Hypnosis Niche Marketing – These Profitable Niches are Going to Shock You!

hypnosis niche marketingLet’s discuss hypnosis niche marketing and I am guessing that most of you today are going to be shocked by what I am going to reveal. I’ve always been intrigued by the debate of whether you should niche your business or not.

As many therapy marketers will tell you niching your market down has some specific advantages for your business. Yet it can also be hugely problematic especially if you don’t understand how to do it well or don’t keep your eye on the market for any upcoming changes. Good niche marketing means:

  • You get seen as an expert if someone reads your niche-specific website.
  • You build your expertise and results in a certain area.
  • You build a name for yourself as the go-to person for a specific problem.
  • You can market more accurately at your core demographic.
  • You lessen the competition.

In theory, this works brilliantly until something goes wrong such as COVID. Suddenly all the people with one niche websites who were no longer relevant in the middle of a pandemic saw their incomes dry up and customers disappear.  Whilst the virus is just one example of a problem there can be many others:

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The Problems with Niche Therapy Marketing

Your website gets hacked. – I’ve had a problem with this one myself. One of my websites got hacked and I spent nearly a month getting it back up. Not a great experience but thankfully as I have multiple websites it wasn’t the end of the world.

Google changes its algorithm and you disappear off the front page of the search results. – Google is always playing around with how it presents its information. Keeping on top of the latest initiatives will help but many people have found themselves floundering after a change in the search results.

Facebook or Google Ads Change – In case you weren’t aware something very big is going on in this arena right now. Apple has decided that it wants to give its users the ability to opt-out of being tracked by ad networks. There are huge discussions going on right now about how to retarget customers under this new initiative.

Someone or something comes along to make your niche irrelevant. – The big companies are muscling in on the therapy market fast. If one of the majors comes after your niche you are going to have a problem. Keep your eyes peeled on these developments as you may need to change your marketing to contend with this in the near future.

Diversification in niches is hugely important if you want to stay in business as well as always looking forward and staying relevant. If you don’t do these you could be in for a shock.

Choosing a Therapy Niche

Hypnosis niche marketing in more than one area is important if you want to hedge your bets but what niches do you go for? Well, this is where things get interesting. Most therapists choose some of the most obvious areas such as weight loss or stop smoking and so on but have you ever looked at the numbers? Most therapists choose a niche depending on their interest in the topic and may keep an eye out for the competition but I wonder how many of you actually think in detail about your business models.

I said that I might shock you today and this is where I might open your eyes to exactly what you are competing against and why you might have problems struggling to attract clients. Let’s do a deep dive into the stats and see what we find.

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Hypnosis Marketing Stats

Well, one of the most popular niches in the entire world is sleep hypnosis with over 40,000 people searching for an answer to their problems with insomnia every month. So far so normal. Most hypnotherapists should be aware that sleep is a huge area for potential clients. However, you have absolutely no hope of getting on the front page of Google for this specific keyword term unless you pay to play by using ads or get very clever with social media or geographical targeting.

I can guarantee that most hypnotherapists get the majority of their clients because of their websites being found for a specific area and Google maps not because they have a great web page that places them on page one in the bigger search arena. A tiny therapy practice can never compete with Audible as an example who is on the first page for this term.  This means that whilst you will get some customers your bigger competition hoover up the vast majority.

Sex Sells in Hypnosis

I digress however because the next biggest niche with 33,100 searches a month is erotic hypnosis. Yup I know I bet you weren’t expecting to hear that. Sex sells and I can guarantee that most of you will never have even considered that erotic hypnosis was such a huge hypnosis marketing niche. I can go on as sexual hypnosis gets looked at by 18,100 people per month. Another huge number that gets overlooked.

After sleep and sex, we have a huge steep drop in searches until we get to weight loss and stop smoking at around the 6,000 searches per month and then we have Furry Hypnosis at 2,400 searches. Yup hypnosis aimed at people who liked to imagine they are furry creatures. Told you I would shock you. Not because of the subject matter (because personally what someone does in their own time is none of my business) but because I bet you had never even dreamed that this was a niche to go after.

But I bet you will have considered some of these. Sports hypnosis for example which comes in at a measly 390 searches per month which is roughly similar to the numbers for confidence and stress hypnosis.

Now the General Hypnotherapy Register in the UK has around 3000 hypnotherapists registered with them and the Hypnotherapy Society 2,000. There are other organisations that also don’t publish numbers plus people who aren’t registered at all but I think you can start to see an issue with why people have a problem with marketing. without having the stats. Look at how many hypnotherapists will want to offer sports hypnosis and then check out the reality of the niche. The numbers for that keyword don’t stack up especially when you consider that the numbers I have used are for search results worldwide.

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Understanding Basic Business Figures

Now before you all go rushing off to add porn to your websites (I’m only joking) there is a more serious point to be made. The key to attracting clients is to understand the numbers, niches, competition and keywords so that you can get a new client or sale. Until you get to know these facts you will always be scrabbling around to try and get people to come and see you. You don’t have to be writing about porn or fetishes to get results but you do need to understand how to compete effectively and with what topics.

Spending your time and energy in niches that will actually earn you a decent income rather than second-guessing. It can make all the difference! Only when you have this detail and hypnosis niche marketing information can you start to create a website attracting the right people or advertising the right products. Don’t do it the other way round as you are going to face a world of frustration! If you don’t know how to do this then think about hypnosis coaching to help you. It will save you a ton of money and heartache in the long term.

