69 Expanding Your Practice: 3X Client Load Increase With SEO Strategies and Relationship Mastery

Embark on a marketing odyssey with us and Jenny Melrose, a virtuoso in speaking the language of client growth through SEO and keyword optimization. We dissect the code behind Key Performance Indicators and craft strategies tailored for clients on divergent timelines, from those in dire need to the ones still contemplating. As we map out our journey, akin to my impending trek across Spain, we share invaluable insights on how to position your business as the go-to solution in urgent scenarios and how to cater to the more reflective search habits of potential clients. You'll also learn the intricacies of tracking your digital footprint with tools like Pretty Links, ensuring every step of your growth is measured and accounted for.

In the realm of client engagement, the conversation takes a deep dive into building relationships that last and improving your practice's visibility. We tackle the nuances of navigating the digital marketplace, from optimizing content that climbs the Google search ladder to engaging proactively in community activities for heightened visibility. Whether you're balancing the scales between cash payments and insurance claims, or curating content that resonates from the first click, this episode is your compass. Plus, we offer a candid look at redefining user experience with a personal tale about streamlining navigation on our own 'start here' feature, proving that sometimes the smallest tweaks make the biggest ripples. Join us as we share the blueprint for a thriving practice that stands out in a sea of online noise.

Get your step by step guide to private practice. Because you are too important to lose to not knowing the rules, going broke, burning out, and giving up. #counselorsdontquit.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:13

All right, hello and welcome to our Tuesday training and the Step it Up membership. Thank you so much for joining live or, if you're watching me on a replay. Thank you for joining on a replay, and you can have your camera on or off. It's totally up to you, pam, I see you. So if you want to leave it on, perfect. If not, that's okay too. So good to see you. All right, let me double check that we are live and all right. We are Good deal there. I'm even in focus. Okay, good deal.

Speaker 1: 0:55

So today is another marketing training, because the one I did in December it sort of gave you a little tidbit. But we have Jenny Melrose, who's a blogger for the Melrose family and she really understands SEO and she speaks counselor, so she can make it to where it's very understandable for us. And so I wanted to make sure I did one more training, at least in January. I don't think I'll do one more in February, but for sure in January to make sure I help you understand what keywords are, what SEO means. And, as I promised in the title, I want you to test me on this. I want you to see a three-time increase in your client load, so whether that is your roster. If you have 10 people, I want you to see 30. If that's phone calls and you are connecting with three people a week, I want you to connect with nine people a week.

Speaker 1: 1:56

I really want you to develop a metric. Remember we call that a KPI, a Key Performance Indicator, and these are indicators that really do matter when it comes to is your business growing? So, for example, how many likes you got on Facebook is not a KPI, because there's no way to associate that view count with dollars in your bank account. That's more like how many votes you got for prom queen, right? There's just no way of knowing how that associates to sale. Same thing with Instagram. Same thing with TikTok. Now you've heard me talk about in trainings before something called Pretty Links, and I'm not going to go into it today, but there are some YouTube videos and trainings out there that I've done where I talk about how you can use something called a Pretty Link in your social media and when somebody clicks that Pretty Link, you can say, aha, that came from Instagram or aha, that came from Facebook. So when we talk about a Key Performance Indicator, it really has to be something that you can tie back to an increase in performance, and that's why I put in the title today a three times increase, because I want you to report back to me. I want you to tag me on Instagram. I want you to send me an email. I want you to tag me in this Facebook group. I want to know how it improved.

Speaker 1: 3:23

Now, for those of you listening, I am going to use my screen, but I will be true to my word, which is always I will describe everything that I'm typing out, and if you're joining me on a replay, I think you're awesome anyway, because you are likely bored to tears doing something else, like on a treadmill or sitting in a parking lot waiting for someone to get out of their piano lesson. So here we are in. All I'm showing folks right now is a blank screen with a Word document on it. So here's my goal You're going to understand what SEO keywords are and why they're important to doubling and tripling your client load, because every single one of you is on a journey. Every single one of your clients is on a journey. So here's my metaphor Ready set, here we go.

Speaker 1: 4:26

So in April, I am going to be going with Dr Don Brunkenhofer to Spain and we are going to walk the Camino and it's a 100 kilometer walk and I'm researching and I'm trying to find out as much as I possibly can for this journey. So as I'm doing my research, things are coming up like where will I eat, where can I change clothes, where can I go to the bathroom? So all of these things are now important to me because I'm now on this journey. I haven't even started the journey yet, so it's the pre-contemplation stage, or I've made the decision, but I'm not ready for the things I'm searching for. Where can I get hiking poles in Spain? How long can I expect my shoes to last? I don't need that stuff now. That's for my journey coming up.

