Today is a special Tuesday because The Counselor Entrepreneur is participating in a CARNIVAL! Tamara Suttle, from Private Practice from the Inside Out, has invited and selected The Counselor Entrepreneur to participate in this years carnival and of course we said YES! This year the theme is all about the “Top 10’s in Private Practice.”
So let’s get started…
Top 10 Ways To Increase Client Retention In Private Practice
1. Your Clinical Skills
Your clinical training and your ability to use that training effectively will definitely make or break a private practice. When you don’t have sufficient training to perform the therapeutic services you offer, your clients will notice this deficit and will move on to a therapist that is a better fit.
2. Return Client Calls In A Timely Manner
When you call your therapist, doctor, manager, or anyoneelse of importance in your life, you expect them to call you back. When exactly do you expect them to do that? How about 3 days or a week from the time you called? What if they explained that they were busy or, better yet, they never address it at all. You might be left feeling quite low on their priority list. While many therapists are busy, if you are too busy to return calls you need to find another way to manage your voicemail. It’s costing you clients.
3. Be Clear About Services Offered
Clients may want you to help them with a variety of mental and emotional health challenges, because they trust and respect you. However, they will respect you even more as a professional if you are able to clearly outline the services you perform. You can offer to help them find the right provider for the challenges that fall outside your scope of practice. People are sometimes skeptical of a person you claims they can do it all. It’s like that saying, “Jack of all trades and master of none.”
4. The Look Of Your Practice
From the time a client walks in the door, their experience with you is being formed. This is categorized as the “halo effect”. Yes, the halo effect applies to business too. The feeling that people get when they walk in your door can be transferred to the feeling they believe they will get when they experience therapy with you. Make sure your private practice space creates the kind of experience that shines a positive light on you.
5. Be Direct About Treatment Recommendations
Helping clients, by giving treatment recommendations, will be critical to helping clients know whether their time with you is more like a marathon or a sprint. Be clear about the goals that are being worked on, of course get client input on goals, so that the client is more invested in the process.
6. Schedule Appointments After Counseling Sessions
Clients are coming to you because they believe you are the expert. When you say things like, “When do you want to come back for counseling?” or “Just call whenever you feel you need your next appointment.”, your clients may not call. It’s not always an indication that they don’t want help. Clients don’t always know how often they need to be seen, they need direction. Telling people to call when they need you, is more associated with someone who has basically terminated and only needs check-ins, aka tune ups.
7. Be Willing To Collaborate
Collaboration with other counselors, physicians, nutritionists, or providers that are helping your client can increase client retention. This may be because the client has a team of professionals working to help them vs. the client getting burned out as they battle to make sure everyone is on the same page and receives the right information. This can also allow you to meet people who are willing to refer to you, a win-win for client and therapist.
8. Stay On Time
You may find that you can’t seem to end certain sessions on time. Clients who arrive on time for their session are not able to start on time because of a non-emergency counseling session that ran over. This can make clients feel like you don’t value their time and they may decide to go to someone who does.
9. Build Trust – Stay Connected
Using e-mails and blogs to engage your clients allows you to build trust and expert status. Thereby, helping the client to feel more connected to you and the therapy process.
10. Welcome Feedback
Doing satisfaction surveys or just asking clients to provide anonymous feedback will help you understand your practice from a totally different angel. Yes, it’s scary sometimes to know what people really think but it let’s them know you care and are willing to change, if needed.
The Carnival fun is by no means over! Let me know what you think of this list.
Can you implement a few or all of these in your practice?
After you interact here, go to the other carnival blog posts and get more information to enhance your private practice knowledge!
Top 10 Ways to Procrastinate on Building Your Private Practice – Dr. Vanessa Pawlowski http://drvanessapawlowski.
Hi Camille. This is a great list. One of the things I’ve still dismayed by is how long it takes some therapists to return an inquiry phone call. This is such a simple tip you offered, but many therapists don’t do it!
I also agree a treatment plan is important and it is our responsibility to educate clients about how therapy works and the frequency required to get the best results.
I want to echo that staying on time can be so important — because it can be so hard! 🙂 I want to be there to help and I have that drive to leave the session with a productive ending, even if it takes extra time. That’s one of my weak points I’m still working on.
Thanks for sharing all these great points! I think that staying connected is very important, especially when working with children/families. I try my best to structure my sessions and the way I work with families in a way that helps parents feel connected, even if a lot of time is spent working with primarily their child.
Good morning, Camille!
I’ve been away too long!
I love that you are participating in this Blog Carnival because you always provide great tips!
I especially love your emphasis (here and elsewhere) on #6 – Collaborating!
So often as new professionals in private practice we think that we are supposed to know everything and do everything on our own.
While that may look great in the movies, the truth is that our practices will soar even higher if we engage in joint ventures and partner up with other professionals.
It’s how my practice has mushroomed in growth and expanded my reach.
I suspect that is true for you, too.
Speaking of which – I hope to have your voice back on my blog in 2015!
Great information to keep in mind every time a new client calls me on the phone! I especially had not thought about the “halo effect” but it is so true that we need to be aware of all the various ways we are impacting people when they are reaching out to us for help. I try to be as clear as I can on the phone before new clients come in about the type of therapy I provide and the types of challenges I work best with so that the client and I can decide if we are going to be a good matching to work together.
These are all great points! I especially appreciated your recommendation to be clear about services offered. There are so many types of therapists out there, and so many different ways that people can benefit from mental health services. It is important for clients to find someone who is the right fit for them. No one can do it all — but when we are able to help steer someone in the right direction and help them get what they need, this is a valuable service.
Hi Camille, thanks for these fantastic tips, all great reminders of things we should all be doing consistently in our businesses. I am certainly guilty of not following your last piece of advice, to find ways to invite my clients’ feedback on my services. I love your tip to find ways that this feedback can be given anonymously; thanks for inspiring me to start asking more directly for feedback!