bit, but essentially people aren't specific enough in their messaging is a problem. I see. Again and again,
Tiffany(40:43):
This was clear as day. I'm like, I love this conversation. We could talk about this all day. So folks, by the way, if you are the person who wants to scale your impact and without losing your depth and you're like spending a hundred years on can because you are like, hi, well I don't wanna do it on Instagram. You know where to go. We'll talk about how people can work with you soon. Yeah. Very exciting and very clear. So also if you wanna be able to, like if you are listening to Jen and you're like, Jen's talking to me mm-hmm . Jen helps you do that for your ideal client who's gonna be paying you $300 per session. So I always love to learn from people who are already doing the thing. If I feel pull, if I'm reading some marketing copy or like looking at a sales anything and I'm like, I'm salivating to join up right now, then I'm like, oh, that person is teaching.
Tiffany(41:29):
Gonna teach me how to make other people feel how I feel right now. That's how I'm, that's the kind of meta way I'm listening to you right now. Yes. So one of the things I wanna touch on before we let folks know how they can work with you is kind of, I I think it, I I I have been talking to a lot of therapists about this or people even in the mental health industry around the changes with things like ai mm-hmm . And these huge platforms like better help mm-hmm . Just the, the, in the olden days, one could have a website do some SEO and be number one in Google. And now it's like you can't even get seen in Psychology Today. If you blog, you could blog, but you know, there are other people out there using AI and teams of a hundred people to blog. It just feels like what used to work, maybe it really doesn't work anymore. How do you think about marketing in 2025? What are some of the things you're paying attention to? What are some of the things that have changed over 2024 as we come into 2025? Any thoughts about this?
Jen(42:27):
So I, I wanna name lead generation changes. Hmm. Right. I think in general, like the landscape in the world that we live, and I don't think it's gonna change that much. Search is gonna continue to be big. In fact, Instagram, other platforms, TikTok rely more on search for their algorithm now and search is SEO, it's just on Google. I think search will continue to be a piece of what happens. I think it's actually gonna get smarter at detecting AI stuff. Mm-Hmm. That's my thought. But lead generation changes just the ways that we as people change how we meet people, right? Like where I am in my life right now, like I think I made my first daycare mom the other day and I'm real excited about it. But like, that's not where I used to meet friends. I didn't meet them at daycare.
Jen(43:17):
But now I can, right? Because I'm in a different area. And I think sometimes holding lead generation is like, this is just where we're gonna meet people. And that does shift both I think just as industry shifts and technology shifts, but as we as individual shifts, like how we wanna show up, what doesn't change is the foundational marketing principles. And marketing again is a relationship between you and your ICA and y'all are gonna go on a journey together. And ideally at the end of that journey, your ICA is transformed. They have healed in ways that they would not have been able to articulate when they first met you because we have to pace the journey, right? And there's plenty of things that I know, at least in my own healing journey I didn't know would happen for me or would be impactful for me until I was way in it, right?
Jen(44:08):
So for people who are like, okay Jen, this is all nice and theoretical, but like, what the do I actually do? I wanna suggest that you get crystal clear about who your ICA is and then get crystal clear about what makes you wanna vomit When you think about marketing, like what is it you don't wanna do? When you and I first met I had just worked with Alison per, and Alison per is all about networking and I am a rule follower. So I went and did some networking. I was like, Alison, I don't like this. She's like, it can be so impactful. And then I did it a little bit and I was like, I don't wanna do it anymore. I'm, I'm going to figure out how to market so I never have to network ever again. Which was kind of crazy 'cause I do a ton of networking now that I don't actually need it.
