171 Sticky vs. Shiny Marketing: How to Build a Caseload That Actually Lasts

Most therapists don’t struggle with marketing because they’re doing it wrong—they struggle because they’re exhausted. In this episode, I break down the difference between shiny marketing (the tactics that look good but burn you out) and sticky marketing (the strategies that actually build trust, referrals, and consistent caseloads).

We talk about why chasing algorithms, keywords, and trends often leads to panic posting and random visibility—and how to shift toward a relationship-based approach that works even when you’re busy. If you’ve ever felt pressured to “do more content” or worried you can’t compete with billion-dollar platforms, this episode will help you reset your strategy without adding more to your plate.

In this episode, I cover:

• Why shiny marketing plays on burnout—and how sticky marketing builds trust instead of stress
• The KPIs that actually matter for filling your caseload (and where most marketing breaks down)
• How opt-ins, simple resources, and community reduce no-shows and buyer mismatch
• Why one focused lead magnet and one ideal client beats doing “all the things” every time

If you’re tired of marketing that fizzles out as soon as your schedule fills—or you want a more predictable, values-aligned way to grow—this episode will help you build a plan that works with your energy, not against it.

For therapists who want clearer systems and less friction, this month’s Paperwork Essential Starter Kit gives you practical tools to streamline intake, documentation, and onboarding. And inside the Step It Up Membership, we go deeper into building opt-ins, content pillars, and marketing systems you can actually sustain long-term.

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.

Chapters

• 0:00 Tired Of Shiny Marketing
• 0:32 Sticky Vs Shiny Defined
• 2:24 KPIs That Predict Booked Sessions
• 4:18 Lead Magnets And Email Lists
• 6:24 Random Posting And Panic Visibility
• 9:30 Why SEO Alone Falls Short
• 12:01 Reduce Friction And Build Trust
• 12:56 Listener Bonus: Paperwork Power Hour Pack
• 14:12 Opt‑Ins, Content Pillars, And Nurture
• 16:48 Repurpose Content And Plan Q1
• 18:16 Choose One Niche And One Opt‑In
• 20:47 CTA Reminder And Closing

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:00

This does not mean you're bad at marketing. It just means you're tired. Shiny marketing plays on people who are tired.

SPEAKER_00: 0:18

Welcome to the Hamas Therapist Building Practices of the Working Smart.