 

 

 

 

 

Online Hypnotherapy and Big Business?

Therapy Marketing and Big BusinessI hope you are all doing well wherever you are and that the Coronavirus interruption isn’t hurting your business too much. There are definite signs of more business activity out there in the UK as people start to emerge from the strict restrictions so expect more work in the coming weeks. Face to face work may not begin for another month or so but certainly, there are signs of life in the online market as people realise that they can’t wait forever to get help. Anyway, let’s talk about online hypnotherapy and what I am beginning to see out there.

Online Hypnosis Sessions

As you are probably aware a good percentage of the hypnotherapy market up until a few months ago predominantly operated on a face to face basis. Therapists either worked from their homes or alternatively rented rooms throughout the world to conduct their sessions. Yes, online hypnotherapy existed but for the most part, the vast percentage of hypnosis was still done using old school methods.

Then along came Coronavirus and everything suddenly changed. When therapists realised they were going to earn no money at all because of the lockdown a rush began to move business online. Therapists who had never used Zoom or Skype for sessions were now trying to work out how to work with clients on screen and also how to attract those new clients.

Over the past couple of months, the revolution to online working has picked up speed. Not just with hypnotherapy but in thousands of industries worldwide. We are never likely to go back to exactly how things were in the past as big businesses talk about shelving their office space and allowing their clients to work from home. Partly the speed at which the changes are taking place is because of health and safety but the second is money. An office block, especially in the centre of a thriving city, is hugely costly to run whilst if you get your employees to work from home costs are slashed.

So far all well and good. Surely therapists should be rejoicing as working from home as online hypnotherapy saves costs and cuts dead time waiting for clients. It is a winning scenario, isn’t it?

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Hypnosis Teletherapy

Now I am going to look into my crystal ball and give you some potential pitfalls that I am seeing which you might not have expected as you contemplated this new online world.

I hate to break it to you but once this move to online hypnotherapy picks up pace there are other people looking at your clients and wanting a piece of the action. Big business is out there right at this moment and thinking how can we make money from these people who need mental health support. I’m not talking about charities or online directories but big corporations selling health services and I can tell you they want the money that your clients have in their pocket and not yours.

You see trying to package hypnosis whilst therapists were scattered was difficult part from say in big cities. It costs money to be a therapy company and hire rooms across the country and then hire therapists so the costs didn’t stack up. It is a whole different ball game when you move online because of the profit margin change.

The Amazonification (is that a word?) or certainly the commodification of therapy has begun and over the next few years, everything is going to change. Once big business starts to muscle in on the talking therapy market the small players are in trouble especially those who don’t know how to market well.

The Facts about Online Therapy

When you were working locally and seeing clients the world was a relatively small place. You say had a therapy business in say Kent and you would attract people to your practice from the surrounding county. If you were a little more well known you might have got business from further afield but most people would have driven no more than 30 miles to see you. You could be a big player in a small area and might well have done incredibly well.

In the local search engine results, you might have been on the first page of Google or if not you could have posted a local Adwords or Facebook Ad and attracted clients to see you. Getting clients would have been relatively easy and your business might have been doing very nicely.

Now everyone is moving online. Suddenly you are a very tiny fish in a big big ocean and here is where the problems start. As the general public gradually get used to online hypnotherapy that is what they will search for. Now Google only has 10 search spaces on the front page in any country for that particular keyword term plus around four or five ads. So where does that leave your business? I can tell you that getting one of those covered 10 spaces when thousands of therapists are competing for them as online therapists are going to be almost impossible.

So where does that leave you? Well, it means either trying to compete for smaller niches or problems or continuing local therapy. The Google local pack appears here to stay for now. Alternatively, you will need to start using ads to get business or building a social media presence to attract clients.

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Big Business and Therapy

As big business moves into the therapy market they will have money to spend to dominate the niche. With their SEO experts and content creators, they can start to blow a hole in your profits relatively quickly. I am already seeing companies out there who are offering therapy help and have a pool of therapists on their books. The client contacts the big company and they farm the client out to one of their therapists. Of course, the company takes a hefty chunk of the money leaving the therapist with peanuts.

Don’t believe me let’s look at one therapy company who boasts that their online counsellors make between $15 and $25 per hour if they join. To become one of their therapists in the US you need a masters degree! So you work for them and earn little more than you would in a low paid admin job. This company is currently pushing its services in the UK market! Did you get in this business to work for that kind of money and to work for someone else? I know I didn’t.

Also last night I was sat watching Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find them on ITV (one of the big three TV companies in the UK) During the ad break an advert appeared for an online therapy company and their app. To give you an idea of the cost of that ad it would be somewhere between £10,000 and £30,000 for 30 seconds. My guess is there will be more. Bet that has blown your marketing budget out of the water!

Yes, some people will always want face to face sessions but expect that sector of the market to get smaller over the next five years. Big business has started to muscle in and they want your hard-earned cash.

Therapy Marketing Knowledge is Everything

So do you want to become one of the wage slaves working for big business or do you want to differentiate your business and get ahead? Now is the time to get up and start to work out how to fight back and make sure you protect your income over the next few years. That means:

  • Having an Amazing Website (not just a good enough one)
  • Understanding SEO
  • Differentiating Yourself on the Market
  • Blogging for Business
  • Being an Ads Master

Simply put if you are one of those people who have plodded along and know that you need to do something about your business then this is the time to do it. You need to get up to speed fast otherwise it will be too late.