Speaker 1: 5:23

So we're going to divide our clients into two types of folks. We're going to have clients with an emergency, an ER, and, obviously enough, we're going to have clients who don't have an emergency. All right. So if we were going to go back to my metaphor, this is me. I don't have a need for a bodega on a trail on the way to the church in Santiago, so I do not have a pressing need right now for a cafe on the way to wherever. I don't have the need right now for some rain gear because I'm about to get rained on. So this is a really different client than this one. So I'm going to take you through the different needs for these clients.

Speaker 1: 6:26

Now, word is weird, so I imagine it's going to mess with my tabs and stuff. So if you're listening to me, you're kind of in the same situation as the people watching me, because I have no idea where my cursor will end up. So let's make a list of clients with an emergency. What do you need to be in order to attract clients with a pressing emergency? So let's go. You need to be top of mind and you got to be available and I can't spell.

Speaker 1: 7:10

So if I'm on the trail and I have fallen and skinned my knee and I'm like, okay, where's a pharmacy where I can get some bandages, I have a pressing need, I'm just going to go through my phone and call until somebody picks up. So if this is your client, your potential client, and you're trying to do a three time increase, then your KPI has to be how many calls you answer? Right, I'm not talking phone tag, and those of you still use an email, I don't even. I hate to even get into that, but it's about who can get me in first, because I, my partner, my child, my family member has an emergency. So your keywords we're going to call them SEO, search engine optimization terms are going to have things like near me, and you're going to hate this.

Speaker 1: 8:12

Those of you who are virtual, only a physical address. So if you have a virtual practice and you don't have a physical address, google may ignore you. So that person, in whatever town you're trying to gather clients from, you're and you may say, well, kate, I don't care, you know it's all virtual. Well then this whole thing may be out of reach for you. I don't know, it might be a great question for Jenny, but if you're trying to market to clients with a pressing issue, a pressing issue, an immediate issue, that is your sweet spot, that's the person you want to reach and you don't have a physical address All of the people who have a physical address they're going to come up first, they're going to be answering their phones first, they're going to have the immediate openings first. So you've really got to think about if this is your ideal client.

Speaker 1: 9:14

Okay, so let's go over here to clients who don't have an emergency. You still want to be top of mind, of course, and you don't have an emergency yet. So who is this person over here? Well, maybe they're single, but someday they're going to get married. Maybe they are let's see what are no kids, right? But in 10 years they're going to have kids. Let's do one more. So they are a kid themselves, but they're going to have to learn how to adult soon, right?

Speaker 1: 9:54

So now we have some keywords, some search terms that we can start working with. You're going to start marketing to these folks who are thinking about the journey, or maybe they don't even know they're going to be thinking about the journey. I know, as you know, when I was thinking about having kids, I wasn't also thinking, gosh, I wonder who's going to be their therapist, right? But now you can start doing things like putting yourself at top of mind. But it is a longer client journey, right? I know I'm going to Spain in April, but if I'm a newlywed and I'm not planning to have kids, for you know five years and you are a kid specialist and you're thinking, okay, I've got five years for this fictional client, right? I want to somehow remain top of mind. That's a lot of work, but this is where the fun comes in, because now your search terms are going to be things like and I'm just sticking with kids for a minute, let's try to keep this a little bit, even for those of you who are watching. So we have SEO keywords like three things to keep in mind when you are thinking about having a baby, I don't know, or how to protect your mental health. These are called long tail keywords. That just means they're more like sentences than they are like therapists near me, right? So this is where we start. We start talking about developing content, because you've got to develop content for these people, these single folks who may get married someday, thinking about getting married. Here are three yellow flags to watch out for. Let's see the no kids having kids. Oh, the kids who are adulting soon. Oh my gosh.

Speaker 1: 11:52

I used to love working with young adults struggling to leave the nest, struggling to launch. I loved working with their parents who were struggling, with kiddos who were having trouble becoming remaining independent. I had so much content and it was fun. It was a lot of fun to develop that content and once I put that content out there, then I could start matching it with search terms. So imagine if I'm a parent and if you guys are in my classroom right now.

Speaker 1: 12:27

I want you to kind of shout out some keywords for me. What are some things parents might look for if they've got young adults who are struggling to launch? Maybe something as simple as how to launch my adult kid. All right, so let's test our theory here. I'm going to stop the share for a second, I'm going to go to the Google machine and I will share again. And let's put how to launch my adult kit. And remember, this is called a long tail keyword.

