|
|
GETTING NEW CLIENTS: WHAT WORKS?
When I first started as a therapist, practicing reiki and life coaching, I thought getting clients was going to be easy. I had a website, I produced some leaflets, I listed myself on a number of website directories and I waited for the clients to come rolling in. I couldn't have been more naive. I started to ask a number of established therapists how they got their clients and they said from referrals. This was all very well, but how could I get referrals if I didn't have any clients in the first place? Months of trying unsuccesfully to build my business and I was feeling rather dispirited. In fact I stopped practicing and decided to concentrate on my counselling course, which was taking up most of my time and energy anyway. A year later, now a fully qualified counsellor I was ready to try again, only this time I was determined to get it right. Everyone kept telling my how hard it was to get clients, most of the recently qualified counsellors I knew were struggling to get a steady flow of business, so how was I going to succeed? From my own predicament was born the idea of therapists sharing with each other what works and what doesn't. This page is dedicated to sharing knowledge about how to get clients. It is a constantly evolving project, as I gain more experiance myself and also recive information from other therapists. Why not join in and share your experiances? I hope you find this page useful and I'd love to hear your success stories, and your false starts, as we can all learn from each other.
Nancy Hine
ADVERTISING
Where is it actually worth advertising? You can spend a fortune if you're not careful and end up with no results. We are currently gathering information from therapists around the country to find out what works and what doesn't. Please email us to share your experiance and/or complete our survey. So far we have a big thumbs down for advertising. Most therapists that have contacted us don't think its effective. In fact most haven't covered their costs.
|
|
|
Yellow Pages
I only had two client from my yellow pages advert the year I ran it. It cost me £211 for the smallest box they offer, so that means I didn't cover my costs.
Inclusion in Charity Brochures
I tried one of these and had no enquiries at all. There are also a lot of scams claiming to be for charity, so you need to be careful.
NHS Employee Discount Scheme
This is the most expensive piece of advertising that I did and I got no enquiries whatsoever. Definately not worth it, don't waste your money.
Newspapers and Magazines
I've not tried this, so I'd be interested to hear from those who have.
Having Your Own Website
So far I've had more clients through my website than through any other means. The trick is getting the site to be high enough in the rankings so that people actually find it. I focus on the keywords 'counselling wokingham' . Read more here.
Google Adwords
Its difficult to assess this as I don't know whether the clients I've had through my website found me through google adwords or through the search results. However it did help to guarantee that I appeared on the first page of google before my website was appearing their in its own right. It also helps me appear on the first page for other searches that my site isn't optomised for. So this is the only advertising I am still paying for.
Online Directories
I've not had any clients directly from any of the general online directories like Healthy Pages etc., but it is possible that some of the clients that came through my website found the site through a directory. I have, however, had one client through the BACP Register. Success with the BACP Register seems to be mixed, some counsellors I've spoken to found it useful, others say the don't get any enquiries. It may have something to do with whether or not you are accredited, but also how many other counsellors are in your area. I know some therapists do get enquiries through the directory on this site. I'd be interested to know whether or not you find it effective.
|
NETWORKING
Find out more about networking on our Networking Page
WRITING A BOOK
I attended a workshop on how to use a book to promote my business. It all seemed very plausable and I went ahead and wrote and self published a book. Unfortunately it has not led to any new clients as far as I can tell. Given the costs involved this was an expensive mistake. Maybe this approach would work for some therapies better than for counselling. It might also work better for you if you do alot of public speaking and can have your book out at the back of the hall. If you do decide to try this approach I would recommended either going for a print to order option or only printing 100 copies (I have 950 copies sitting in boxes in my living room with little hope of selling them). Also be careful how much money you spend. Don't be fooled by people charging large sums of money and promising you the world. The sales pitch and workshops may be very motivating, but you can loose a lot of money this way. It is very unlikely that you will sell many copies, the book market is totally saturated. Having said that if you want to write then don't let me put you off, just be realistic about it. I am happy to give you more information about this if you are interesested. Just email me.
|
