Today on the podcast, I’m talking with Joanna Sapir, a business coach who helps wellness practitioners streamline their businesses to achieve predictable income.
Joanna’s expertise is rooted in decades of experience, including founding and selling a successful brick-and-mortar fitness business and her background as a teacher.
Her goals are to help practitioners step into leadership, implement sustainable systems, and make a bigger impact in their communities.
In today’s episode, we talk about:
- Building your ideal work schedule around your personal life and not the other way around
- Accepting leadership of your business even if you’re a solopreneur
- A reminder that you can shape your business any way you like
- Boundaries and codependency as healthcare providers
- The difference between marketing and sales
- A really helpful tip for more effective networking
- And much more
🎙️ Click to listen to Episode #90: Leadership, Boundaries, and Sustainable Income with Joanna Sapir:
💚 Today’s episode is sponsored by Faire, the online marketplace dedicated to empowering small businesses.
Faire believes the future is local. As more consumers choose to shop small and support their communities, Faire connects small business owners with the best products from over 100,000 unique brands, making it easy to stock your clinic with high-quality, curated products your patients will love—like wellness gifts, skincare, and more.
With millions of products sold each year, Faire gives you access to bestselling products that complement your services and boost your income.
Plus, Faire’s product database is searchable based on what matters most to you, allowing you to find items that are, for instance, not available on Amazon, eco-friendly, handmade, organic, and more. This ensures the retail products you offer align seamlessly with your business philosophy and values.
Subscribe to the Acupuncture Marketing School podcast on Apple Podcasts or Spotify
💖 Love the podcast? Help other acupuncturists find the podcast by leaving a review here.
Transcript:
[MICHELLE GRASEK] (00:00):
Welcome to the Acupuncture Marketing School Podcast. I’m your host, Michelle Grasek, and I’m here to help you get visible in your community, take marketing action with confidence and get more patients in your practice and more money in your pocket every week. We both know you’re a talented, passionate acupuncturist and that acupuncture has the power to change lives. So let’s dive right into this episode and talk about how you can reach more patients.
(00:34):
Welcome back. Today on the podcast I’m thrilled to welcome Joanna Sapir, a seasoned wellness business coach who helps practitioners streamline their businesses to achieve predictable income. Joanna’s expertise is rooted in decades of experience, including founding and selling a successful brick and mortar fitness business, and her background as a teacher and teacher educator. She’s passionate about helping practitioners step into leadership, implement sustainable systems, and make a bigger impact in their communities. In today’s episode, we talk about building your ideal work schedule around your personal life and not the other way around, accepting leadership of your business, even if you’re a solopreneur. A reminder that you can shape your business any way you like, boundaries and codependency as healthcare providers, the difference between marketing and sales, a really helpful tip for more effective networking and more.
[FAIRE] (01:29):
Before we dive in with Joanna, today’s episode is sponsored by Faire Wholesale, the online marketplace dedicated to empowering small businesses. Faire believes the future is local. As more consumers choose to shop small and support their communities, fair connects small business owners with the best products from over a hundred thousand unique brands, making it easy to stock your clinic with high-quality, curated products your patients will love, like wellness gifts, skincare, and much more. Since 2017 Faire has been leveling the playing field for small businesses, helping them compete with big box giants like Walmart and Amazon. With millions of products sold each year, Faire gives you access to bestselling products that compliment your services and boost your income. Plus, their product database is searchable based on what matters most to you, allowing you to find items that are, for instance, not available on Amazon, eco-friendly, handmade, organic, and more. This ensures that the retail products you offer align seamlessly with your business philosophy and values. Click the link in the show notes to learn how Faire can help you strengthen your connection with your patients, grow your practice, and boost your per patient revenue.
[MICHELLE] (02:42):
Alright, let’s dive into this episode with Joanna. Hi, Joanna, how are you?
[JOANNA SAPIR] (02:49):
Good. I’m excited to talk with you again, Michelle.
[MICHELLE] (02:52):
Yeah, thank you so much for coming back for another episode. Do you want to introduce yourself a little bit for the audience, just for the new people before we dive in?
[JOANNA] (03:00):
Sure. So I’m a business strategist and a business coach for wellness practitioners, and I came to this the same way that most practitioners come to business, which is they start their businesses with a passion for the craft, the modality and for helping people, but with no experience running a business. And so I started a strength and conditioning gym 15 years ago now, and had no idea what I was doing on the business front and basically had to hit the ground running and figure it out and had plenty of challenges that I had to work through and just found that I happened to be somebody who really fell in love with the business side of things. And I have to note that that’s my favorite thing to see my clients do is fall in love with the business side of things. So anyway, I figured out and eventually I decided to sell my gym and move just into helping others and coaching others. I had been a teacher for 10 years before, so this really feels like it’s all my world’s wrapped up, I really feel like I’m teaching. Just want to say that part about falling in love with the business side of things. I truly believe that the reason we struggle in business is just because we don’t know how and that you can learn how you can totally learn how, and that really a lot of that process, sure, there are nuts and bolts and step by step and here’s how you do this and here’s how you do this, but really it starts with, and ends with and carries you through, is realizing like, oh, I own a business, so I actually need to be a business owner.
(04:38):
Oh, this is an organization, even if it’s just me and there needs to be somebody leading it and that’s me. I can and want to be the leader of this business and actually like, take it in it, like I get to decide the direction I want to take it in. I get to decide what I want it to look like, what I want it to feel like. You get to decide all of that as the business owner. And usually, when we start our businesses, we just sort of fall into it and are just in the beginning of course, just like trying to get clients and so on. And there’s a gap there, there is nobody leading it. We’re just being the practitioner, just serving the clients day by day, session by session. Anyway, that’s what I think that I help people do, is like step into leadership and learn. I mean, first start by going, what do I want my business to be? What do I want it to be, like how do I want it to, what do I want it to provide for me, for my clients, for my community? And then how do we do that? How do we make that happen?