Speaker 1: 13:31

Here we go from Beyond Booksmart, we've got BrightQuest, aarp. So guess what AARP is marketing to right? Hello, over 50, over 55. How to get your adult child out of your basement. Six tips for launching your adult children. Now, I don't recommend any of these. I mean, I recommend I don't know any of these folks. So we're just getting some ideas here and we're looking to see, okay, what kind of search terms are out there. Now, if you're a virtual counselor, let's just throw virtual counseling texts on there. So we're going to put a location if you're licensed in Texas, and we're going to put virtual counseling just in case you don't have a physical address. Now we have Embark, behavioral health coming up first. So, hey, embark, if you're watching this good job. We've got Barton Counseling Services coming up second, mosaic Therapy coming up third and Russi Counseling coming up fourth, therapy Tribe, which I think is a kind of a national organization. They're hard to beat, angie Nelson Gates, but you get the idea.

Speaker 1: 14:43

Now that you have identified your client by their journey, you can start developing this content right? And one of the things Jenny Melrose is going to talk to you guys about at least I hope she does is something called content pillars. And when you think about a content pillar, I'm going to stop the share and I will reshare as soon as I change screens. So we've got content. Pillars are going to be things like how to resources for. Here's your guide to. And so here we have this one keyword, this one little search term launching adult kids and we're going to come up with five pieces of content. So what do we have? How to resource guide oh, what is so? How to communicate with your spouse if you're on different pages about your adult child, resources for your adult child who may have an IEP and they're trying to go to college and stay independent. Here's your guide to launching your adult child. What is failure to launch.

Speaker 1: 16:14

So, without even thinking about it, we've identified our client by their journey and we've come up with content that we know Google loves and we've identified it, or we've narrowed it down in a way so that it's location, even if you're virtual, if you put in location, you can have your content appearing high in the Google rankings. Now this is where I want you to test me. Remember, the title says I want you to have a three time increase because we're not done yet, just because you have identified your client on their journey. Remember, these are folks that we're working with who don't have an emergency. They're in this. They may take a year or more to actually contact you.

Speaker 1: 17:07

So, for those of you who are just starting your practice, you may be saying, oh well, I'm just going to work with clients with emergencies because then I can get them in. Ok, that's great. I mean, there is a business model for that. But you're still going to be in business for a long time because you're awesome, and so the word's going to get around about how awesome you are, and so you're still going to have to do the work for the clients who don't have an emergency, because they're going to hear about the fabulous work you did with the Jones family and they're going to want to know who you are if and when they have a similar emergency. So you want to be that top of mind for your specialty when this happens or when they want to reach out to you.

Speaker 1: 17:57

So how do we do that? Well, you've heard me talk about it before. You got to get out from behind the keyboard. You've got to get out into the community. You can do speaking gigs, you can do special classes for the population you work with. You could do for AARP, I don't know.

Speaker 1: 18:25

Let's say nursing homes. I know I'm just talking about a different population, but I'm kind of just roughing a little bit. So let's say that you want to work with this client population struggling to launch. Well, that's folks who are maybe in their 50s. Well, that's also called the sandwich generation, right? Because they're taking care of their elderly parents at the same time they're trying to launch those kids. So if you got a gig at a nursing home, you could pepper that speech with hey. By the way, I also help with trying to get your adult kid to be independent. I know we're talking about your elderly parents who are struggling, but you know.

Speaker 1: 19:10

So you have to start thinking in terms of this client on their journey everywhere you go, right, like if I sell hiking poles, I'm going to sell hiking poles. Whether somebody needs one right now, or if they're thinking about going to Spain in a year, I'm still the hiking pole person. I still want people to come to me for those hiking poles. So we've got, let me, that's what I want, okay, yeah, okay. So back to this. So you know what you got to do. You got to get out from behind the keyboard.

Speaker 1: 19:44

Now I'm going to throw this at you. It's a little bit of a curveball, but as you're crafting this content, cash or insurance matters, okay, and here's why the client journey, when they are cash only, may be very short. So let's just I put them under the clients with emergencies. Just bear with me for a minute, because it could be either side, right, it could be a client with an emergency or a client without an emergency, but generally, when you're cash based, you're looking at a shorter duration of counseling. So this is for I'm talking to you guys who think you know somebody's got to have a weekly appointment or somehow you're failing as a counselor, right? So this is when you need to look at your theory and start looking at solution focused techniques, theories, ways of viewing and seeing the issues. So the client is getting the most bang for their buck. But or and you're also looking at the front end of this sales cycle Right, you're going to focus on intakes rather than okay, what am I working on in session?