Jen(44:54):
'Cause It takes the pressure off for me. But understanding what it is you don't wanna do that. Your nervous system is just like, I cannot tolerate it. Don't do that just because you think it's the thing you have to do for marketing. There's a gazillion kinds of lead generating activities. And when you are really clear about who your ICA is, and this is sort of the magic trick, if you're able to articulate what it is you do in language that makes sense to them, right? If I said to my ICA, I'm gonna work on helping you heal your attachment wounds from your childhood that you think is not actually that bad and you're gonna argue with me that it wasn't that bad, but it really kind of was that bad and you had a lot of emotional neglect. And I'm gonna weave in young Ian and a little bit of Ellis and Erickson stages of development and like attachment theory. They'd be like, I what? I don't . I have no idea what that means. Some of my people probably would still come 'cause they'd be like, they would do what I did with 40 acres and a mule. Like what does that mean? Tell me everything. But it's not gonna be as effective as me saying people can't keep up with your brain. You need somebody who can do that. So you can give them access to your heart.
Tiffany(46:10):

(02:07):
Oh, every time. Right?
Jen(46:12):
Right. Like people quote that back to me, like still, like current clients are like, we're doing that brain thing again. I'm like, yeah, you're going meta like we're in Plato's Crave. Like whatever. I'll come up with metaphors. Can we go back to the feeling right? Can we feel into what's going on that resonates with people more than me giving them my credentials? Hmm. So clear on your ICA clear on your offer also clear that you were never the solution, you were holding the container for the solution. So you don't have to magically fix people or transform them. You're giving them the space to do that and then find a way that you can tell people about it. You can network, you can run ads, you can get on Instagram if you want. I actually think Instagram is one of the hardest ways to build a one-to-one practice. 'cause It takes so much energy. Can you
Tiffany(47:01):
Just say something? I was gonna try to wrap us up, but you keep saying gems, you keep dropping. Sorry, sorry,
Jen(47:06):
Sorry,
Tiffany(47:06):
Sorry. Can you say something about that Instagram thing?
Jen(47:09):
Yeah, I just, it Instagram is like its own ecosphere of all the things you need to do. And like, it's a fun game for me actually to be able to grow, to be able to convert, to be able to stay consistent. Like there you have a whole funnel on Instagram to really make it work for you. And often what happens is by the time people make it work and have grown their following, they don't need to fill their caseload because most people aren't trying to bring in more than 20 people. And maybe most of the people I work with tend to do longer term work. But even if you don't like the amount of lead Jen that you need doesn't, it's not gonna get to the level of Instagram. On top of that, Instagram is not geographically restricted. And so you're gonna get, and I've had friends who have done this, I've had students who do it, who get then a lot of dms like, I really wanna work with you, but they're in Indiana and you're licensed in California, or they're in whatever Canada.
Jen(48:07):
And you're like, I'm sorry, I can't, I can't work with you. And so then you're generating a lot of leads that you can't do anything with. And so what I typically say to people is, I don't want you to spend a lot of energy on Instagram unless it is like your True hearts passion. And if it's your true heart's passion, we need to talk about how you're also gonna monetize beyond building up your caseload. You need to have something else to sell, period. And if you have other things to sell, we should talk about social media because then it's not geographically restricted in the same way. And the energy is going to have, it's gonna have an ROI yeah
Tiffany(48:44):
Folks, clearly Jen knows herself. Jen, what does Lim need to do? What is getting in li's way of scaling to a $5 million company?
Jen(48:53):
I'd have to look at your backend. I we've had this conversation before. I think I think you would do well to have least a mini ascension model. You have so many people after they finish limb who are like, gimme more Tiffany, but you don't have the next level. And really li is a signature program. I don't know that you have a flagship higher, more premium offer. And I don't know that you would want a close proximity, which would be the highest piece of like doing like, actually that's not true. You were advertising for this back in the fall, right? One-On-One. But being able to nurture people through here's the next level and actually a really good flagship for you would be what happens when people are making a hundred, 200,000 but struggling to break through. And it's not just their market. What No, no
Tiffany(49:39):
Send up to you.
Jen(49:40):
It's not just their marketing. Oh yeah, they're market. There's plenty, there's plenty of people who make in like low six figures who have good marketing and mo it's not so much that their marketing isn't always working, it's that they keep sabotaging themselves. Ah-Huh. I end up doing actually quite a bit of money work with my students because it's like, you're , these are the things you need to do. Marketing's actually pretty simple. Here's where you're getting stuck. Here's the sole stuff that you're getting stuck on, which is fun for me to do. And I can do it. But that would be next level for you. And actually, I also think you should charge for your fee with calculator and run ads to it.