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Therapy Marketing Courses

Head on over to my website now and start picking up the pace. There are courses there to help you with website layout, business blogging and creating profitable online ads. This is the very minimum you are going to need if you want to start competing for a slice of the therapy market. Online hypnotherapy is here to stay but to really compete you need to have the right skills and from my experience, at least 95% of therapists haven’t taken the time to learn them. What you do right now is going to determine what kind of business you are going to end up within the next year or so.

Happy New Year & Welcome to the Future of Hypnotherapy Marketing

The Future of Hypnotherapy Marketing Happy New Year!

As we all know the New Year is a time for new beginnings, fresh starts and looking to the future. So I thought I would do exactly that in my first blog of the year by looking at the very latest trends in marketing which are going to be super important in 2019 and beyond.

Remember that in hypnotherapy marketing nothing ever stands still for very long. One minute you are selling your services through the Yellow Pages and the next thing you know the world has moved on everything has moved online. In the space of a few years the world changed and if you don’t keep up your ability to get clients and make money has vanished and you are left behind by your competitors. So what do you need to be looking at in the near future to ensure that you are ahead of the pack instead of playing catch up?

Site Speed and Mobile Optimised Pages 

I have been taking about mobile optimised pages for a good few years now but with that you need to also think about site speed. If your website is not loading quickly enough on mobile devices it will lag in the rankings. For Google the issue is really simple. They want to give users the best possible experience and so favour websites that load quickly. Slow loading websites are going to mean that you web visitors will bounce off your site quickly meaning less money and less conversions. To check your site speed head to the following:

Google Page Speed Test and GTmetrix

Video 

Yes so you watch YouTube and have created the odd video but are you really aware of the video revolution that is happening out there. It is estimated that this year that up to 80% of all consumer internet traffic will be on video! Just think about that number for a second it is huge! So if you are relying on websites alone you have a problem because you are missing the majority of the potential traffic out there that is going to get you your customers.

Are you aware of what stories are? If not I suggest you head over to Instagram and Facebook and see how some of the masters in the industry are killing it daily on video. Influencers are out there creating snippets of video about their lives, customers and products and people are lapping it up. Generally the stories are only up for 24 hours but thousands of people end up following these people daily and buying what they recommend. How can you jump on the bandwagon and use them to market your hypnotherapy practice?

Voice Search

I have spoken about voice search a few years ago and how it would grow significantly in the years to come and that is exactly what we are currently seeing. How many of you now own an Amazon Echo dot or a Google home mini speaker? When people are looking for help now many don’t bother typing in to their systems what they want, instead they ask their smart speakers. If your website uses the correct words and phrases that help it to be found by voice you are more likely to be the person who is picked by the system. The current estimates are that by 2020 over 50% of internet searches will be done via voice search.

Chatbots and AI

Long gone are the days of 9 to 5 working hours. With access to computers, tablets and mobile phones people want instant answers to their questions 24 hours a day. If you are a therapist working on your own it can be impossible to keep up with the demands for information about your products and services especially when they are sent late at night. I know that my Facebook page gets queries daily from clients often well after I have finished for the evening.

Automated Chatbots and artificial intelligence have started to take over. By programming in answers to some questions it is possible for your potential clients to get the answers they need to their queries without ever talking to a human. Watch out for this trend increasing over the next few years. Embrace it or be prepared to work very long hours!

Dynamic Therapy Marketing

Marketing a therapy practice means you can never sit still and rest on your laurels waiting for your clients to come to you. You have to keep an eye on the future so that you don’t become a dinosaur. Change it happening all the time so keep your eye on the latest trends and research ways in which you can easily incorporate them into your hypnosis practice.

9 Great Sources of Traffic for Hypnosis Marketing

Website Traffic Hypnotherapy MarketingToday I am going to talk about traffic and hypnosis marketing and some of the amazing sources out there that can help you to advertise your products and services. So firstly what do I mean by traffic? I am talking about directing potential customers to your business online rather than to a bricks and mortar location. Without online traffic it is highly unlikely that a hypnotherapy business would survive in 2017 which means a huge part of your marketing plan needs to factor in getting more people to hear about your business. Now even though attracting traffic sounds difficult it is actually incredibly easy especially if you pay for it however the trick is understanding how well the traffic you attract to your website actually converts otherwise you will be wasting a load of time and money and ending up with no new sales.

It is important to also differentiate between cold and warm traffic. When traffic is warm it means that the visitors to your website have already engaged with your business or actively sought you out. An example of warm traffic might be a client that you have seen in the past who actively goes back to your website a year or two later with the thought that they may use your services again. Cold traffic involves people turning up at your website and blog who haven’t actively thought about hiring you or buying your products. Your job is to convince those people to use your services or buy your products.

Here are just some of the places where you can go to create both warm and cold traffic in order to boost your hypnosis marketing business.

Google Adwords

Google Adwords is the mother of all traffic generators and with over 6 Billion people using its search engine every day you have the perfect source of traffic. Even better the people that click on your ads are highly targeted individuals and if you set it up correctly they are also motivated to spend money.  Google is literally handing these potential customers to you on a plate providing you pay them a finders fee.

