Massage Practice Builder

Do people really still do New Years Resolutions?  Everyone knows that they don’t really work or last very long.   A New Years Resolution without a plan and without the beliefs to back it up don’t really work.

This year instead of creating those new years resolutions that actually set you up to fail just by the fact that you are focusing on what is wrong most of the time like :  I want to get out of debt -really says I hate being in debt so I want to get rid of it.

I want to lose 20 pounds says  – I hate being overweight.

When you focus on what you don’t want you get more of the same.  Focus on what you do want.

You want to have enough money to pay your bills, save for retirement and take vacations and that equals xx amount of dollars that you will need to make each month.  There – that isn’t a resolution it is a concrete goal.

I want to be healthy, be fit and weigh my ideal weight of xx pounds by xx date.   Another goal.

But then how do you really achieve those things.  Most of the trouble lies in the unconscious and conscious beliefs that we have about those things we want for ourselves.  The unconscious is of course difficult to figure out because it is unconscious.  Your feeling will be what tell you about what your unconscious thoughts are telling you.  Whenever you are feeling anything but love or joy you are believing in an unconscious thought that just isn’t true.  I know that is really hard to get your head around and apply.  It is really an ongoing process of learning to tune into your feelings and honor them.

So maybe the new years resolution could be – pay more attention to my feelings!  Make this year the year that you allow yourself to have desires and let it be OK.

It is OK to make $100,000 a year as a massage therapist.  It is OK to take vacations and have a retirement fund.  It is OK to have the clients that you need to be successful.

Make 2010 different by changing your thoughts!  The rest will follow!

What I wish Massage therapists would get for Christmas… or well just get anytime…

• That being a massage therapist is one of the most rewarding careers where you do get to help people but you do also get to make a Great living.
• That giving to others begins with giving to yourself first in every way.
• That being a massage therapist does not mean you have to live in poverty or live without.
• That having desires is not a bad thing (Desires for a house, retirement fund, nice vacations and a full savings account along with relationships that nurture you are what make you human.)
• You are getting paid for your time and knowledge.  You aren’t getting paid to care.  That you give for free.
• It is OK to charge the fees that you need to make a great living and stay in business.  Charging less than you need to make will lead to feeling resentful of clients and is also the biggest part of burnout.  Just because massage is so wonderful doesn’t mean you have to give it away.
• That you can’t do it all alone.  It is OK and even advisable to ask for help in the way of marketing, promoting yourself, getting your finances under control.  Hire a bookkeeper, financial adviser, marketing adviser and a webdesigner who knows how to get you business. You can also find a mentor or supervisor or create your own peer supervision group to help you along the way.
• That even when you have a job in massage it is your job to get and keep clients coming in.
• You don’t have to take low paying jobs under $20 an hour.  You can create or find higher paying jobs if you put the effort into it.
• That having a job doesn’t mean that you just get to do massage.  You still can have a say in what is going on in the place where you work if you do it wisely and without complaining.
• You teach employers how to treat you so taking low paying jobs is teaching the employers that massage therapists don’t value their own work.
• That burnout can be avoided if you learn to take care of yourself first.  That is financially as well as emotionally, mentally and spiritually.
• That being a successful massage therapist will probably be the hardest thing you will ever do.   It just isn’t about doing massage.
• Taking classes in ethics and participating in supervision will take your career farther than most technique classes.
• There isn’t any one technique that will make you a successful massage therapist.
• Because you are working closely with people it is important that you be doing your own self growth work.
• That you have to take responsibility for your career.  You can blame your lack of clients on the economy or take responsibility and creatively figure out a way to keep your own economy stable.  It isn’t easy and you won’t like to hear that, I know.  Is it the economy or your not having a website that gets you new clients every week and makes you additional income or that you haven’t networked enough or done a mailing every week or gave presentations or the other millions of massage marketing ideas that you can do?
• Clients do not magically appear on your table.  It takes believing in yourself and skill and taking action.  Action is what prepares you to receive.
• It is your basic beliefs about yourself and success that are really are what get in your way of success.  These are mostly unconscious beliefs.  Most of our lives are run on unconscious behaviors and patterns.  It is like driving a car- how often do you think what you are doing?  If you don’t know what your beliefs are just take a look at what you have in your life and start asking – what would someone believe to have that in their life.
• Continuing education is a very important part of creating a successful business and promoting the profession.  Plan and choose your classes accordingly.  Don’t wait until the last minute when your license is up for renewal.
• Figure out what it is that you want for yourself and don’t stop until you get it.  Focus on what you do want rather than what you don’t have.
• Get a massage once a week and better yet -pay for it.  Go out and find a massage therapist that you can work with on a regular basis.  You can learn so much about your own business just trying to find a good massage therapist that meets your needs and of course it will help you maintain your own health.
• Share your knowledge and experience with other massage therapists as often as you can.