(02:28):
Tiffany(50:19):
My fun with fee calculator charge for that
Jen(50:22):
Low, low ticket, less than $30
Tiffany(50:25):
Fun with fee. I was thinking like 50 cents. Tiffany's got some money mindset work to do
Jen(50:29):
Folks. No, no, no, no. Like 27. And then do an order bump and maybe an OTO god. Okay. Take notes. So no, this is someday I'm gonna, when I put the rest of my together, I'm like, I just need to go to all these healers. Like, you, like Allison, I'm be like, you're leaving money on the table. I see it. I feel it. Like just let me get in your back end. I'll tell you what to do. Yeah,
Tiffany(50:50):
You should do that sooner rather than later. What are you waiting for? Get it going. I
Jen(50:54):
I'm trying to rewrite sales pages and get some of my funnels together. I'll put it on my Q2 list. You and I, I'll buy you a cup of coffee and I'll pitch you
Tiffany(51:04):
Folks. Holy mackerel. You gotta see so Jen can help you with your practice, with your next level, with your first offer, what's gonna come next. And then clearly also companies who have already scaled and are doing well. What's next? Jen thinks big, can think on all levels. How, so? If someone wants to work with you, what, what do you offer? How can someone work with you? Well clearly I ac actually during this conversation I'm like, oh, I need to send this client to you, but they're in California. But then also clearly like all these therapists, so someone listening, she's like, okay, I, I've, I've, I'm getting off on panels, I'm getting off panels. I've let my people know in six months I'm gonna be off. I have my cash pay. I know how many people are gonna stay. I need to do this marketing thing. What does it look like to work with Jen?
Jen(51:45):
So what, I wanna really be clear, I don't work with beginners very much anymore. In part because it takes time. And what I found working with beginners in marketing is some people don't wanna scale, which is fine. But like scaling is where it gets more complicated and more fun for me. So somebody's like, I need to get off insurance panels and like, how do I market? I don't necessarily have a lot of offers right now. You can DM me. I have some like legacy stuff that I will give you the link for. If you wanna buy all my old programs, you can. But honestly, I would say I want you to go to Alison per mm-hmm . Alison Perr has a amazing program that like helps people do exactly this. Like she's honed it over years. I think she's brilliant. She's great with beginners.
Jen(52:29):
Like that's where you should go if you're like, okay, Jen, I did that. I have a practice. I'm starting to feel settled, but I do want more. Then I think a great place to start would be my program grow, which is not actually about marketing or messaging, which is what we've been talking about today, but it's about really looking at what is your current business look like and where are you leaking? Like where are your resources is leaking people. Often I'll work with people, and this is true, I'll mention attunement distilled in a minute, but this is true almost always for my attunement distilled students who start, I'm like, I need you to go through grow because I feel almost a hundred percent certain your schedule is messy. And a hundred percent of the time their schedule is messy. They don't have a good system for notes.
Jen(53:16):
Their money. Stuff like logistically isn't like working for them. Like they haven't tightened things up. Their space doesn't actually literally physically hold them, or their digital stuff is all over the place. Mm-Hmm. I tend to work with a lot of people who are neurodivergent. So like Grow is executive functioning. Mm-Hmm. It is how I run my, both of my businesses. This is such a flex in less than 32 hours a week. And then includes three hours of therapy and an hour supervision. So when I say like 14, 15 clients a week, so like I run a tight ship and grow is how I, it's me teaching you how to do that once you've done that, and or if you're somebody who's like, just put me in the, the deep engine, that's where I wanna go. Attunement distilled is where I spend most of my time.