Sounds wonderful but of course, it also has huge pitfalls. Set up Adwords incorrectly and you may as well be burning your money. The thing with Adwords is that it is a relatively complex site which means it can be very easy to make a costly mistake. A former therapy clinic owner I knew threw away thousands of pounds on the site because her SEO guy set up her account incorrectly. Instead of attracting people to her complementary health clinic who wanted therapeutic massages, she managed to attract every sleazy man in the area looking for something a more intimate form of massage. Ouch!

If you are a newbie at Adwords and don’t want to get burned check out our online course which will show you how to set up your account without the common pitfalls.

Google Adwords for Therapists

 

 

Hypnosis Google Adwords Online Course

 

 

 

Bing 

In the UK most people still use Google but over the past few years Bing has been increasing its market share and now makes up 20% of the UK market. This means that when you are creating content or using ads this search engine needs to be considered. Also because the competition for ad space is still low on this particular search engine the cost for clicks is still relatively cheap which means it is worth considering in some niches as your return on investment will be significantly more.

Facebook

Now once upon a time creating a fan page and adding useful articles and videos on Facebook was a great way of reaching lots of new potential customers. That was until Facebook started to reduce the reach. So what is reach? It simply means the number of people who would see the content in your posts. Once upon a time around 16% of the audience who liked your fan page would see your posts that has now dropped to around 2% unless of course, you pay.

Facebook Ads are becoming increasingly popular because of the sheer number of people that you can reach on the site if you are spending the cash however it is worth noting that if you are not targeting real fans of your page then the traffic is cold. That simply means that you have to find a way of turning the people who come across your content into believers who are willing to spend on your services.

Pinterest

Yes, you may associate the site with pins of interior decor or recipes but it is also used to drum up traffic for many businesses. Add captivating pictures that link back to your website content or blog posts and some people will click through to see what you have to say. If they like what they see and hear then you are going to have a sale or a new customer. Of course, Pinterest has also got into the habit of getting people to pay for promoted pins.

Email

Some of the old fashioned methods are the best. Every hypnotherapist should be capturing the emails of visitors to their website or their clinics. Just remember that the people who come to see you need to have agreed to sign up to your mailing list. Once you have that email you can start to market to those customers and sell them solutions to their problem.

The great thing about email is that nobody can take your list away from you. Yes, some people will always unsubscribe from your content but in general, if you are sending out useful information it can only continue to grow. Yet your Google ranking can change in a heartbeat depending on the latest updates tanking your traffic as quickly as you built it. The money, as they say, is in the list!

SEO

Search Engine Optimisation is another way to get found and to attract visitors to your website. If you are a hypnotherapist without a website then you have a problem as that is where most people go to get information. The problem is that SEO takes time and you have to know what you are doing in order to get your content found in the search engines.

Even if you do get your SEO right and get that coveted number one Google slot for your particular keyword you still have a problem, the pesky ads. In high traffic areas, there are likely to be four other people paying to advertise above your listing which means that you are half way down the page even before you have begun. SEO can be great but the consensus appears to be that it won’t be long before the first page of Google is almost completely dominated by ads.

To set up your website correctly for SEO my Turn Your Therapy Website into a Client Magnet Can Help.

Marketing a Therapy Website Online Course

 

 

Hypnosis Google Adwords Online Course

 

 

 

YouTube

YouTube is one of the most popular channels in the world with people. People love to view the free content on the site and they love to solve their problems by searching for video solutions. I know I have used it to solve IT problems, help with DIY and of course for fun. In the case of hypnosis marketing, it is the perfect place to upload videos either about your business or to demonstrate how you can solve other peoples problems. If you aren’t using the site then you are missing a trick.

Directories

In the UK one of the largest directories is the Hypnotherapy Directory which is a traffic source and can help to bring in referrals. This is a niche directory as well which means that the people who are searching on it are actively looking to get help for their particular problems. There are of course thousands of other directories both free and unpaid which you can place your details on to get customers in through your doors. Be cautious where you spend your hard-earned cash and never pay for a directory or a listing in a publication when you are cold-called.

Instagram

People love actually seeing things which is why sites such as Instagram and Pinterest have taken off in the last few years. Now with this site, there is no point in just putting up picture after picture of your therapy practice or logo because people will unfollow straight away. For example, there is a gym near me that just puts up post after post of boring pictures of their equipment and classes. Yawn! Make sure that you are putting up interesting content about other events and places you have been and then every now and again drop a picture of one of your success stories or promotions.  That way your followers won’t get bored and will be actually engaged by what you have to say.

Getting traffic doesn’t have to be hard but the key for hypnosis marketing is to make sure that it is diverse. I have talked before about not putting all your eggs in one basket. If you are getting all your traffic from one source then you need to start to find other alternatives fast. Having a number of great places where you can attract new customers is the key to propelling your business to success.

Oh and finally I have decided that my hypnotherapy marketing mentoring rates are going to increase from June of this year. This is simply because the time and effort it takes to mentor one person is significant vs the revenue I make from my online work.  So if you are looking to work with me on a one to one basis I suggest you book in now as my fees are going to double from the middle of this year.

Who is The Target Market For Your Therapy Business?

Therapy MarketingHave you ever stopped and taken the time to consider your therapy marketing and who exactly it is supposed to be targeting? My guess it that the majority of therapists have never given it a second thought. Why? Because they construct a generic website that is all things to all people but don’t take the time to really focus in on what their customers really need and want. Here’s a typical example:

Sharon has just completed her therapy training and decides she wants to set up a practice in Townsville. She works with a local web designer and tells them that she would like a website similar to the ones that she has seen her competitors use. She tells that designer that she is looking to get business in Townsville and asks them to construct website pages detailing all the different forms of therapy she does. Sharon knows that she loves working with people suffering from pet bereavement so makes that a feature on her front page. The rest of the website pages have a brief overview of her services and there is a contact page for potential customers to send her an email. Sharon gets the website placed live online and waits for the phone to ring.