That is my wish for you (all the massage therapists out there) this Holiday and MORE!

One of my passions is teaching massage therapists how to set up websites to promote your massage business.  If you do it right that is all you will ever really need to promote your massage business.  People usually turn to the web and more often Google of course to find what they are needing.  When they are looking for a massage therapsit they type in ‘massage, your city’ or ‘massage, some area of a city’.  Having your website show up at the top of the search results for those keywords will bring you targeted traffic.  They already are looking for a massage therapist!  When they find your site at the top or at least on the first page of Google your listing has to look appealing so that they will have the choice of whether to click on it or not.  So even after you get your site on the first page of results you then need to get people to click on the results.  This is done by using some simple search engine optimization tools that will show up on the listing.  You need to use words that will appeal to their needs and let them know exactly what it is that you do.  You can do this by choosing the best domain name that does communicate your unique selling position and also by using keywords. That listing is done by using targeted keywords in the metatags of your website and also in the title and in the first few sentences of your website.

When people click on the results they want to know if you can provide a solution to their problem which is usually pain, stress,  some type of injury or disease.  They want to know if you can handle the condition that they have!  When massage therapists start their websites their homepage is usually filled with some thing like this:

Welcome to my website.  I am so and so a massage therapist that is trained in such and such unknown type of massage that the person really doesn’t care about or know what it means.  I am NCBTMB certified which will mean nothing to you again but I did pay a lot for it.  To find a contact number for me you will have to hunt around on this website and see if you can find it.

People who find you online are already looking for massage. You don’t have to do much to convert these people into clients because they are already looking for massage.  They actually aren’t looking for you to begin with so the other thing your site has to do is just provide enough information so that they will begin to know that you know your stuff and can handle their condition and needs.  Your website needs to build trust so that they will then make the call.  Most people today are weary of sales pitches.  They know when they are being sold too and they usually run the other way.  To overcome that all you really need to do is to create enough information about who you are and what you do and do it in a way that focuses on the reader and not you. You do that by using the main/homepage as a way to connect with your reader.  You don’t talk about yourself there yet.

Just take a minute and go online and do a search for ‘massage, your city’ or any city and just look at some massage therapists websites.  Pretend you are a potential client and really need a massage to help you heal from a back strain.  Who would you choose on the basis of reading a few websites?  Actually go out and find a massage therapist by their website.  See if you can find a reputable massage therapist that you think will meet your need and go and get a massage to see if the do or not.

If you don’t have a website that is on the first page of search engine results you are missing out on highly targeted clients.   I have the full details of what you need to do when choosing a webhost, domain name and setting up your website on my site www.thebodyworker.com

An important part of being successful in the massage profession is your perception of the money that you pay out for various services – are they a expense or an investment in your massage business?  So many massage therapists seem to want to skimp on paying for things that are essential in building a business.  Something as simple as your own phone line instead of using your personal cell phone can go a long way in creating an image for yourself.  They don’t want to spend money on classes or their website and try to get away with just getting whatever is the cheapest.  I can understand not wanting to spend money when you don’t have it and that brings up a whole other can of worms in why don’t you have the money that you need to invest in and create your ideal massage business but just changing your thinking from one of the money going out as being an expense to the idea that the money going out is an investment in yourself and your business can go a long way in creating your massage business.  The idea that money going out is just an expense is also a great reflection of your beliefs about money.

