[JOE SANOK]
This is the Practice of the Practice podcast with Joe Sanok, bonus episode.

I’m Joe Sanok, your host, and welcome to the Practice of the Practice podcast. I am so glad that you are here today. We are doing another Ask Joe show. We’re doing these, for a little bit we’ve been doing it two days a week. We’re doing at least one day a week. We have an awesome series coming up that Alison and Whitney are doing all about why it is a great idea to start a group practice in 2022. So that starts on Tuesday February 17th. They’re going to be doing all sorts of teaching as well as live interviews with people that have lived out group practice. So make sure you tune in for that. They are going to be doing a nine-part podcast takeover throughout the end of February, early March. It’s a pretty awesome series coming up. We’ve got a lot of great series coming up that have some themes.

Today, for this question, Regina Isaias wants to know how to branch out of direct client work. How do you bring out of direct client work? So I totally get this. I remember as I started to realize that I was loving Practice of the Practice, I was not enjoying doing as much of the client work as I had wanted to, or as I had in the past. So a couple ways to start to branch out of direct work is first, I mean, starting a group practice is a great way to build some momentum without having to maybe start a brand new product. Hold on. I need a little sip of water here.

A group practice is a great way to monetize something that’s already working. I mean, people are already calling your clinic, they’re already calling your practice. There’s so many different ways to do that. So whether it’s Group Practice Launch, or doing it yourself, we have a lot of supports in helping you to start a group practice. I would say that’s one big step that you can take. Even if you’re just hiring a couple people that work evenings or work on the weekend, you don’t necessarily have to upgrade your office right away just to make it work. You can do it in so many different scalable ways.

I would say another mindset is thinking about what I’ve heard called either the hamburger approach or the sandwich approach, and thinking about your clinical work as being the middle of the sandwich. Before that, what are people that maybe aren’t ready for therapy willing to purchase or be a part of? Maybe it could be some sort of workbook, e-course or thing to help couples before they need to come in and work with you one on one. Maybe it’s a self assessment, maybe it’s an e-course, a membership community. Maybe it’s something that you do just in your community. That’s a little bit more scalable.

Then on the other side, when people are done doing the work with you, what would that look like to have some sort of maintenance program, whether that’s through e-courses or membership communities or podcasts or check-ins. Technology has helped in so many different ways that even creating a software-as-a-service that can help people check in is a wonderful way of just helping you get to the next level financially, but also helping serve people in that line.
[GUSTO]
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[JOE SANOK]
Another way that I would say you can build multiple streams of income is looking at growing your audience in a variety of different ways. That’s what we’re doing with Audience Building Academy, audiencebuilding.academy, and it’s really amazing to see how people first figure out their specialty then they really start to build that audience. That can be through a podcast or are doing free summits, or you can be doing some webinars. You can be doing just live teachings through Facebook Live or Instagram Lives. There’s a lot of different ways that you can build that audience.

Offering a free email course or extra content that people say, “Holy cow, I can’t believe this is free,” helps you continue to build that authority. Then really finding yourself going into more media. So using Help A Reporter Out to get those “as seen on” so that you can get quoted in different magazines, in different areas, that you can be seen as an authority in a variety of areas, doing some keynote speeches and really educating yourself beyond the average clinician in person, in whatever particular area you are in.

Then if we continue to look at that trajectory as you grow your particular specialty area and you grow that audience, that audience is going to tell you what they want. That’s how we launched Audience Building Academy. At the time of this recording, we’re testing that out to see if it’s a good fit, to see if we have enough people that are really into it. From our initial launch, with the Thursday is the New Friday group, it went really well. So I’m super excited about that. We’re going to see how it goes with our Next Level Practice people and with other folks. Then at the time of this recording, I’m still launching it to a broader community. By the time this actually airs we’ll know.

But the thing is when you have a new product you test it, you do your best, you listen to people, you reflect back what they say that they want to buy at the price point they say that they’re willing to buy. Then you put it out there. Do people actually buy it? If, for example, with Audience Building Academy, if we don’t get enough people in this round well, we’ll re-tool. We’ll say, well, what is it that we missed the mark on? Where did we maybe not nail what people wanted? Or maybe people said they wanted something and would pay for something and they didn’t. That’s okay. I don’t need to have a bunch of ego wrapped up in it that, “Oh, I failed. I didn’t do something,” or, “Ooh, look, I succeeded. It’s amazing. It’s sold out.”

Either way I’m testing it. I’m saying, is there overlap between what you want for your support with audience building at a price that you think is reasonable, that it’s a heck yes, that’s a no brainer? Can my team and my self do that at that price and make money, make it worth it for us? Is there an overlap there? If you say I want to have all this amazing support and I would only pay $12 a month for it, the amount of people I would need to have that say yes to that is just too many. It would take too much effort. There’s no overlap between what my team can do at a price point that we would need and what maybe you want and can afford.

So there’s a gap. We don’t need to get all worked up over it and have our ego feel like, oh shoot, I’m such a failure. We’re all perfectionistic. I want to do it right. No, there’s a gap there. Then we just seek ways to find overlap and to show that there’s value in it and that the things that we can teach and that we can show and the outcomes that you can get at the price point you want, those overlap. So really that’s what you’re looking for. You’re looking for that overlap between what customers want, what they’re willing to pay for and what you can offer and what you need to get paid.

That’s, what’s is. Sales is where that overlap is, where on one side, somebody’s saying, this is exactly what I want. It’s a heck, yes, and that’s totally what I need, or it’s close enough to what I need. You’re saying, “Hey, I’m providing that service. The amount that I’m getting paid for that is worth it.” That overlap is where we find that sweet spot.

So pretty awesome stuff we’re covering here. We are continuing to help you level up here at Practice of the Practice. It’s really exciting to just be able to be hanging out with you in all these different ways. And just, I don’t know, it is really fun to do this work.

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Thanks for letting me into your ears and into your brain. Have a great day. I’ll talk to you soon.

Special thanks to the band Silence is Sexy for your intro music. We really like it. And this podcast is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regard to the subject matter covered. This is given with the understanding that neither the host, the publisher, or the guests are rendering legal, accounting, clinical, or other professional information. If you want a professional, you should find one.