Sound familiar? I would say the vast majority of therapists do something very similar to Sharon and never really think about who their customers are and what they want. Instead they construct a website that they have seen a thousand times before or alternatively they choose to focus on a treatment  that really interests them without ever giving a thought to whether their customers actually want or need it. To really target your therapy marketing it is necessary to put in much more thought into who your customer really is.

Defining your Therapy Business Market

1) Location – One of the biggest mistakes I see therapists making is defining a market location that is too small. In Sharon’s case her marketing revolved around Townsville but that really does not make much sense especially if that area does not have a significant population. The reality is that you need to be targeting the towns and villages around your home location as well. This could also mean the county or the region where you are based. I regularly get clients coming to see me from many miles away so it does not make sense to focus on a small area.

2) Age – How old are the clients who are coming to see you? Are your treatments aimed at children, young professionals,the middle aged or even the elderly? Try and work out who is coming to see you and then create a website and marketing plan that appeals to that niche.

3) Gender – Can you define your market even further and differentiate by gender? If you specialise in fertility therapy or Hypnobirthing then creating a website that also appeals to men is slightly pointless as it is the women who are making the buying decisions in these cases.

4) Income – There is no point in offering £200 per hour treatments or an expensive package of treatments if you know that your local area is filled with low income earners. That said if you are in the middle of Central London or New York then yes you can sell top dollar all singing all dancing therapies at premium prices.

5) Interests – You may have a huge interest in pet bereavement therapy like Sharon but is it the most suitable therapy to highlight on your website front page? This issue by the way is not made up. I worked with a Counsellor who was getting hardly any clients and was scratching a living. She had put this treatment as the highlight on her website. It was obvious that not only did nobody care about this treatment but that it was probably putting them off contacting her for other issues. Think about the real problems that people really want to see you about such as couples counselling or anxiety reduction and concentrate on those. If you do offer other treatments that are more “out” there stick them on your inside pages.

6) Best Sellers – I have mentioned before that in order to be a great therapy marketer you need to “Smell What Sells”. Have a look at your competition and the people who are typically coming to see you and you will find that some of your treatments will be ten times more popular than others. These need to form the core of what you offer as that is what is going to make you a living. Creating a niche is great but not when it is so obscure that nobody is paying to come and see you for it.

7) Where are They? – Once you have a better idea of where your target market is based you can start to market to that location. So if you are selling Hypnobirthing you need to target local midwives and doctors surgeries, playgroups and coffee shops. Get together with local Yoga and Pilates teachers to sell your services and so on. There is no point just sticking an advert in the local paper as it isn’t targeted marketing. You need to focus in as closely as you can to your niche and sell them more services.

8) What do You love? – Even though I don’t advocate choosing obscure treatments to focus on there is no harm in choosing to focus on the other areas that you love to work in. If you get a kick out of helping people to stop smoking then really focus in on making that part of your core business. If you hate working in other areas then leave them off your websites. I know that I don’t get excited about working with children so where possible I try and avoid  that kind of work. Others however will love the little ones. Horses for courses as they say.

9) Vocabulary – I saw a great website today from a Life Coach called “yourkickasslife.com”. The title of the website and the content stood out but remember that this kind of website has its limitations. It has been clearly designed to appeal to women and I would say an age demographic of 30 to 50. Having a website using similar language whilst offering treatment for older customers will simply not appeal in the same way. Choose the tone of your words and phrasing carefully to suit the customers you are trying to appeal to.

10) Keywords – Finally make sure that you use keywords in your copy that will help you get found. In other words think about what your customers would type into the search engines and then use those phrases in your website content. There is no point in wasting words talking about non related content as nobody will find you!

Defining an audience for your therapy marketing and targeting those customers can be easier than you think but it does take a little effort. Get it right and you will reap the rewards but get it wrong and you will be lucky to see a customer coming your way. If you need help with your therapy marketing strategy then getting a professional involved is a great way of making a difference to your bottom line. It can make the difference between success at your new chosen career or failure and heading back to your old day job!

 

 

Are You Making This Pricing Mistake?

Hypnotherapy Marketing PlanHow do you sell to your customers? Here is what I generally see when I visit other therapists websites. There will be a price per hour charge that is offered to most customers for general problems and then sometimes a more expensive price for stop smoking sessions or perhaps weight loss. That is it! No thought has gone into the packaging of these prices and how you can use price to make additional profits. Remember in order to really boost your profits you need a decent Hypnotherapy Marketing Plan.

So lets start with the basics. Offering a bog standard one off price for most of your sessions makes no sense whatsoever. You need to start thinking about what a customer is worth to you in monetary terms and how you can make additional profits by manipulating your price points. A single price per hour does not do very much towards making this happen.

For example you know that a weight loss client who needs to lose five stone will need to see you for multiple sessions in order to see real results. Offering them one session at a time is sending out totally the wrong signal to that person. It gives some people the impression that just like Harry Potter you are going to magic away their problem in one hour and you know that is not going to happen. When you advertise like this the client is going to be disappointed when they don’t see miracles happening after that first session and they will not bother to return. This is a wasted opportunity on both sides and therefore you need to create a better strategy to prevent this from happening.

