tWhen you chose to pursue the path of therapy and healing, you chose to help people in the most profound way possible you chose to sit with people with power and empathy and empower them while they are facing some of the most difficult times of thier lives
no one told you you will have to become a marketer or a sales person
and if you are like most therapists and coaches, you do not like marketing, you do not like to chase people and try to convince them they should use your help.
probably you do not feel comfortable posting endless instagram stories and you do not understand the complaxity of facebook’s ad system.
and even if you did the personal work and removed all the limiting beliefs you have around these areas
this is still not your passion and doing this is still less fulfilling than doing your actual work sitting for session, helping people.
the problem is you HAVE to do it, you MUST have a mailing list, an instagram account, a website, and facebook ads, in order to have enough people in your clinical practice
BUT WHAT IF THIS IS A LIMITING BELIEF?
Hi, my name is Gal Tzhayek and I am a Therapist, I’ve studied NLP, Existential coaching, Academic Psychology, Hypnotherapy, and I even dubbled in several more spiritual methods like theta healing.
almost 6 years ago, and after working with hundreds of people in my clinical practice, I started teaching.
I started teaching espcially around my areas of expertise, I taught NLP, Coaching and hypnotherapy, alongside with some methods and techniques I designed over the years.
In those 6 years we trained more than 6,000 NLP Practitioners, Masters, Coaches and Hypnotherapists.
so I couldn’t not notice that most of them faced the same problem when they finished their courses, they had hard time getting their schedule filled with meetings, most of them even had trouble finding enough people to work for a full day.
I Had this LIMITING BELIEF too
I told them they should study marketing, learn how to sell, and gather business skills. and while those things can absulotly help, over the years I’ve found that this is a crappy advice.
I was so blind by my limiting belief that I did not look around me, and obviously out of the thousands we have trained there were hundreds of successful coaches and therapists.
those people did not have this problem, they had wating lists, they could raise the price and no one would complain, and people would travel, sometimes for hours just for a 40-60 minute session with them
I was so blind by my limitig belief that I did not notice that those people usually: did not have a website did not post stories every day did not have a mailing list did not run facebook ads or any other ads for that matter
and people were coming 100% word to mouth.
I understood that if I wand to serve my students I must get to the bottom of this
and I have I have the answer as in what is the thing that makes these people different.
but before I will tell you what is it and how you can do it too (most likely it won’t be fast or easy, and it’s not going to be something you will like hearing) I want to make sure you understand I am not anti-marketing
I believe that when you have a great product or service, it is increadibly beneficial for everyone involved if you do your best to market it and sell it as best as you can.
and also, if you want, next to being a therapist or a coach to also be a speaker, and you want to speak to huge audiences, you will probably have to do marketing BUT if at this point, just having 5-15 people a week for sessions, sounds great to you, you do not need to do any of these things.
the psychology of asking for help how do most people find and hire therapists or coaches?
I am going to tell you a secret most marketers do not what you to know most successful and well established digital marketing agencies will refuse to service you as a coach or a therapist.
because they know that unless you want to sell a book or a seminar, selling coaching / therapy sessions online, and in general, is a hard task.
because most people will not come to ask for help when thier lives are perfect, people come to get help when they need help.
and when they need help, they feel like thier situation is complicated, as if thier problems are unsolveable and no one understands them.
even if you could target them with an ultra intelligent ad spesificaly at this time, 9 out of 10 wouldn’t trust you can help them.
also, most people, even if they are facing major difficulties, will not sit all day at home crying infront of facebook waiting for an ad to pop.
they will supress that pain – and you as a therapist should know that.
when will they allow themselves to feel it? when they are sharing thier situation with a friend or a family member and that is the opprotunity to make them go and ask for help
if you want to get people in your practice you need friends and family members talking about you when thier loved ones are in pain
obviously I’m not going to suggest some sneaky and manipulative method to achieve that, the best way to get there is to create such an outstanding result for somone, that
1. They won’t stop talking about it. 2. People around them will see the change, and will ask them about it even if they do not initiate the conversation. 3. The story about this change is so powerful that it will be moved forward to more and more people.
PLEASE NOTE: you do not need anything more than 2-3 amazing stories (real ones obviously) of people you helped in an outstanding way to kickstart your clinical practice.
and if you will be able to deliver these kind of results to 1 out of 5 people, you will forever have a waiting list without spending 1$ on marketing.
most therapists will deny what I am saying
because it’s easier to hide behind the convinient limiting belief, I HATE / I AM BAD AT MARKETING than looking in the mirror and acknowledging that even if I studied for 2 years, I still lack some practice, lack some skills and lack some practical advice on creating these breakthroughs in my clients lives.
contrary to what most people think, most of the people who are on my personal waiting list do not know me from the courses I’ve created, because I quickly got away from the spotlight.
most of the people got to my personal waiting list, because of a crazy (real) story that got to them from a friend who I personally helped or a friend of a friend of a friend…
after that one lady who came to me while she was losing her eye sight at the age of 37 years old, the doctors could not explain it, and she already lost her drivers lisence – regained 95% of her sight back after 1 session.
after that one man who was stuttering for 25 years, it would often take him more than 2 minutes to just say his name, started posting youtube videos and public speaking.
after marriages were fixed and refilled with passion, parents and children got reunited after years of conflict.
after these things happened again and again and again, people are constantly contacting me, asking if it is ok to reffer people to me. because they want to make sure I have time to help thier friends and loved ones.
there is no magic formula other then give great results -> get more refferals
but this is a call for a journey, not a magic pill.
its not about learning this one thing and getting bombarded with messages its about work.
very profound, greatly rewarding, highly meaningful work but its still work.
how to do it
constantly keep learning (I take at least 2 full length courses every year), keep practicing with peers, and keep watching and analysing demonstrations.
this was the thought behind the simple program I created, called beyond a therapist, in this program we meet twice a week with a subject like “complicated trauma” or “dealing with disease” we have an in depth conversation about the subject and then I do a LIVE demonstration dealing with it LIVE.
after that we analize it and get into small groups and practice using the insights and techniques, because learning there is a difference between knowing and doing.
also, between meetings, you and every other member has the opprotunity to directly ask me questions about dealing with real life problems working with clients and the answers are posted anonymously for everyone to learn from.