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How can you expand your therapeutic services beyond the counselling room to serve your clients? Have you had a great creative idea that you want to try to use to supplement your therapy? If these apply to you, where should you start?
In this podcast episode, Joe Sanok answers the question, “Should I start a program in the mental health space?” with Annie Schuessler.
Podcast Sponsor: Alma
As a clinician, you probably chose this field because you wanted to support people in navigating challenges and finding personal growth. But many mental health care providers end up spending almost as much time on billing, insurance, and other documentation as you do in sessions with clients.
That’s where Alma can help.
Alma supports clinicians in building rewarding private practices—with simplified insurance credentialing in under 45 days, enhanced reimbursement rates, and guaranteed two-week payback.
Plus, a free profile in their searchable, filterable directory—making it easy for clients who are the right fit for your practice to find you.
Learn more about how Alma could support you in building a thriving private practice at helloalma.com/joe.
Meet Annie Schuessler
Annie Schuessler is a business coach, former therapist, and host of the Rebel Therapist® Podcast.
With over two decades of experience in the mental health field, Annie now helps therapists, coaches, and healers design and launch signature programs that generate income beyond one-on-one sessions. Through her program Create Your Program, she guides clients in developing offers like courses, groups, and retreats—so they can scale their impact without burning out.
Annie’s coaching centers around clarity, creativity, and purpose. She believes the work therapists want to do—the thing they wish existed—is often the key to building meaningful, sustainable income streams. Her approach helps clinicians step into innovation without sacrificing their values or well-being.
Visit the Rebel Therapist, listen to the podcast, and connect on Instagram and LinkedIn.
In This Podcast
- How Annie helps therapists go beyond their practices
- Consider the opportunities that await you
- Thinking through your program process
- Annie’s advice to private practitioners
How Annie helps therapists go beyond their practices
05:20 – 05:43 I was a therapist for a long time before I started being a business coach for therapists, and I started helping people with their private practices. Then, after a few years, I discovered that the projects I was most excited about were the ones where people were saying, “Okay, I want to build this other thing!” (Annie Schuessler)
Within her entire audience and niche, Annie was most excited about working with therapists who were inspired and curious about starting new streams of income by offering new outlets for their therapeutic services.
Annie was inspired and excited to work with the therapists who wanted to start programs, groups, retreats, courses, and so many other methods of expanding and extending their therapy services beyond the physical private practice.
I [also] really love doubling or tripling down on one thing and, you know, creating a process around it … And then I get to work with people who are outside-the-box thinkers, innovators, who are drawn to trying something different. (Annie Schuessler)
Of course, launching or offering something different to therapy isn’t any better or worse than standard therapy, but it is just another way for you to make the best use of your gifts and passions to assist your clients.
Consider the opportunities that await you
I wish I had known this [earlier], that you can take your therapy skills and if you are feeling like private practice is a great fit and you just want more clients, awesome! But if you are feeling, “I want to add another chapter to my career” or another branch … then you could be working with people from everywhere! (Annie Schuessler)
Expanding your therapeutic career opens the door to so many new opportunities that you can enjoy. For example, some of the benefits may include:
- Working with a broader audience
- Earning more money
- Diversifying your work schedule without sacrificing your income
- Using your education and experience in creative ways
Really, the creativity is pretty limitless in what you can create for people, and you can then get to watch people walk through your really niche outcome-oriented program and grow from there. (Annie Schuessler)
You don’t need to know where you will end up when you start this creative work, but just remember that the possibilities are endless!
Thinking through your program process
Even though this work is very creative and can be customized in various ways, there can be a general structure that you follow when fleshing out your program. Consider the following:
- Go through your niching process as far as you can
- Once you know your niche outcome, then build an outline of what is going to be in your program
As long as you have your outcome clear and everything that you do in the process of getting toward that outcome, you’re going to know whether you want to go super detailed or whether you want to leave it very flexible. And, either way, you will be flexible as you’re walking through the program with people, because you are going to adjust [if you need to.] (Annie Schuessler)
- Be flexible in your program outline, especially the first few times while you are getting used to running things, so that you can adjust your course or offering based on your client’s needs and what you discover from doing this process
You can fall short when you put too much into your program.
The mistake I often see is people trying to cram every exercise, every insight, every piece of information into their program that they possibly can to add more value, and when I look at people’s outlines, sometimes that’s what I see … That this is amazing stuff, [but] you are actually going to make it more valuable if you can pull it back to teaching, just like one or two really important things in every session. (Annie Schuessler)
Annie’s advice to private practitioners
The thing that you wish you could do, and the way that you wish you could be working, are both possible!
Sponsors Mentioned in this episode:
- Apply to work with us — a decision-making matrix for your next steps
- Learn more about how Alma could support you in building a thriving private practice at helloalma.com/joe.
Useful links mentioned in this episode:
- Visit the Rebel Therapist, listen to the podcast, and connect on Instagram and LinkedIn.
Check out these additional resources:
How to Host Intensives with Dr. Adina Silvestri | POP 1238
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Meet Joe Sanok
Joe Sanok helps counselors to create thriving practices that are the envy of other counselors. He has helped counselors to grow their businesses by 50-500% and is proud of all the private practice owners who are growing their income, influence, and impact on the world. Click here to explore consulting with Joe.
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