Hypnotherapy Marketing Plan

Now if you were not aware most businesses create a three tier pricing structure for their products in order to maximise their revenue. You will have seen it everywhere but probably not noticed it or thought about apply it to your hypnotherapy marketing. Ever gone on to a website and been offered a bronze, silver or gold package for software? Or perhaps you were booking a flight and you were given the option of economy, business or first class? When you start looking out for this three tier pricing model it will become obvious how retailers and service providers are squeezing extra profits from their clients.

So how does this model apply to your hypnotherapy marketing plan. Well lets look again at the issue of weight loss and how your pricing could be adapted to this model. You can now tier your services so that you can move your customers into different pricing brackets.

Package One – Offering a three session suggestion hypnosis package. No frills, no in-depth analysis of why the client is overeating but three sessions of suggestion to motivate them and get them on track.

Package Two – A six session plan offering more interactive sessions involving regression and parts therapy to really find out why your client has the problem. Once the reason for the problem is found you then work on resolving that issue with more complex hypnosis procedures. You could even throw in the extras such as NLP, CBT or any other therapy that you would find useful.

Package Three – A ten session plan offering the deluxe, all singing all dancing weight loss support. Daily check in’s on email plus a full audio program and eBook. Nutritional support and exercise plan (bought in from other practitioners) and so on.

How Three Tier Pricing Will Transform Your Hypnotherapy Profit

Now you have no need to see a person for a one session wonder again. They are barely worth it to you financially. Instead you are arranging to see your clients for a minimum number of sessions to reach their goal. How you create these tiers and differentiate them is entirely up to you. What I have placed above is purely an example of what can be done so feel free to come up with your own versions. That weight loss client who rings you will now have a much better understanding of what may be necessary to really achieve their goal. By understanding they need to commit to a program of sessions means they will no longer be disappointed with a one off session. It also means at the very least you are getting to see those clients for a minimum of three sessions.

But things get better! It is a well known psychological fact that most people do not like paying the lowest price for goods and services. In their mind it means that they are getting poor value or a product that will only do part of what they need. A prime example of this is wine in restaurants. Most people will opt for a mid price bottle rather than go for the cheapest especially if they are trying to impress a date! That means that a good percentage of your clients will opt for the second package of weight loss support rather than the cheapest. This means that you can expect to earn five times more than you did with your one session wonder.

By having a three tier pricing structure you are also preventing people from trying to haggle down your prices or asking for discounts. As there is already a lower price option there is nowhere for them to negotiate down to and so those time sappers no longer even bother to ask the question. There is also the upside. Even though most of your clients will choose tier one or two there will be a small percentage who go for the full on 10 session mega package. Why? Because they like to buy premium products (the best TV, mobile phone etc) and so when it comes to weight loss they continue to want the most expensive product. That now means that you have potentially got some clients staying with you for weeks and months filling out your appointment diary in a much simpler way.

You Can Have a Successful Hypnotherapy Practice

If you really take the time out to analyse your business you can see that using this one tactic can alter your entire hypnotherapy marketing plan and your bottom line. Even better this three tier pricing policy can be applied to almost all of the treatments that you have on offer. By being smart about how you offer your products you can increase your profits substantially. So take the time out and really think about how you can apply this methodology to your business and watch your profits begin to rise substantially. Alternatively if you would like a little extra help you can purchase my eBook from the online store today or contact me for more details on my hypnotherapy marketing mentoring sessions.

 

Boost Your Hypnosis Marketing by Learning from the Best

hypnosis marketingHow many times as a therapist have you actually gone online and started researching marketing methods for your business? How often do you sign up to some of the leading marketers emails and newsletters to get help with your business? From what I have seen this is something that very few therapists actually do. Given the opportunity most hypnotherapists would happily sign up to numerous CPD courses on hypnosis rather than spending time learning how marketing works. This attitude is killing your business. In order to boost your hypnosis marketing you need to be looking at what the best in marketing business are doing.

As I have said many times before without clients you are nothing. It means no revenue and no mortgage being paid. In order to get the clients you need to do hypnosis marketing. It is not a nice to have but an essential. Now as well as learning how to market from people such as myself there are plenty of people online who have taken their marketing to another level. They may work in completely different industries but the great thing with marketing is that the techniques used can be applied to all kinds of businesses and areas. Keep your eye on what the best marketers are doing and you can use their tried and tested methods to boost your business.

I know that to make sure I achieve my business goals I am always looking at what other people are doing. In-between seeing clients and running my online business I can spend a considerable amount of time browsing online and seeing what is new. I no longer bother to see what my local competitors are doing instead I look and see what the best people in the world are doing. These are the people who have taken their businesses to the next level.

So who are these movers and shakers?

Well the list is changing all the time but some great people to follow are:

Marie Forleo – This woman is amazing. She started off as a life coach and now she runs a multi- million dollar company. Sign up for her updates and news and you will get access to her great videos on all kinds of issues that you may experience with a business. Her website is glossy, her videos funny and informative and you can get much of this for free. What’s not to like?

Mari Smith – Want to learn more about how to make Facebook work for you? This woman has all kinds of information on the social media site. Analysis of updates as well as showing you how you can make money on this social media platform.