[MICHELLE] (05:37):
I love that perspective that you can learn to run a business. I tell my marketing clients all the time that they can learn marketing. And I agree with you that the reason we’re so afraid to try is we just feel like we don’t know what we’re doing, and so many of us, I think in the beginning felt like, this isn’t what I signed up for, but, and this is harsh, but it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter. That’s correct. This isn’t what you thought you signed up for when you went to acupuncture school or PT school or opened a gym, whatever it is. But it’s like, here we are, this is what’s happening.
[JOANNA] (06:14):
Right, you didn’t sign up for it and it is what’s happening, and if you don’t take leadership who’s leading, you know—
[MICHELLE] (06:21):
The patients, I think.
[JOANNA] (06:22):
It’s, that’s right. That’s right. Well, it’s more like the, what do they say, the tail wagging the dog? Like you are just following along, putting out fires, leading and stepping in and learning the parts that you don’t know.
[MICHELLE] (06:36):
And so how do you guide your clients through that idea of becoming the leader in their business? Because I think, especially for new grads, it’s a little scary to like, remember, like you are the one who’s supposed to be telling the patients what to do and they don’t get to dictate your schedule, but you also never want to turn anyone away because you feel like you can’t afford to, so how do you help people through that?
[JOANNA] (06:59):
Yeah, I mean, it’s definitely not as simple as just being like, you are the leader, step into leadership.
[MICHELLE] (07:05):
Right, do it.
[JOANNA] (07:06):
But that energy does need to be there. So it’s not like, for example, in my programs with my clients, it’s not like there’s a unit that’s like, okay, now we step into leadership. It’s just more like the big idea behind it all. But as far as the actual steps, I think Michelle, that it really starts with truly turning inward and actually identifying what is it that you really want, what is it that you truly want, what does your heart desire here, and getting honest and into relationship with truly, like why do you have your practice? What is it that you want? And so this could be called goal setting, it could be called vision setting. And I have a particular way that I do it with folks to help elicit good ideas. But I think that that’s number one, where it starts so that provides the structure and the foundation of, okay, well, now I see this is, and again, before I use the phrase, I said how you want to feel, it’s like how do you want your business to look? How do you want it to feel? How do you want to feel? How do you want your clients to feel? It can be things like that that don’t seem so tangible in terms of setting your vision or setting your goals. But then of course, part of that we have, these are businesses. We have businesses in a capitalist society. Like the job of the business is to make money and even to make profit. What do you want the finances to look like? How much do you want to be taking home every single month? How much do you want to be able to put into the business savings every month? What’s the financial vision here? What’s your long-term vision in terms of your exit plan? For younger folks, this can be hard. They’re like, I want to work forever? I’ve, I mean I’ve heard that a lot. Not even younger.
[MICHELLE] (08:59):
Same.
[JOANNA] (08:59):
I’ve heard that a lot. Even I just talked to a guy who is close to what I would consider retirement age. “I’m like, what’s your exit plan? How do you want to leave your business?” He’s like, “I just want to keep working forever.” I’m like, “{Okay, that’s not really a plan.” I also just want to know, you can change your plans at any time, but really starting with what do I think right now? What do I think right now I want this business to be like? I’ll also just note Michelle, that plenty of people set a vision for their business, and this can apply to many aspects of life. I’m sure that anybody who’s been married and divorced could say this, which is, you have a vision for what you want, and then you actually get it and you go, “Oh, this isn’t quite exactly what I thought it was going to be.” And you know you know what, that’s when you reset your vision, that’s when you change it in a different direction and you’re so much wiser for all that you learned to get where you got. This isn’t like setting things in stone, this is how it has to be forever. But it provides the lane, the guardrails for all the other decisions. You were talking about enrolling clients in programs and setting boundaries with clients, et cetera. All of that just falls within the lane of, well, here’s where I’m going because this is what I want to have in my future. This is what I want my business to be like.
[MICHELLE] (10:21):
I do feel like in the beginning, a lot of practitioners think that we want what we were told to want or expected to want. I, in particular, remember thinking, I want it to be really busy in acupuncture. It’s classic to imagine 40 patients a week, one hour per person, that’s “full time.” And then it’s not until, as you said, you arrive there and you realize this isn’t, for some people it’s a great fit, and then for some people, maybe it isn’t. I understood eventually only through the big experiment that I did not have the energy for 40 people a week. And everybody always wants the evening appointments after work. In my best working hours, which also took me a very long time to understand is like 7:30 AM to three o’clock. Like, I can work until six or seven, but definitely not every day of the week. And so I think it is really hard to have those boundaries with patients and feel like you’re, like on Mondays I only work until four, but even though I know there are people who would pay me to stay until six or later. But then I have no energy for the people on Tuesday. But learning to set those boundaries was very difficult and stick to them. And I think we all go through those cycles where we’re like, “Okay, I’m only working until four,” until someone asks me to stay until five and then I’ll stay until five. So how do you help people through that as well? And I know it’s a process. It’s something you get better with practice.