Jen(54:04):

(02:49):
It's my flagship. It's really my signature program where I help people from everything from setting up an Ascension model, getting clear on your ICA, which we talked about today. I do a lot around brand identity, brand voice. We didn't get to talk a lot about ai, but I've been leveraging AI more and more. AI is a tool, by the way. It's not gonna like an overlord that's gonna take us over unless the archs end up taking over. But that's a different story for a different day. But AI is a tool that helps us go faster and there are ways to ethically leverage it to, to write all the copy you need to write. And I write a ton of copy in a pretty tight schedule. And so Toman distilled, you get access to all that. I coach every week on Fridays from noon to one Eastern Standard. And the community is just like, I don't mean any shade to limb, but my community is the best community on the internet. And I get a, I get a lot of limb people after. So like that's a piece of, did they
Tiffany(55:03):
Say that limb?
Jen(55:05):
I, I say that. I say that. I say I have the cream of the crop. I think people do agree. It's a incredibly supportive community. And people really show up for each other. Like, I was sick in the fall and we still met. They're like, can we just still cowork? Let's all get together. I was like, I don't have the energy to give you guys a Zoom link. I'm sorry, but I'm glad you're gonna get together and do this thing. So they're great and supportive and brilliant. I learned so much from all of them. It's really fun. It's
Tiffany(55:34):
After they, they take after their teacher, their mentor, I think, or, or
Jen(55:40):
Maybe not take after like we find each other, right? Like attract attack, like attracts like, and . The other thing is if people wanna follow me, I'm on Instagram. Like it's my newest, not my newest it, but it's my project right now. Like, I'm gonna figure out Instagram, I'm gonna figure out how to master it and really make it work for me. And I'm pretty consistently promoting whatever it is that I'm promoting. 'cause I don't write content unless I am have an intervention to offer you. Mm-Hmm . Which means there's something for sale. Great. Yeah.
Tiffany(56:13):
I, and I've been seeing you on there. So, so where can people find you on link? Linkedin. Oh my god, we don't care. Not LinkedIn. Where can people find you on Instagram? And also if people are not on Instagram, how can people find you?
Jen(56:25):
So on Instagram at a Thinkers Guide and if people just wanna like get on my email list, the easiest way right now is a thinkers guide.com/quiz. That's exciting to, to find out your marketing attachment style,
Tiffany(56:40):
Yay. A thinkers guide.com/quiz/quiz to find out your marketing attachment style. Beautiful.
Jen(56:50):
It's so fun. It regularly makes people cry, which is my dream. And most of the things I do that you feel so seen that you either wanna like rage quit and like close the laptop really quick, or you tear up and most people tear up and they DM me about it and it delights me.
Tiffany(57:05):
Jen doesn't mess around too. I think you sent me this quiz a while back and it's very thoughtful. Jen does not do anything half-assed. Folks. It's thoughtful. It's an adventure. You're going on a ride, you're moved, you're surprised. So definitely go get that quiz. Definitely go find Jen on Instagram. Jen, we can talk about clearly marketing for another like three hours. Unfortunately, we cannot for the sake of time, but focus, if you have had a taste and you're like, mm, this tastes delicious. Something about the smell, sweet. Definitely go find Jen. Learn more about what she's up to. Thank you.
Jen(57:35):
I love it. Thank you.

(03:10):
Outro (57:42):
All right. Whatever you're doing, I want you to pause. If you're driving, pull over. If you're chopping a carrot, put that knife away. If you're making sweet love to your woman, well, I mean that's, that's, That's
Kind of flattering in a weird way. Huh. You can go, you can just go ahead and you can keep doing that. But for the rest of you, if you learn even just one thing of value today, please share this episode with even just one therapist who could benefit from the message. Here's how, if you're listening on iTunes, click on the episode and you'll see a small purple circle with three dots. Click on those dots and you're gonna see the option to share at the bottom of the list. Click that and you can just go ahead and share it on Facebook, or you can even just text it to one therapist who you know needs to hear it. If you're listening on Stitcher, just tap the triangle icon on the upper right corner. It's next to the menu that displays your upcoming playlist. You'll see the option to share the episode you're currently listening to Right on Facebook. Look, it's time to get the word out. We gotta spread the message. Thank you so much, and we'll join each other again soon.