SPEAKER_01: 0:32

Today we're untangling sticky marketing, the strategies that build trust and sustain your practice from shiny marketing, otherwise known as the tactics that look good but fizzle out faster than a New Year's gym membership. If you're ready to stop chasing algorithms and start building something that lasts, this one's for you. And don't forget, January's bonus is waiting for you at KateWalkertraining.com slash bonus. Now let's get to work. Hey there, welcome to your pre-recorded Tuesday training. I'm really glad I got to get this out to you guys before the new year. And I promise, I know your brains are fried. You don't need another project, you don't need to learn a new thing. But today the topic is sticky versus shiny marketing. And this is a game changer. If you've noticed your client load is dropping, if you are worried you're competing against companies that are using, you know, like Headway and Alma and all the things, they have billion-dollar marketing budgets. And you just want to steady caseload so that you can make a living. And it can be very overwhelming when somebody like me comes along and says, hey, I've got this new way of doing things. So first of all, it's not new. You're going to understand it. And when I start talking about it, you're going to, you know, have bells going off. You're going to recognize this. It's going to make you think, oh no, one more thing. But I my goal is that you lead this training, and this is only going to be about 15 minutes long, understanding what we're going to cover in December and January to get this thing going, to get your client load up. And remember our KPIs, key performance indicators, right? We want to increase the number of contacts. So whether that's phone calls or texts or emails, and you know me, I love phone calls. Then we want to increase the number of connections. So that's not the phone tag. That's not 14 emails back and forth trying to settle on a time. This is an actual connection that you make with the potential client. Our third KPI is going to be a booked first appointment. And then our fourth KPI is an actual show up to that first appointment. I just read something today in the social media world where somebody was posting, I can't get people to show up for their first appointment. We talk and then I they book, but they don't show up. So what that tells me, it's a mismatch. It's a buyer mismatch, right? It's like you're trying to sell a Lamborghini to someone who needs a minivan, right? You have to have a conversation to make sure that you are setting expectations and that your potential client understands what they're going to receive from you, that it starts with them liking you, knowing you, and trusting you. And so one of the things I want to talk about that uh it's a new term for many of you. It's called a lead magnet. A lead magnet means something that's going to magnetize or attract a lead, which is your potential client. All right. So here's what you may be doing now. And I'm reading notes. You're posting when you feel guilty. So maybe you have an Instagram or a blog or a TikTok and you just kind of like, oh my gosh, I really should do a thing today. And then you post, and it's like throwing rocks off the rim of the Grand Canyon, right? You just never hear back. You're trying to be everywhere, but not consistently. I mean, you heard what I said a second ago. If you have a blog and Instagram and TikTok, that's that's pretty wide. That's pretty varied because people who read blogs aren't necessarily on TikTok or Instagram. You're relying on trends, cute videos, or Canva roulette. So a Canva may be another thing you you aren't familiar with. It's super fun. C-A-N-V-A, and that's creating thumbnails or creating images to go with your blogs in your Instagram. And so if you're out there trying all the things, that's random posting syndrome. All right, we're gonna diagnose that. The next thing is panic visibility. You're posting during slow weeks, but you disappear when things pick up, right? You think of a farmer, right? If you're going to plant seeds and you're only going to plant seeds when you're hungry, well, that's not gonna work because you're sowing things that won't bear fruit for months and months and months. You don't know what the world is gonna be like in six months. So with your practice, you have to be consistent and carve out time. Can't emphasize that enough. You think the problem is I just need more content. Well, you probably don't. You're Googling strategies that you aren't interested in following. I mean, I don't do TikTok at all. So for me to Google what TikTok dance should I do today, it wouldn't work for me because I would give it up. I don't even like Instagram that much, but sometimes, and I actually fall a victim to this. I do kind of the sporadic Instagram posting, but that's another story. I have a strategy for that. Also, funnel FOMO. This is you buying a course that you never open. I don't know how many people purchase even our courses and they don't finish. So having that, oh my gosh, I have to do this, I have to buy this, I have to learn this, and thinking it's just gonna magically happen and it never does. So this does not mean you're bad in marketing. It just means you're tired. Shiny marketing plays on people who are tired. So shiny marketing is SEO. It's chasing keywords, it's chasing page views. And if I'm speaking, it sounds like I'm speaking another language, just hang on. I promise it'll become clearer. So search engine optimization means you want the search engines to find you. In order to find you, you must be shiny. And so a lot of people invest time in search engine optimization or finding out which keywords people are looking for. For example, restaurants near me, Thai restaurants near me, Thai restaurants that serve vegan food near me. So these types of phrases, people spend lots and lots of time trying to make sure that that puts them on page one, right? They try to be super shiny. I'm gonna put Thai restaurant, vegan restaurant near, you know, Lampass's Texas, and I'm gonna put that on