[JOANNA] (12:06):
I love the question. I love the question because to me this, we address all this in my, in my work with clients we address all of this and it really is a step-by-step process. So here’s the thing, that feeling that you’re talking about of, well, I only want to work till four, but if somebody comes along and asks me, like I’ll probably end up squeezing them in, these tendencies, let’s call it that, like tendencies to squeeze clients in and book as many sessions as you can and try to be at 40 sessions a week thing come from two places. Number one, I think the number one place it comes from is the finance and money and the idea like, this is how I make money in my business, book as many sessions as I can. Why would I ever turn that away? All that means is I’m turning away income and I could lose this person and so on. And then a second reason is some codependency stuff that happens. So I’ll address that later, but I just want to start with that money piece and say that it is, I mean, I’ve been on here before and I’ve, I’ve talked about this on podcast before, but the session by session book, as many people as you can model is will forever be one that is going to lead to that burnout that you’re saying you even discovered I can’t work that long in the day. It hurts me. I’m not able to give the way I want to doing that.
(13:35):
So it is, I just think it’s bad business, even though it’s the norm for practitioners across the world, is to sell sessions or packs of sessions. And so here’s what I do with my clients. Number one, I have them, just like I was talking about that vision setting, that goal setting, like what do I want, part of that process is, and this is one of my favorite things to do, is create your ideal schedule. And it’s your ideal life schedule, not just work schedule. And so I actually have people put in, what are the things that you’re not getting to do right now that you wish you could do? Is it a walk every morning with your partner? Is it you get to pick your kids up from school at two o’clock some certain every day of the week or certain days of the week? Do you get to take them to gymnastics? Whatever it is, what are the things? Your own health, oh, I wish I could work out three days a week. Okay, where do you want that to go?
(14:33):
So we put that stuff in to their ideal schedule first. Get that stuff in first. And along with that is what is your ideal work schedule? And so you just said, Michelle, like you figured out here are my prime hours. I’ll just share with you that mine are even, mine’s an even smaller window. So mine’s 9:00 AM to 2:00 PM. And that’s not because I’m like, I want, and that’s four days a week too. That’s not because I’m like, I want a four-day work week, or it’s not like based on anything, but knowing my own energy and rhythms, that’s my prime. That’s when I want to serve people and help people and serve my business. So that’s what I make my hours. And so we create that ideal schedule. And what I have to tell people is, you are not allowed to think of the money right now because I’m going to help you with that afterwards, all right?
(15:27):
So I will just say, even when people are given the freedom to work as little as they want to, we are all like passionate about our services in wellness. All of us. Nobody ever is like, I want to work. Nobody has ever come to me with an ideal schedule that it’s like, I want to work two hours a week and make $20,000 a month. Like nobody, everybody still puts in plenty of hours. And sometimes I have to actually tell people, no, you’ve got four kids. No, let’s cut your hours back a bit. I mean it’s really how we roll. It’s like we’re supposed to work more, but when we get to lean back and go, what truly is my ideal work schedule? So anyway, we create then the ideal work schedule and then within that I actually have the practitioners identify of those hours.
(16:16):
And I love that I get to share this here because it’s shocking for people. So all of you listening just want to say this is shocking, which is that they come with their ideal schedule, or I tell you, get your ideal schedule. You’ve laid out what your work hours are, and then we go, okay, 50% of those, maximum 50% are client facing hours, maximum. So that’s for a solo practitioner who has no help in their business. You Michelle, like have a practitioner that works with you. I’m sure you can attest to this, that the more advanced your business and scaled your business as the owner, your client facing hours actually go down from there. So as a solo practitioner, I say 50%. So then we identify which are those hours, which are the client facing hours, which again goes back to when is my, when’s my best self to serve my clients? When is that for me?
(17:15):
And for some people, they want to lead the business in the morning and see clients in the afternoon. And for some people it’s flipped. And some people it’s mixed-up day to day. Like you can make this day to day, you can have all, two all-client days and two all-leadership days. You get to do it however you want to. So we design that. So that, I just want to say that’s a powerful, empowering, amazing step to do because now you actually have your client hours outlined. It’s not, oh, I just squeeze people in to whatever hours I work, and your work hours are defined. Because now it’s like, okay, well, Thursdays I end at three o’clock because then I go work out or I go for my walk or I go to yoga or whatever it is and then I go, that’s my night that I cook a spread for my family or whatever. Do you know what I mean? You’ve set that up the way you want to.
(18:07):
So then comes the money part. And so what I do, I have a tool called the Profitable Pricing Calculator and I lead people through a whole process where we determine their pricing in order for their business to make the money it needs to provide the paycheck they need and to support the business as needed based on those number of client-facing hours. And I will just say it always, it works out. It always works out. And so then we design their programs and we design the pricing based on that. In other words, their pricing ensures that their business makes everything that they want and need matched up with those hours of their ideal schedule.
[MICHELLE] (18:55):
And I know that you often teach people how to put together these programs so that they aren’t relying on the one treatment for one person at a time model. So can you talk a little bit about that for people who didn’t hear your first interview? Because I just think it’s a new concept for a lot of acupuncturists to sell a program, which is not the same thing as a package.
[JOANNA] (19:17):
I would love to talk about that. Programs are how you get commitment from your clients. It’s how you get them on board and it’s how you provide them better results. It’s also, the side effects of it are you end up with much deeper, more powerful relationships with your clients. You end up with far more referrals because people get incredible results. They’re working with you really, really deeply. It eliminates cancellations and no-shows, you just don’t have people dropping off. And also on that business side of things, it gives you predictable recurring revenue in your business. I really, I highlighted all those non-financial business results of programs first because so many practitioners hear something like this, enrolling a client in a program, so rather than selling sessions as some sleazy business move, and it could not be more different than that. I mean it could not be more, it is so client-centered. This really is about serving your clients so much more deeply.
