How to be Effective in Marketing Your Niche as a Private Practice Therapist
Now that you have a niche, marketing will be so much easier. When you have a niche, you know who you are trying to reach and what service you are offering. This makes things so much easier for all your marketing.
It even directs who and how you do your marketing.
Get Clear on Your Ideal Client
Make sure you are super clear on who your people are, and create an ideal client in your head
Start by going back over who your niche is and why you are working with them. The clearer you are, the easier it is to complete the next step.
Remember, claiming a niche doesn’t just help you to know who you are working with, but helps you to know who you are marketing to. The clearer you are about who they are, the better.
Once you’ve gone back and reviewed your niche, you can start creating your Ideal client avatar.
Your ideal client avatar is the exact person that you want to work with and the person you are writing to in your marketing. If you pick one person, imaginary or real, the people who are similar will see themselves in your writing and know that you are the right therapist for them.
Your ideal client can be someone you actually know or work with, or they can be an imaginary person who fits your niche to a tee.
When you are developing your ideal client, get as specific as possible. You are describing one single person, it can be that client you love working with, who brings out your best therapist self, it’s okay to be that specific. For more information on how to create your ideal client avatar I have written a blog that you can reference here.
An example of an ideal client avatar is if your niche is anxious women your ideal client might be Janey, age 25, who has been anxious as long as she can remember. She has just graduated from college and her anxiety is currently focused on finding a job and what the future will look like. Etc etc.
If you need to write a description of them out, it can be really helpful to check back on as you get further into your practice. Don’t worry if it changes a little here and there, or shifts completely.
Once you have your ideal client avatar, you can go even further and create a niche statement for your practice (check out a blog about niche statements for therapists here), but you don’t have to do that now (or ever).
Keep reading to learn about the next step of finding where your people hang out online.
Effectively Targeting the Marketing for Your Private Practice Niche
Now that you know specifically who your ideal client is, it’s time to figure out specifically where they hang out. This is important so that you can focus your marketing instead of just posting where you think they might be.
Therapists often miss this step in their marketing. They create great content but don’t place it where their clients will actually see it.
That’s why this step is so early in the process. Because if you don’t know where your people are, then you are wasting your time and energy.
You don’t need to be everywhere, just where your clients are, and that is what this step is about.
Where Are Your Clients Online?
So much of our lives are online at this point, and many of us find our service providers there as well.
Keeping this in mind, we are going to start by finding where your ideal clients hang out online.
Start by putting yourself in your client's shoes. What are they searching for online, and where do they look for answers?
Are they on Google?
Do they join communities to get information?
Are they having conversations on Reddit or Discord?
Do they search for motivation on Pinterest?
Do they listen to certain podcasts?
Are there blogs that they like to read?
Listen for whether they talk about social media or other places where they get information. This is where they are hanging out online.
Make a list of the places that you hear your ideal clients talk about or explore online, and see if you can find them yourself.
Go ahead and check those spaces out. Start by just watching and learning the culture. Then start looking for their needs and pain points.
What questions do they ask?
What are they worried about?
What do they vent about?
This is a good place to get information and will also be a good place to market.
Once you find one place that your ideal clients hang out, you’ll find (or the algorithm will show you) other places that they hang out as well.
Where are your ideal clients in real life?
I know many of us prefer to do everything online, but figuring out where our ideal clients are in person is a gold mine of information and ideas for networking. So, once again, pay attention to what your clients are talking about.
Are they all obsessed with a certain children's bookstore? Has a group of them started to see the same nutritionist or chiropractor? Do they prefer the mall on the south side of town?
Specifically, you want to pay attention to:
Medical providers they frequent
Community organizations or groups that they are drawn to
Locations where they engage in leisure activities
Other professionals and services they tend to reach out to for help
This will all be helpful information moving forward, and I’m going to help you learn how to use it to bring more clients into your practice.
Targeted Copy
Now we are going to use all of the information that you’ve collected to write copy for your website and other marketing materials. This information will help ensure that your writing connects with prospective ideal clients.
This copy will make them say “It feels like you are reading my mind, you understand me so well.” Or “ I knew you were the therapist for me when I read your website.”
Don’t forget to use their struggles and hopes to show them that you understand the help that they need.
Content to Show Off Your Expertise
Once you have your website copy up, you can start to create content. You want to use your expertise to attract and educate your ideal clients.
This will help them to see you as the expert that you are. This will draw them to your website when they are struggling.
You will become the person they go to, in order to answer their questions. The person they go to, for help when they are stuck. Even before they work with you.