my website. And that way, when Google comes and it searches my website, it's gonna find those terms. Okay, it finds it, but then what? It posts me on page one, page two, and then I'm still thinking shiny, right? Is my website pretty enough? Are my graphics, you know, fancy enough? Am I using a good font? Are things, you know, all of those things that make you stand out in the crowd? Sticky marketing, on the other hand, is about opt-ins, creating community and content that converts potential clients into actual clients. And so we're gonna talk about things like an email list or an opt-in so people get a free resource in exchange for their email. And you're warming up your audience, you're warming up the people who are attracted to your shininess. We're not gonna give up shiny. They're attracted to your shininess, but they want to stick around and find out more about you, right? So the shiny is like seeing somebody over there, and you're like, oh, hey, that's they're kind of interesting. But you want to get to know them, to like them, and then to trust them if you're going to interact with them or purchase something like counseling from them. So what you're probably doing now are, like I mentioned before, you're blogging, you're kind of doing that scattersh approach, you know, maybe doing a lot of things when client load is low, but then not so much when client load is high. And you're thinking, well, if I'm just on page one, that's all I need. In fact, I was talking with a colleague of mine, and they said, my website has really good SEO, and that's great, but that's not enough. And she was really doing a great job of building community. She had opt-ins, she did webinars, she did trainings, she did all kinds of things. But you are a counselor, you're trying to get your clients to come in. So if you have something that you think you can just kind of set it and forget it, like being shiny, or you have a blog, or you have a website, or you maybe even rank for a certain keyword. So maybe you live in an area where if I search for counselors who help preteens struggling with grief in Frisco, Texas, you come up like number three. That's great. But if you are not collecting emails, if you're not nurturing those people attracted to your wonderful shininess, they're going to visit your site and then they're going to leave. Okay. When you go to a site for a thing, and you know, my favorite example is always the dentist. If you go to a site because your tooth hurts and you can't click a button and make an appointment, or click a button and make a phone call, you're going to keep looking for a site. It's called friction. What we're trying to do is reduce the friction people encounter when they're trying to get to know you. So, what sticky marketing actually is, it's a relationship. You're building a relationship, not a therapeutic one, not a counseling relationship with these folks who are your potential clients, or they're going to become your fans, right? You're not for everybody. Everybody's not for you, but you're going to conceptualize this website. This is your website, where even if people don't book an appointment with you, they are just amazed by the resources they can get. And what does everybody like to do? Everybody wants to help other people, right? So if they're coming to your website and thinking, wow, this isn't for me, but man, this could really help my neighbor Judy, who's struggling with a similar issue with her kiddo. I think I'm going to tell Judy about this website. So this person who's visiting your website, it doesn't fit what they need. They can go become the hero in their story because they're going to be able to refer you, the amazing resource that is you, to friends and family. Quick break. If you've been meaning to clean up your paperwork for oh the past six months, here's your easy button for January. This month's free listener bonus is the paperwork power hour pack. And it includes an updated intake packet checklist, a clean 2026 Ready Soap Note template, a social media policy you can drop straight into your client consent paperwork, and a mini onboarding checklist for new employees or contractors. It's everything you need to tighten up your systems without spending an entire weekend buried in forms. Grab it at KateWalkertraining.com slash bonus and give your practice a smart start to the new year. So that's why sticky marketing is so powerful and be can become a game changer for your practice, right? You can holler out at a chamber of commerce meetings, hey, be sure to tell your friends about me, right? And everybody's like, I don't even want to think about counseling. I'm trying to sell my own business. Or you can create a website that has resources that people stick around, and then they can go become the heroes in their own stories with their friends and family, or they can book with you. And because they like, know, and trust you and they've gotten to know the resources on your site, you're not going to have that mismatch we talked about before, right? They're not going to just go and click and then find out, oh my goodness, I booked an appointment, but the more I read, this isn't really my person at all. And this person over here who's doing sticky marketing, they offered me a downloadable resource. They offered me a 10-minute consultation. They posted a video about this issue in December. I really feel like this person sees me. I feel like they get me. I feel like I'm connecting with them and I haven't even met them yet. That's the power of sticky marketing. So we talk about opt-ins, and I'm going to show Step It Up members, you guys, how to build an opt-in really super easy in a couple of weeks, Durig or Step It Up Coaching. And it's a way to collect emails. And I know for a lot of you that's like a punch in the gut. You're like, Kate, I don't want to manage emails. It's okay. I'm going to walk you through that because we're going to use something called content pillars, right? So if I've got an email list, those people are opting in because they want to. They want more of me. And so I'm going to