(20:31):
So the easiest way to try to talk about it for somebody who hasn’t experienced it as either a client or practitioner is to think about how anybody listening who’s been in business has some client or handful of clients that has worked with them for a long time. There always are those favorite loyal, dedicated clients that just come back over and over. It’s even beyond that. That’s what I want to say, is you think about those folks and you’re like, yeah, they’re great. They’re just like always in. It’s even deeper than that because from the beginning somebody is saying, yes, I want to do this deep work that I know is going to take the time commitment and my commitment to the process and I’m all in on this. And you as the practitioner are not just delivering, it’s not just 10 sessions or 12 sessions. Let me get concrete and just say a client program, you get to design it for your ideal clients. And it’s whatever you think people really need. Again, this is not about the money aspect and like getting more money or getting commitment or anything like that. It’s about truly what are the problems that people are coming to you with and what do you believe is the solution they really need.
(21:57):
And so that can look in so many different ways. But I work with quite a few acupuncturists and it’s often you guys get people who have an acute issue going on, or it might be chronic too, but like there’s a problem. They’re not coming for optimize my life or health in the beginning. Usually, there’s something going on. So the front-end program, I call it the front-end program because it’s where people are initially coming to you, the front-end program will usually be addressing that very specific problem. I know you do cosmetic acupuncture, so it might be like acne or something. And so you design this program that is based on getting not just some symptom relief but getting to the root cause and starting to unravel that or treat that or whatever it is. And so your program might be four months long, let’s just say that. I work with all kinds of different folks. So we have people who have programs that are as little as eight weeks. And then I have folks who have six-month and 12-month front end programs. Just really depends on what the services and what they’re addressing in that.
(23:01):
But let’s just go with a 12-week weekly thing. What I want to note going back to this thing where it’s deeper than people who even come to see you every week for 12 weeks, is that from the beginning you are laying out for them what this plan is, what that treatment plan looks like. And that treatment plan isn’t just a, I’m making it up every day as they come. It’s not just 12 sessions. It’s like, here’s the process that I as an acupuncturist want to take somebody through. And you get to with programs. What’s the process I would love to take people through from beginning to end to address the causes that will address these symptoms. Like what’s going on here? And that may, as we talked about in the other episode, that may include some services or some aspects that you don’t provide right now in your office, I think we talked about like nutrition. And I would imagine that that is absolutely an issue with cosmetic acupuncture, right?
[MICHELLE] (24:03):
Oh yeah. I’m thinking especially with acne. If I was designing a beautiful program, we would absolutely have to learn a lot about nutrition and how it impacts the skin and <crosstalk>.
[JOANNA] (24:15):
Yeah, and so just imagine a client that comes and they’re getting the education before saying yes, they’re getting the education around, here’s what’s actually needed to address this and if like, you want to clear up your face, we’re going to do this and this and this, or this is what’s required. You’re going to need to look at this and do this and do this, and here’s how I can help you do that. And when they say yes, they’re all in. They’re like, “Yes, I am totally in on changing my diet and making dietary changes with your help and guidance. I’m totally in on coming in and getting the treatments.” That’s like the easy part because they’re, you know what I mean? Like you’re doing the work, but if there’s other work that they need to do. And so they are so committed because you have educated them, it’s not that people come already committed. It’s because your education process, which actually happens through the sales process that I teach, it’s because you’re showing them this is what’s needed. This is how to address this.
(25:17):
And you’re pointing out to folks, they may have tried a bunch of stuff. They may have tried the latest infomercial, acne pack of products or whatever and maybe it didn’t work. Or maybe they’re wondering, what should I try? And you can even be educating them about here’s what happens when you use that or try that, or here’s why this doesn’t work. Or here’s why this works for the short term and not for the long term or whatever. It’s really educating them on what’s going on and what they need to actually address this issue that they have. So the level of, I don’t like the phrase buy-in, but I think it really works, the level of just buy-in and commitment and understanding is so deep and it’s more than the person who happens to come back every week.
(26:04):
The person who happens to come back every week, they just know they’re being served. They enjoy it. They like you. That’s still different than, oh, we’re on this journey together and here’s where we are in that journey and here’s where we know we’re going long term. And maybe you’ve developed, not you Michelle, but anybody listening, maybe you have ended up developing relationships like that with your most dedicated clients where you guys do have a long-range plan and maybe you are talking about it out loud. Fantastic. Imagine that all of your clients, you’re having that situation with like that depth of services with, and that then you actually put the structures in place in terms of enrolling them in a program where they’re not having to say, I just want to say energetically, because I’ve been the client in this situation many times/ energetically, honestly, it sucks to come in and have to pay every time. There’s something about it. There’s a pain to it every time I have to pull out my credit card, my card or whatever and pay every time versus I am thrilled to just give you my card and say, put me on a monthly payment and I know that out of that I’m getting a weekly visit for the next whatever, four months and yep you charge me every month and I now don’t have to feel that or think about that. I’ve made that commitment, I’ve put that money aside. I’ve said yes. And it’s not dependent on me coming in. I just know, of course I’m coming in and getting what I’m getting.
(27:30):
And the last thing I want to say, I know I’ve just talked for a long time, but the last thing I want to say is I just did, I mentioned this to you before we started recording that I just did an interview with one of my clients who’s an acupuncturist who has implemented all the systems and it’s basically her just sharing what it’s like now, she built her business. And she talks about the difference in the amount of energy she has now, at the end of client sessions. At the end of a workday, she’s like, I have so much more energy now. It’s really amazing because working with clients in this depth gives you more energy for them. You don’t have to do this rebooking thing, you don’t have to spend time taking payment. You don’t have to try to get them in again. It’s all set up already and all of your time with them, your energy is just part of the process of this plan they’re on and taking them further, progressing them in it.