Neil Patel – Founder of quicksprout.com and guru on all kinds of marketing. His blogs get hoards of visitors because they are useful and informative. He talks on everything from infographics to SEO.

Derek Halpern – Founder of Social Triggers and a individual who is particularly interested in the psychology of marketing. When I started to watch his videos he looked like a college graduate and an amateur but with great information. By showing people such as myself how to market he has made a fortune. His videos are now more polished and professional. Just shows you what money can do for you.

Matt Cutts – Never heard of him? Well you should as he is in charge of Google’s webmaster videos. If there is a big change coming on the Google search engine he will be the first person to tell you about it. Keep an eye on what he has to say as it could impact your web position.

Rand Fishkin – The founder of moz.com. He is an expert in SEO, marketing methods and provides great information on building great businesses.

I could go on. Look around the internet and there are plenty of people who are willing to show you how to run a better business. You don’t have to purchase everything they publish but I have no doubt that in some cases it would be well worth your money to do so. None of these people talk about hypnosis marketing specifically but I can tell you that when it comes to selling everything is simple. You have a product or service and you need to persuade your customer to buy it. Get that right and you have the perfect business.

Hypnotherapy Marketing – What Should You Charge?

THypnotherapy feesoday I participated in a fascinating debate on a LinkedIn group where a person had posted a question on exactly how much a hypnotherapist should charge. What followed were a series of posts on the amount people charged clients, what was too much and what was too little. What really got me interested however was that a number of people wrote that they saw themselves as healers first and then hypnotherapists and therefore they never expected to earn much from the profession. Wow I thought this is a problem. How can we be expected for people to take us seriously when we can’t even see ourselves as offering a service that is worth real money. This is a perfect example of negative hypnotherapy marketing.

I was very clear with the group. I do not or have never seen myself as a healer. In fact for those of you writing websites please never post that word on your pages. What does the image of a healer conjure up to you in this day and age? My guess is some new age hippy type who believes that they can make someone well without there being any scientific evidence to demonstrate their abilities. Healers are seen as quacks and also people who could potentially prey on the vulnerable in exchange for dubious services. Alternatively healers are seen as people who have some god given gift to help others. In particular they go around offering to help others for little or no money. Frankly neither of these descriptions comes even close to what I do.

In my hypnotherapy marketing I am very clear. I am a professional therapist who is a member of a serious professional body and who has got significant training and expertise in the area in which I work. I run a very serious business and because of that I deserve to be paid accordingly. My charges may vary depending on the area where you come to see me or the program which you are on but ultimately do not expect cheap. Why am I not cheap? Because I need to pay my bills and live a good lifestyle.  Think like a healer or a person who does not deserve to earn very much and that is exactly what will happen.

Your earnings as a hypnotherapist need to be sufficient for you to pay the bills. That means your income at the very least needs to keep you solvent. Personally I prefer my income to do more than just pay my outgoings each month. I like to go on nice holidays and eat in nice restaurants and I work hard to make sure that I earn enough so I can enjoy the finer things in life. Not every therapist however has the business savvy to make sure that they can do the same.

Get Your Priorities Right

As well as working with therapists I have helped plenty of small business owners over the years. One individual springs to mind who ran play classes for small children. Generally her business model was that she would hire out a school or a church hall and a number of times a week parents could bring their children to the classes for a couple of hours. It would allow the parents to know that the children were being looked after for a couple of hours whilst they got on with other chores. Meanwhile the children would have a great time playing with their friends and enjoying the activities provided for them.

Such a simple business model yet the person concerned was living hand to mouth. In fact when I met her she could not afford to put on the heating in her flat. Why? Because instead of charging the parents for a terms worth of classes she would only charge them if they turned up. This therefore created the problem that she never knew how much money she would be earning each week. If the parents fancied doing something else she would have the hall and overheads to pay for and no money to pay for it. In order to create a stable income for her it was really simple, charge the parents per term. She would have a guaranteed income and then she would not need to worry about her basic income.

Now What About You?

Why do I tell this story? Because I know that plenty of therapists out there do the same thing. They have a room which they need to pay for either in a set time slot or on an ad-hoc basis. They book their client in for a session and the client does not bother to show up. Not only have you then lost the time for the session but you have also paid for room hire, travel costs and lost the travel time to and from the clinic. You have lost money by trying to help people. Now if you had taken a deposit or the payment up front it would be a very different story. I rarely get no shows now because people have paid their hard earned cash upfront.

Or what about the therapists who book their clients on a program and charge session by session. They hand their clients booklets, audios and information packs in the first session and never see their clients again. They have taken all your valuable information and resources and walked out the door with and you will never get paid the full cost of the service.

Have you ever given discounts? Felt sorry for a client and worried that they would not have access to therapy if you didn’t lower your price. Then you found out that this client was living in a large house, paid for Sky TV every month and eating in the best restaurants in town. You have reduced your income because your client has decided they want to prioritise their spending in areas other than their health.

Earn The Income You Deserve

Unless you are one of the few very business savvy therapists in this industry you need to up your prices today. Whatever you are charging is probably too little and if you are a woman this is almost definitely the case. Read my blog on hypnotherapists and gender pay differentials. In this same LinkedIn group there were many people saying that they had hardly upped their charges in years. There is a fear in the industry that we will push our clients away if we charge too much. Yet year on year I have consistently increased my prices and each year my income has risen substantially. I should point out that I started my business during the worst recession out there and still made money.