Remember, as a therapist you can share information in a way that is helpful for your clients and non-therapeutic. This gives them a place to explore when they are in the precontemplation stage of change.
Post your content on your website and in social media spaces that your ideal clients frequent.
The content you post helps them to get to know you and when they are ready they can take the next steps to work with you.
Building Trust and Credibility
When it comes to your website and other content, it’s important to remember that this is where you are starting to build trust with your prospective clients. You are showing them who you are and what your style is so that they feel safe and comfortable reaching out to you.
One of the ways we build trust and credibility is by being consistent and predictable. You can do this in your content through maintaining the same tone and beliefs. You don’t have to use content pillars (if you want to check out my blog here).
But try to maintain consistency in the ideas you share and the opinions you write about. Try not to be all over the place so that the people who consume a lot of your content know who you are.
If you are consistent, it is clear you know what you are talking about and you actually believe the things that you say.
Networking: Building a Professional Support Network That Brings You Clients Too
Most people, when you talk about networking, their hands get sweaty and they’re stomach drops. They hate the idea of talking to strangers and trying to sell their services (or themselves) to complete strangers.
I take a completely different approach to networking. Yes, you are trying to build your business but also as a a therapist and person you are actually trying to get to know the person so that you can figure out if they would be a good fit for your clients or if they are someone that you would want to send clients too.
I have met some of my best friends through networking, and if you approach this right, you might too.
Network Generally
You want to start your networking by reaching out to other therapists. Go to meetups, consultation groups, and your local therapist groups. Find the therapist groups on social media, whether they are on Facebook, Instagram, or discussions on Reddit.
Get to know the other therapists, and when you get a chance, talk about the work you do and who you work with. Talk about your beliefs and interests with your ideal clients. But really try to see this as a chance to break the isolation of private practice.
Spend some time getting to know the other therapists in your community. Once you get to know a couple of people well it helps you to decide who you would refer out to, and they will get to know you well enough to know if you are someone that they would refer to.
We all feel better about referring to people that we know and trust.
Network Strategically
After you have made some contacts with other therapists in the community, it’s time to start being more strategic with your networking. Using all the information you collected at the beginning of this process, we’re going to start by reaching out to the other professionals that your ideal clients are seeing. So you are going to start reaching out to the doctors (either individual or type), the chiropractors, the naturopaths, basically the people that you put on your list.
You can do this in a variety of ways, some people email and ask for coffee dates (in person or virtual), others drop brochures and baked goods off at offices, and still other people look for ways to be helpful to the other professionals that see their Ideal clients.
Being helpful might look like creating a flyer about depression or talking to the whole office about warning signs of domestic violence.
During this time, you will also want to reach out to other therapists who see your ideal clients or people who are adjacent to your ideal clients. For example, if you are a couples therapist, you might want to reach out to therapists who see women who are the female ideal half of your clients.
When you find therapists who work similarly to you, then you will find people to consult with and people with whom you can exchange referrals and feel good about doing so.
You might have to meet up with quite a few people to find therapists that you like, but keep at it. The more people you talk to, the more people know who you are and what you do.
Because you have a clear niche, networking is so much easier because your networking partners know exactly who to send your way.
Track Your Marketing
Once you’ve started marketing, it can feel like you're throwing darts into the ocean. To help you keep up your efforts and to make sure that your efforts are paying off, it’s important to track the number of clients that are coming into your practice.
Not only do you want to track the clients coming into your practice, but you also want to track where they are coming from.
This will help you decide where to continue to put your energy. If your clients are coming from one particular place, then you know where to put more energy.
It’s not all about the numbers
Once you can see where your numbers are coming from, it’s also important to pay attention to the actual new clients you are getting.
Are you enjoying working with them?
Are they the right fit clients?
Is something a little bit off?
It’s good to pay attention to what clients you are getting as well as how many clients you are receiving. This way you can make decisions around adjusting your copy and where you are doing your marketing.
Putting it All into Practice
Marketing your therapy niche effectively isn’t about doing it all. It’s about figuring out the best use of your energy. Just take one step at a time and you’ll reach your goals in no time.
Remember, just a little bit at a time will eventually get you to where you want to be. It’s all about consistent effort and not letting yourself give up.
Be patient with yourself and the universe and trust the process. Give yourself credit for the work you are putting in and know that you will get there.
As time goes by, you will be able to recognize by the clients you are getting if things need to be adjusted, and you can make that happen.
If you get stuck anywhere in this process, reach out to me for help. I’d love to help you reach your goals.