[MICHELLE] (28:37):
So it sounds like most of the programs are on a subscription. So people know in the beginning like the total cost for three months for this program would be, I don’t know, like $2,000. And then it’s divided up month by month. And so it just charges them each month. Okay, I feel like that definitely makes people come in for their appointment if they know that it’s already happening. I think we talked about this in our last session as well, where I can think about all of the things that I would love to teach people about their skin that we really don’t have time for in each session and how useful it would be as part of a program to set up almost like educational modules. Okay, in the first month we’re learning about X, Y, Z and then in month two we’re learning about how hormones impact your skin and then the third month we’re learning about this so that they’ve watched it. And then when they come in they can ask questions if they have them. But it is, as you said, it’s a pathway. It’s a very directed journey that they know where they’re headed.
(29:47):
And even with the structured way that I try to do my cosmetic packages, I still am surprised sometimes about how confused people are about where they are in the journey or what they’re supposed to be doing. And it’s very simple. In the beginning I tell them, you need to increase your protein intake. Here’s how you might do that. You need to man-figure out how to manage your stress. You have to be exercising regularly. And even if I am checking in with them, sometimes they’re still at like week four of five. They’re like, “Oh, am I still doing that?” In a magical perfect world, you would never stop doing this until you die if you want to keep taking good care of your skin and your health. I do think that having even more structure than we think that we have in place would be useful. And whenever we talk, I have these same thoughts in my brain and now I’m like, why haven’t I like shored up those structures that I have experienced over 14 years are just still a little confusing for people.
[JOANNA] (30:51):
Yeah, well, you have the experience to see where people need more support. And then it’s just, it’s a matter of asking, how do I solve for this? How do I provide this support? And there’s not one answer as to how. I just want to note when you’re talking about the education piece around diet, around protein, around whatever the pieces are. And you said watch, like, I just want to note. It doesn’t have to be a video, it might be an audio recording. You can create recordings that people can download on their phone and listen to, like a podcast, whatever. There’s all different ways. And the same is the tracking element. There could be so many different ways to do that of how do I help people actually make this change? It’s really up to you to look at what is that? And of course you can also learn what other people do to create change.
(31:41):
But the other thing I want to say is it is a common error. Ask me how I know, the fire hose effect, to want to give people so much information. And you know, too much is the fire hose versus just drinking out of a garden hose? I can drink water out of a garden hose, but if it’s a fire hose, I just get knocked down. And so we do have to pay attention to, this isn’t about throwing information at people, because the information’s there, the information exists already in the world. So really our job is less about the information, it’s curating the information in a way that’s really just what they need to know in order to help them. And then like how to help them actually implement new habits or changes. So just noting like, it’s not easy, it’s not as simple as I’m just going to stick this in my program. And it’s really looking at what is, how do I want to help somebody do this?
[MICHELLE] (32:43):
I’m definitely a kitchen sink person. I love that you brought that up because even in my online programs, I’m always like, the initial version of a class is too much.
[JOANNA] (32:53):
Totally.
[MICHELLE] (32:54):
And then the way that I understand that it’s too much is when students are like, “I made it 50% of the way through and then I just could never open the class again.” I’m like, “Noted. No problem.” And I do think that we tend to think we have to overdeliver in every way possible. Like that’s why we’re staying late for clients when they ask and that’s why we have poor boundaries that, one of the reasons, and it really is more helpful for people to have, as you said, very specific directed instructions for their situation or experience instead of maybe in the example I gave teaching people about nutrition and how their hormones impact their skin. Maybe younger cosmetic clients are not that interested in learning about how their hormones are impacting them, but people who are approaching perimenopause or menopause, they might have more of an interest, whatever it might be and just dialing in and getting really specific. Because I agree with you, when you dump too many recommendations on patients, they don’t do anything. They’re just overwhelmed. So, and this is something that you are walking your clients through, right? I could come to you and sort of word vomit all of this like I’m doing right now. And then you have a part of your program where you’re helping people sift through what’s most important and how are you going to deliver it?
[JOANNA] (34:22):
Exactly.
[MICHELLE] (34:22):
Is that right? Okay.
[JOANNA] (34:23):
The series of exercises and a series of steps that we do to end up designing the program. And then of course, just to note too, and I did talk about this last time on your podcast, which is how we’re not talking about making some fancy thing with bells and whistles. We’re not talking about an online course that’s DIY and they buy this thing and go do it on their own, this can be your one-on-one clients in your office and you can customize this plan for each person. So you have a basic journey that you take people through. And let’s just say it includes education on nutrition and hormones, and then there’s the acupuncture treatments. Let’s just say that that’s the core. You might have a bunch of, let’s just say these recordings, you might have a bunch of these recordings or maybe they’re handouts.
(35:14):
Let’s just say they’re handouts on nutrition. Well, there’s a lot of aspects of nutrition. There’s protein and there’s this and there’s that. You mentioned protein, which is why I’m mentioning it. But with each individual client, just like you were talking about adolescent versus a woman in perimenopause, you might simply be picking and choosing which pieces of the written curriculum or the education piece that you are delivering to that person. We are just going to be focusing on protein. Perimenopausal woman definitely like protein. We’re just going to be talking about protein, the quality of protein, upping your protein intake, how much, blah, blah, blah. That’s it, for four weeks, we’re just talking protein and the aspects of that and little changes we can make and noting week by week, what’s the commitment that that client might make in their protein intake? And then the next week checking in, what do we notice? Maybe you’ve given them a journal to actually note energy levels or something.