Speaker 1: 21:04

What are my? How am I doing on session 10 or session 40 or session 50? Yes, I know that there are going to be outliers out there and I know I'm probably going to get emails today from people who say I do 20 sessions all the time on a cash basis and I want to. I respect that and yay, go you. I love that. But if you're going to do cash, then you start thinking about okay, let's think about what I'm going to, how my content is going to go. I'm going to really focus on what my client will get in session one, what my client will get in session two, the resources they'll have in session three, what they can expect in session four.

Speaker 1: 21:50

So, right off the bat, this person who maybe doesn't want to use their insurance is focused on listening to you describe what they're getting, whether it's an emergency or not, in those first four sessions insurance. You may not need to do that Right. You may want to write content that simply says hey, by the way, I'm on these 15 insurances and we have a great billing department and here's how we help you file that insurance how. Here's how we make sure we make it easy for you so that you don't you're worried about this over here. You don't want to worry about this over here. So you go to the how to resources, for here's your guide. What is right? How to file with insurance. Here are your resources for talking to your physician if you get denied the first time. Here's your guide to local IOPs, who are very helpful at making sure that you're navigating their system effectively.

Speaker 1: 22:59

What is insurance? What is out of network? I know that sounds so basic, but if you write something as simple as what is out of network and you follow that up with a call to action, you guys know what that is if you've been following me. If you follow that up with a call to action to click the button, we'll answer your questions. Click the button, we will. You can schedule a 10 minute call and I'll walk you through it. Click the button and we'll give you your guide to what to say to your insurance, to find out if you have benefits or not.

Speaker 1: 23:40

I mean, think about your own journey with counseling. How helpful would it have been to have a guide helping you through all of that maze of sometimes very confusing information while you're suffering with this emergency, or even if it's not an emergency. Remember, anxiety goes up, cognition goes down right the things that you forget. If you had a handy guide for people that they could use, imagine you. I would imagine you would have no trouble staying top of mind, right. So here's where the three time increase comes in.

Speaker 1: 24:20

Here's your homework. I want you to identify your client, but I also want you to identify where they are on their journey. Are you looking for a potential client in the thick of an emergency or someone who is just maybe down the road someday? And for the purposes of our experiment, I would like you to pick one. Okay, and then that's homework number one. Number two I want you to Google anything you can think of having to do with that client on that part of their journey. What are the biggest issues parents run into when they're struggling to launch their adult child? Yes, I know that's a huge search term, but who knows what you'll see come up. I was surprised to see the one by AARP, right? But that makes sense because that's the age you're marketing to.

Speaker 1: 25:18

So use the Google machine and then challenge yourself to write five pieces of content. Five pieces of content. Now, there are lots of software companies out there who can help you with keyword optimization. I use WordPress, and so Yoast Y O A S T is the software that I use to help me make sure that my content goes to where I want it to go. But you don't have to have fancy content. If you do simply what I just did, which is Google and then create content and then pepper that content with that search term, and it has to be exact, right? If you say 15 ways or three ways to launch your adult child, then make one heading here are three ways to launch your adult child. When you're using the three ways to launch your adult child, right, you have to use that keyword exactly how it's written. And then finally I don't know if I'm on three or on four please make sure you have a call to action and attend to it. Don't just say click the button, sign up for the email and then never send an email, right, make sure that you're having them. Click the button so that it connects to you, because that's really what it comes down to is connecting with you.

Speaker 1: 26:39

All right, I'm Dr Kate Walker. Thank you for watching. I'm going to hit the record button and I'm going to answer questions. The record button to stop the recording. But here we go. I'm going to hit pause and let me, because you found your way to the group and that's half the battle. So I'm going to go ahead and show you where to find it in the group and we are back recording again, just so that it's there. So if you're looking at the step it up on Facebook, there is a post that is pinned that shows you how to do that. So you're just going to go to your Kate Walker training profile. There we go.

Speaker 1: 27:38

You click the start here, step it up tools, and you scroll down where it says click this. First there are the links the links to the Facebook group, the link to the zoom, because I don't post the zoom in the Facebook group, because we do have people in the Facebook group who you know, because we're not too great at cleaning out the Facebook group. But you're able to join by going into your start here and let's see I'm pointing. You guys can't see that, but it does have the link right there you can join. So that's what was throwing me off, because when it says start here, I said well, I'm not starting, so I didn't even click that, like you know. So that's good feedback for me. No, thank you, I can put it in a different place. That is too easy to do. Thank you, all right, that was helpful. No, good information, as usual, and the limitation these are if they dial again. These services are not my thing.