give them more of me through my content. So we'll talk about content pillars. And it makes it really easy to map out a year. If you did one newsletter a year, 12 newsletters to these people who already want more of you, and you're going to help them with this issue. And, you know, you may be thinking, and I get asked this all the time. Well, if I give them resources, they're not going to book with me. Is that ever the case? Have you ever gotten a resource from somebody and you didn't want more of them? You didn't want to buy their book. You didn't want to go see them speak somewhere. Well, this is similar, not the same, but it's similar because these folks are, they're in a shopping mood, right? They're searching for counselors, which means they want to book with a counselor. All right. So they're in your, we call it a funnel. I know people don't like that term, but they're in your funnel. And when they click that button and honor you by giving you their email, you need to give them something in return. And when we talk about the content pillars and building opt-ins, I can tell you what way what day we're doing that. We're going to do that. We're going to talk more about what exactly folks can get from you so that they are going to either book an appointment or they're going to share this resource with family and friends and they're going to book with you. So we've got shiny marketing, which is, hey, Google, here I am, look at me. And Sticky, which is, you know, I've got a little community going over here. And we are just helping each other out. We're helping our friends and families out. And there's an opportunity to book with me. And these folks are more likely to take that step than people just kind of walking by and going, hey, yeah, that's a great website. Oh, so glad you're in the Frisco area, right? That's not a warm lead. All right. So we're going to talk about blogs, repurposing content. We're not going to throw away anything you've already done. I know this is December. This is about making a plan. You guys are going to be busy and you need some downtime. I don't know why I do. I mean, that's one of the reasons I'm not doing the training today, is because I'm taking care of some medical stuff that I needed to do. It's this time of year can get super crazy. So all we're doing is laying out a plan so that in January, Q1, first quarter, you can hit the ground running. So we'll pick a lead magnet, one lead magnet, not five. It could be a checklist, like a PDF of five things you can do to get your kindergartner ready for school. Or let's see, what's coming up in January and February? Valentine's Day. Okay, that's always a good one. What you can do when your preteen is, gosh, there's so many things with preteens. Junior high, Valentine's Day, school dance, lots of stuff to pick from there. But we'll come up with content that could fit throughout the year and fits what you feel like you're able to do. But here's the thing, and you can go back and listen to other trainings about this. I'm also going to tell you this thing that you like to do may not be the thing that people are looking for. And I get asked all the time, can I do two things? Can I do three things? Can I have four opt-ins, five opt-ins? Because I like grief and I like kids and I like couples and I like no. We're going to pick one thing and one opt-in. In marketing, we often do something called an A B test. And that's basically, does it work? If it doesn't work, well, you got to try something else and you have to do it quickly. Right. That's why if you're doing a blog that's been maybe a blog that's been sitting there for four or five years and it's kind of stale, it's probably not doing anything anymore or not what you think it is. So we're going to be very, very mindful about how these opt-ins are doing and if it's bringing in clients that meet our KPIs. Are they contacting you? Are you connecting with them? Are they booking the first appointment? And are they following through and actually showing up? So we'll dive in deeper in a couple of weeks. We'll talk about how you can do a schedule that works for you. So, you know, there is no hard and fast rule. It's not like, well, if you don't do four emails a week, you're gonna miss out. That's not it. You can do very, very, very well if you have one opt-in and maybe two or three resources and one blog post a month, maybe something like that. So I want you to think small. And what I would challenge you to do is to think about okay, of all the clients that I see, who do I enjoy? Who is a good stream of income? And this one I'm really going to push you on. Fits into my schedule best. All right. So if you right now you feel trapped because you have to work from 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. because that's when your clients are, but you really wish that you could work from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Well, start to brainstorm about what clients could have that kind of flexibility. All right. So I want you to think in terms of one opt-in and one type of potential client. That doesn't mean we're going to throw the rest out with the bathwater. It's just a way to get focused and start to prep yourself for getting this thing ready to go and hit the ground running. Before you head out, a quick reminder. This month's free bonus for podcast listeners is the paperwork power hour pack. If you want your intake forms, soap notes, and supervision paperwork to stop being the slowest part of your day, this bundle will get you there fast. You can grab it at KateWalkertraining.com/slash bonus. It's free for January and built to make your practice run smoother without adding more to your plate. Thanks for spending part of your week with me. I'll see you in the next episode. If you love today's episode, be sure to leave a five-star review. It helps other badass therapists find the show and build practices that thrive. Big thanks to Ridgely Walker for our original fun facts and podcast intro, and to Carl Guyanella for editing this episode and making us sound amazing. See you next week.