(36:08):
And so maybe with that client you’re never even talking about, I don’t know, cutting out junk food, which might be what you focus on with that adolescent. Do you know what I mean? Or whatever. So I just want to say, this isn’t about this whole packaged thing. In the long run, you will have a whole package thing that you want something to be very easy to be delivered, but it doesn’t mean, as you said, throwing the kitchen sink at somebody. You can really individualize it and it’s still the same container of the treatment plan, if that makes sense. So the treatment plan, let’s just say as you’ve designed it or when people are working with me, they’re designing this container. The container is, again, I’ll go back to the example of four months. The container is four months and the process is X, Y, Z, let’s say it’s acupuncture, nutrition, hormones, but you still can be picking and choosing particular pieces that you’re going to highlight or hone in on with an individual client.
[MICHELLE] (37:13):
And I can see how that would connect with people very deeply to have that container to have, we’re working on X, Y, Z in this portion, and then we’re checking in. They have a journal, or maybe they’re using like a MyFitnessPal app or something where you can actually have an account where you can see your client’s progress sort of thing. And then that really does help people feel connected to you. So not even just like, they’re probably going to get better results because it’s very focused, but they do feel that deeper connection, which is so interesting that I haven’t really thought about it that way before.
[JOANNA] (37:52):
Yeah, I mean this is what I’m trying to explain and always struggle to explain for somebody who hasn’t experienced it, is the depth of connection that you end up with your clients. And yes, as you know, better results, but part of that is because you are serving them so much more powerfully and they are fully invested in that process. Like you are really doing this together.
[MICHELLE] (38:17):
Something that I have noticed maybe in the past year is, and this is because I got Jane, which is electronic medical records, I’m not sure if you’re familiar with it, and you can use templates in Jane that other acupuncturists or PTs, whatever your specialty is that they have used. And so I decided instead of creating my online intake for new patients from scratch, I was going to use one that was very popular already. And one of the questions that this woman had put in her intake was, what are your, as the new patient, what are your expectations of me as a provider, which I had never thought to ask people before. In my brain I’m like, oh, the expectation is acupuncture. Well, people answer that question and they never put acupuncture. They almost always put that they want me to provide a plan of action. They want to be told what to do and what are the expectations? Like what is this process going to look like? And that helped me realize that I have not always been very good at that. In my brain if it’s written somewhere in 12 pages of new patient paperwork, oh, usually it’s six to eight treatments and they’re weekly. That’s the plan. Obviously, that’s what we’re doing, but that, it doesn’t, people want you to tell them and after you have spoken to them and you’ve talked about the details of their experience, then they want you to prescribe them a plan.
[JOANNA] (39:55):
I love that you’re talking about this and I love that you see it. That’s exactly right. That’s exactly right. And I would say I never came back to this issue of codependence around boundaries and so on. And I just want to note that if, for anyone listening, for any of you listening, if you have experienced a client who, or clients who have tried to tell you what to do, direct you expect to be able to get in your schedule whenever they want to, that really is because you haven’t put the lanes in. We can say that it’s because of them. And sure there are some outlier, total jerks. Yes, occasionally there’s a jerk. But let’s just exclude the real outlier, like the true jerk. And for the most part, when clients are weaseling around, it’s because you have no boundaries or guardrails in place, period. And so that’s on you.
(40:55):
But back to this, people want us to prescribe for them. People want us to guide them. People want, they’re coming to us because they don’t know how to solve their problem. And yet as practitioners, we do this thing, and this is the codependency side of, well, what is it that you’re looking for? What is it that you want different than the question you asked of what do you expect of a provider for you, right, of a practitioner? What is it you want? And that’s not their job. We should be asking them what are their goals? What is it that you want in terms of your health? But instead we’re asking them, what do you want? Like what services do you want? And this doesn’t happen so much in acupuncture, but I’ll give the example of a massage therapist. A massage therapist will say, what massage do you want? Do you want deep tissue or do you want Swedish? So just looking at that example, no, that’s not the question to ask the client. The question to ask the client is, what’s going on with you right now? Why are you coming here? What pain are you in? What’s happening? How did that happen? How is that feeling? And then for you as the practitioner to say, well, here’s what I think is needed after doing a proper assessment.
(42:09):
So the codependency aspect is the people pleasing, I’m just supposed to be here and give you what you’re going to say yes to and what you say you want versus what you need. Anyway, I just love that you brought this up, that this is what people want because that is part of the stepping into leadership piece and recognizing the break with codependency is understanding that you are not the one that’s changing people’s lives. They’re the ones. They’re the ones that have the power to change their lives. And you are the guide here. Absolutely, you are here to help, but you’re not the one, this isn’t about you. It’s not yours, it’s theirs. And they need to step into leadership of their own lives and the fact that these people are saying to you, I want a plan, that’s agency on their part. That’s them saying, give me the plan. I want to do the work to follow the plan. And we need to recognize their agency. This is theirs. We can only provide this container, but we can’t make people do these things. And the fuzzy lines happen when we think that somehow, we are the agent of chain for them. We’re not, we’re the guide and we provide this container and that’s what these people are asking for. These people are, that is agency on their part to say that rather than fix me, just fix me.
[MICHELLE] (43:45):
Yeah, I’m always impressed when patients put that. So we talked about this a little bit last time, but could we touch on the difference between marketing and sales? Because I think it’s a new concept for a lot of acupuncturists. We really don’t get much, if any, marketing education in school. It’s just what we can find on the internets.