Each year about this time I start creating my spending plan for the next year.  I create a plan rather than a budget.  I plan on what I am going to need and then figure out how to get what I need.  If you just start out without knowing how much you need to make, how will you know what it is you need to do to make that happen?  I allow for a massage each week, two vacations away somewhere, a class or two, my website for my massage business and a few new ones to develop new ideas with and the usual costs of doing business – phone, rent, business cards, any other marketing things, taxes, savings and retirement savings.  Even these things are an investment in your massage business.

When you invest in your massage business, you are saying that your business has value and meaning to you.  You are willing to put money and time into it and know that the returns will make it worth it.  Having faith in these challenging times is challenging in itself.  Often when you are starting out it is important to just take little steps and make little investments in your business and see how they work out so that you can build faith in yourself.  And if they don’t work out that doesn’t mean that they don’t work as in just creating a one page website without doing any optimizations or reading about creating websites.  This is where the faith comes in that will help you stay with the process of creating a website that works for your business or doing whatever it takes to get the clients you need in the door.  ( I always just talk about websites because they are what saved me from having to go out there and market myself and do those ‘sales related’ things that I hate to do and I also make most of my living now just from my two websites – www.massage-career-guides.com and www.thebodyworker.com alone.)

Here is my list of essential investments in your massage business:

1. A website that works- one that gets you a steady flow of new clients and makes you money as you do massage
2. Business cards that are printed professionally that have the necessary information on them to contact you.
3. A separate phone line to keep your business and personal life separate.
4. A financial counselor to help you create and manage a spending plan for your business.
5. A class each year to inspire and support you
6. Regular supervision sessions with a more experienced massage therapist or counselor to help you create professional boundaries and enforce them in difficult situations
7. Regular in depth counseling to help you become more aware and do your own personal growth work.

Investing in your massage business is just part of good self care. What do you invest in for your massage business?  What would you like to invest in to add to your massage business?

One of the most challenging things for massage therapists is setting fees for massage therapy services but it is one of the most important forms of self care that is needed to avoid burnout or even business failure.  Money is such an interesting thing for many as it often equated with power and it is a place where we all project our old beliefs onto.

Massage therapists don’t want to charge for massage because it is such a nurturing, wonderful service and they think that people shouldn’t have to pay for things like that.  They set lower rates than others thinking that is what they need to do to get people in the door and keep them coming back.  They don’t have cancellation policies that support a business and often just let no shows or last minute cancellations go without paying.  Massage therapists seem to put their own needs for financial stability aside in order to get and keep a client.

The thing is that people do want to pay for your services.  When I first started out 20 years ago,  I opened my own business at a health club where the person before me was charging something like $25 an hour for a massage.  Even back then, that was a really low fee for massage.  It was a struggle raising my rates to match the going rate in the area.  An accountant friend of mine even told me not to do it because I would lose too many clients.  I did lose some but there were new ones that came after and they paid the higher rate.  Every year when I raise my rates, I usually get at least one complaint but all of the others say things like “It is about time your raised your rates”.  Actually the person who complained last year is one of my wealthiest clients.  What people can or want to pay has little to do with how much money they have or don’t have.  I also have a client who is a single mother and a day care teacher who makes it a point to always have money for her massage.  The difference is in how much they value massage.  I personally only want to be working with people who value me and my massage service.  Anything less becomes a drain on your business and your self.  That is why setting and raising your fees is one of the highest forms of self care.  I even created a new page on my website on setting your fees and it is linked from the section on Self Care.

So often I work with massage therapists and I hear things like “I can charge less because I work at home and don’t have as much overhead.  I work with mothers and they don’t have much money.”  They also say things like “I just can’t charge for massage because it is such a personal thing”.   These therapists don’t have a retirement account and are hardly getting by but they would rather ‘sacrifice’ their time and take a client who pays less.  Setting introductory fees can be a way of getting people in the door or having special offers occasionally but consistently undercharging and thus underearning can hurt your massage practice (and the massage profession) more than one might think.

In some ways we are providing what people should have got for free- nurturing, relaxation techniques and support for their physical, mental, emotional processing.  How do you put a price on that?  I sometimes think we should be charging more like $500 an hour for massage sessions because of all the things that massage really can do.   I once had a client who had severe neck pain and compressed discs in his neck.  In about 6 sessions he was a different person.  He told me he had come in looking for relief from his pain and he left being a more peaceful person.  He was friendlier and easier to get along with.  How much is that worth to someone?