[JOANNA] (44:06):
Absolutely. It’s a really important concept because They get mushed together a lot. Absolutely. Acupuncturists, practitioners, anybody in business, when they want to grow, they think I need to do more marketing. And so we go out and do more marketing. That might be SEO, that might be networking, that might be social media posting, all of those things. All of those things are marketing. And so I define marketing as visibility. Your visibility. How do you get in front of new eyes? How do you attract an audience? You raise awareness about who you are. You get in front of people, but that doesn’t make clients. And so the mistake that so many of us make is we think that that is getting clients and so we try to sell our services in our marketing, and that’s missing the sales process.
(44:59):
So what happens is we put out, let’s say it’s a social media post saying, book your session, and so that may be the call-to-action is like, here’s the thing, here’s the thing, book your session and trying to sell it there, versus offering invitations for somebody to get into your sales pipeline is what I would, how I would define it. So how the structures, and this is really what I help people put in place, is the systems and structures, so the structures to really break it down, Michelle, are your marketing, again, SEO, social media, networking. Those were the three examples I gave. There could be other things too, but let’s just say any of those attract somebody. So they start following you on Instagram or they land on a blog post on your website or they’re talking to you at a networking meeting.
(45:49):
The next piece that you need is you need a form of lead capture. Capturing a lead means you are getting their contact info. So if we have no, for example on our website, if we have no form of lead capture on our website, somebody that got to us through our SEO optimized blog post, they may read the blog post, disappear and that’s it. We never know that they got there. They might even be like, oh, who is that person? I don’t remember. Do you know what I mean? They might have to try to search their history or whatever. Versus lead capture would be that you have something on your website where somebody can opt in and get something for you. And that’s how they end up on your email list. I know you do email marketing pieces. So this is about capturing them as a lead, in this case, getting them on your email list.
(46:39):
Same with social media. What lead capture do you have? Networking, I will just say a practical tip for anybody that does networking, the standard, I actually hate, hate, hate networking stuff. So like don’t talk to me about it, but I know lots of people use it. One of the things I hate about it is that people think that they’re growing their businesses or doing business development by taking a stack of business cards to some event and handing them out to everybody they know. That is not marketing, that’s not lead generation, handing out your card doesn’t do that. So I just want to know the tip is the next time you get in a conversation with somebody who expresses interest in learning more about what you do in your business, ask for their card and you follow up with them manually. So now you have their contact info and you can follow up with them. Or you might even have an actual lead magnet.
(47:31):
So anyway, I didn’t get to sales yet, Michelle. So the point is that’s what we want our marketing to do. We want our marketing to get us visibility and to capture leads. But the sales process, we don’t want to sell to strangers. We’re not trying to push our services on somebody unless they have a problem that we can solve. So you absolutely want your marketing to speak to those problems that you can solve that people may have. We want the marketing to be about them, what they’re experiencing, that’s not about us, what are they experiencing, and offer them invitations to take a next step. Those invitations might be just to get a free lead magnet, for example, and get on your list. Or the invitation might be directly into your sales pipeline. And for me, in the sales system that I help people build the first invitation is to the free consultation. That’s the first invitation in the sales process. Now that’s free.
(48:31):
And nobody’s going to take that invitation unless they have the pain or problem or goal or desire that you are speaking to and that they feel like you see them and they feel ready. Yes, I want a free consultation. So this would be the main call-to-action on your website, especially for like a brick-and-mortar acupuncture business where somebody is looking for acupuncture. That’s how they get to your website. Maybe they’ve done Google, like a Google Maps or something. They’re going to get to your website and the first thing they see is schedule a free 15-minute phone consultation. Boom. Easy. That’s what I’m going to do. That’s how I learn about these services. That’s how I connect with this person. That’s how I find out what’s going on. Versus I just want to say, what many of us will have is book a first session and that first session might be this whole intake and it’s usually more expensive and that’s a bit of a leap.
(49:30):
I don’t know that you can help me. I don’t know that I’m going to like you. I don’t know that, you know what I mean, like, okay, I’m spending what, 250 bucks on this assessment thing and it’s like a leap of faith. I’m not really sure you’re the one for me. Do you know what I mean? But a free 15-minute phone consultation, heck yeah, I get to talk to you. And so in the process that I teach that 15-minute phone consultation, you are not making a sale. You are not enrolling somebody in your program. You are actually just qualifying them. And that means you are determining is this person the right person for me? Is this person, does this person have the problems or goals that I really can’t help? And so part of this like stepping into leadership process is also recognizing when somebody is just outside of your scope or maybe not a personality fit or has problems that you have a, you know a practitioner in the same town that would be perfect for them and you are not.
(50:33):
This is really you knowing, and this is a process I take practitioners through, because I know that you come out of acupuncture school believing that you should help everyone. And if you have a problem that you don’t necessarily have experience with, you’re going to go research it. I know that that’s the training. But this is really, this process involves ahead of time getting pretty clear on who are the people that I love working with and that I can serve the most powerfully, who do I love working with and really see the best results for my services so that you can build your business around them. And so this prequalification, this phone call is about making sure they’re in the ballpark and is this somebody I can help, and then making sure that they are ready to do what your program would entail.
(51:25):
And again, it’s not like a hard filter. This is not where you’re enrolling people, it’s just making sure that they are the right person to invite to your in-person assessment, which is also free. That’s what I want to note. This is how you’re determining who to invite to come in for that in-person assessment and consultation. And it’s a system that really works. And I just want to note, a lot of people say, why should that be free? I’m charging money for that right now. In fact, many practitioners charge more money for that first in-person assessment. But when I mentioned before that we’re talking about conversion rates into your full in-depth program is 80%, 80 to a 100%, it just becomes completely worth it. This isn’t giving away your services. This is, as I said, people walk away from this consultation feeling so seen and heard. And even for the one in five people that might not enroll, they’re walking away with a really valuable, powerful experience with you. They’ll end up referring clients to you even. Just want to note that, that a lot of folks feel like it’s, why would I do that for free? You do it for free because you’re actually building deep relationships and getting more commitment from clients through that process.
[MICHELLE] (52:45):
And I would imagine that ultimately the cost of your time for the assessment is rolled into the cost of the program overall. Just like you can price your program in a way that it feels like, okay, I am ultimately getting paid for that time anyway, it’s just part of the process.
[JOANNA] (53:05):
Absolutely, absolutely. And remember back when I talked about the setting your ideal schedule and how I said get ready for this, 50% of your working hours are client facing hours and the other 50% are leading your business, well, your free consultation times both the phone calls and the in-person assessments that is part of that 50% of leading the business because that’s sales. That’s not client facing hours. Even though you’re talking to a prospective client who’s going to become a client that’s you leading your business and that’s sales. So that there’s marketing time, there’s sales time, there’s financial management time, there’s all that piece. This is sales time. That’s not those client facing hours that’s in that other 50%. And yes, you set times where that’s what you’re doing is enrolling clients. You’re doing these assessment consultations and enrolling clients.
[MICHELLE] (53:58):
One way that I love to think about sales versus marketing is this idea of, you know, how people will launch something like an eBook or program and then they’re just like, “Hey, I made a thing. Do you want to buy it?” Like that’s basically what their Facebook posts will be.
[JOANNA] (54:15):
Yes, yes.
[MICHELLE] (54:16):
It’s like, no lead up, no nurturing you. I always think of marketing as visibility and nurturing, which I think I saw on your website very recently in your blog posts. So no nurturing whatsoever. That’s like going on a first date with someone and the person’s like, “Hey, you want to get married?” And you’re like, “Whoa, wow. Maybe tell me something about yourself. Buy me dinner first.”
[JOANNA] (54:38):
Yes
[MICHELLE] (54:38):
Before you dive in. And so I think it’s helpful for people to think of marketing versus sales in that way because They don’t like marketing, but they’re thinking that it’s sales and it’s like marketing is this whole process of nurturing people and building trust and letting them get to know you and decide if they do want to like join your email list or get on a consultation. But then even as you said, the sales part doesn’t have to be gross either. It’s like a screening process, either you’re a good fit or you’re not and now you feel deeply connected to me or you don’t. Either outcome is fine.
[JOANNA] (55:14):
Yes, yes. Either outcome is fine. Such an important piece of it and letting go of that codependency thing or the money I’m supposed to be taking everybody, no, make your space for the most aligned clients that you can serve at these really deep levels and you will be a happier practitioner and you’ll have a more profitable practice.
[MICHELLE] (55:37):
Yeah, absolutely. I have one last question for you, which you answered last time, but I know that people’s answer change all the time. And so what is your definition of success?
[JOANNA] (55:50):
Yes. Well, I didn’t go re-listen to what I said, but I know what it is, but I think it actually, I can elaborate on it. My definition of success is definitely that you, I, we get to live the life we want to live. I get to structure my life as I want. So the success of my business for me is about I get to structure my schedule the way I want to. I get to have the money that I need and want. I have this like freedom and power in my business to even adjust, to make, to change, to do whatever I want to really. And so I mentioned to you, Michelle, when we first got on, but I haven’t said it on the podcast that I just moved to Mexico. And so in my case, I don’t have a brick-and-mortar business, it’s online, so that gave me that freedom, but that’s success to me, is the freedom to make adjustments in my life, in this case, absolutely adjustments in my schedule, how I work with folks. I think that that’s success, is that you get to live your life as you want to in terms of your schedule and your money.
[MICHELLE] (56:56):
Mm-hmm, amazing. And congrats on your move to Mexico. That is huge.
[JOANNA] (57:00):
Yeah, thanks.
[MICHELLE] (57:02):
Well, thank you again so, so much for being here and sharing so many thoughts with us. I really appreciate it. Where can everyone find you online? Where can they connect with you?
[JOANNA] (57:12):
So my website is joannasapir.com. Let me see, I have a free gift for your folks, can I share that?
[MICHELLE] (57:18):
Oh yeah, absolutely.
[JOANNA] (57:19):
I have a free handout for you, three of the most powerful systems that I help practitioners build in their businesses and it’s a whole layout of exactly what that would look like in your business. So you can see these handouts and you could even build them in your business to yourself if you already have help to do that. You could find that at joannasapir.com/marketingschool, and maybe you can put that link in the show notes.
[MICHELLE] (57:45):
Absolutely.
[JOANNA] (57:45):
And the other thing is just that I have a podcast as well, the Business (R)evolution for Practitioners with Joanna Sapir. And I don’t know when this episode is being released, but I just did two different interviews with acupuncturists. So anybody listening, you might be interested in hearing those with clients of mine that are acupuncturists.
[MICHELLE] (58:04):
Amazing. Yeah, we will put all of those links in the show notes just so everyone can find them easily. Thank you again.
[JOANNA] (58:10):
Yeah, thank you Michelle.
[MICHELLE] (58:14):
Thanks so much for being here. Don’t forget to check out today’s sponsor, Faire Wholesale. They have a huge range of products so you can offer your patients that are aligned with your values and can increase your bottom line. And on first time orders, they offer a 60-day return period. So if you buy something and you feel like it’s not selling as well as you thought, you can return it and get your money back. This is pretty amazing. Their goal is to reduce your risk and basically doing a retail experiment at your office. So I hope you’ll take a look. The link is in the show notes so you can browse their products and learn more. Have a great week and I’ll talk to you soon.