People will always pay for quality and successful results. Look at your website, the rooms you use with your clients and your advertising. Do they scream success at you? If not then up your game because you will never clients paying more unless they believe they are getting value for their hard earned money. Do not believe as many hypnotherapists do that the profession is lowly paid and therefore you will never become rich from your business. That simply is not true. I see plumbers, builders, electricians all making money from their careers and they are self employed as well. The difference is that they run their businesses to make money whilst most therapists don’t.

Believe it or not you can have your cake and eat it. With my hypnotherapy marketing courses and business mentoring I can help you to have a vocation that you love and to earn great money from it as well. Learn how to market like a pro and watch your income soar.

 

Happy Chinese New Year – Seasonal Hypnosis Marketing Works!

Seasonal Hypnosis MarketingSo for those of you that celebrate it Happy Chinese New Year – The Year of the Goat. A time for sweeping out the old and bringing in the new and of course with that brings those new years resolutions for the second time this year. Yep it means that not only are you able to capture new customers who want to change their life in January but in February as well. Capitalise on an event such as the Chinese New Year and you now have another way of getting those valuable customers in through your door. This post is about seasonal hypnosis marketing and how it can work for you.

You see throughout the year there are set times when people look are looking to purchase products and services. We see them everyday in the shops but many hypnotherapists are not capitalising on capturing those customers in the same way that retailers are and that needs to change if you want a steady stream of visitors coming to your website. Retailers know that by planning seasonal campaigns they can have a great way of boosting their profits and that means you can apply the same tactics to your hypnosis marketing to increase your revenue.

So what exactly am I talking about. Well lets think of some of the services that you could be starting to offering as part of your marketing.  Here are some really basic campaigns to get you started. How about:

Winter – Helping people with SAD syndrome and depression.

Valentines Day – Helping people who are depressed because of break ups.

Summer – In the spring start advertising to help people get the perfect beach body.

Xmas – Audios on how to deal with Xmas stress.

AprilMay – Helping students to calm their exam nerves.

There are literally hundreds of different ways in which you can promote your products to your customers if you take the time to think about it. You just need to plan your marketing year in advance and choose the campaigns that will work for your business and specialisms.

National Awareness Days

As well as just general promotions there are days throughout the year known as national awareness days or weeks when certain issues are promoted to the general public. Get to know the big ones for your interests and you will be able to attract people looking for very specialised problem solving. Most hypnotherapists should be aware of No Smoking Day but what about some of the following where hypnosis can be used to help with the problem:

  • Tinnitus Awareness Week
  • Stress Awareness Month
  • Pain Awareness Month
  • Alcohol Awareness Week
  • IBS Awareness month

Now these are just a few of the weeks or months where you can advertise your specialist skills and there will be many more.

This is a simple hypnosis marketing tactic but it can help to reap great rewards just by targeting specific groups of customers who want to be helped at certain times of the year. Start to think about what you want to be offering your potential clients for 2015 and structure some simple marketing campaigns around it. At the end of the year look at which were successful and stick with those year on year to increase your profits.

 

 

Boost Your Hypnotherapy Marketing – Smell What Sells!

Hypnotherapy Marketing - Smell What Sells!Ever watched the TV program The Apprentice? The UK version has Alan Sugar at the helm and every year they run one particular task. The candidates are told that they will be working in a market stall, shop or pop up stall and they are given a range of goods which they can sell. They are allowed to pick only a certain number of items to put up for sale and the team which makes the most money wins the task. Alan Sugar always barks the same phrase at them “smell what sells”. In other words make sure you pick the products which you know people are going to buy. Great advice and one which you need to apply to your hypnotherapy marketing.

Every time when I run my marketing classes I can guarantee that one of the therapists in the class will come to me and tell me that they are not getting enough clients and they can’t understand why. They will explain to me how they run their hypnotherapy marketing and in most cases it is instantly obvious to me why nobody is knocking at their door. One person in particular springs to mind who illustrates this point perfectly.

A gentleman came to see me who worked in an affluent area of the country and explained how he wanted to specialise in working with people who cared for their elderly or sick relatives. He wanted to help support them and felt hypnosis was a great way of doing this. His website front page openly discussed this service and he advertised locally to bring people into his clinic the only problem was he wasn’t getting any calls for this or his other services and was scratching a living. Well of course he wasn’t.

1) He was trying to get business off people who have no money and no time. How many people who are not working and are only getting a care allowance can afford to see a hypnotherapist? Even if they did have the money they would not have the time to come and see him.

2) He was ignoring the fact that in the area where he lived there were hundreds of thousands of potential clients who would come to see him but for other services. His clinic location was in an area known for rich affluent women. People who probably would love to lose more weight or get help for anxiety or smoking. He was ignoring the people who were practically begging to come and see him.

Now I am not saying that he couldn’t still try and support the people he was interested in but if he wanted to earn money he needed to adjust his business model fast to prevent him ending up broke.

Who is your Hypnosis Marketing Targeted at?

When you are doing your hypnotherapy marketing you need to consider who is willing to spend money to come in through your doors. Picking people who have not got the cash is going to get you nowhere. But I have seen the error being made time and time again. You need to understand what the bestsellers are going to be in your area and market those services to the people who need them. Wasting time and money advertising to the 1% is not going to help your bank balance.

Consider how you market your hypnotherapy practice because there is nothing more off putting that an advert or website that actually repels clients. Yep I see plenty of these as well. For example a Counsellor who used her website home page to explain how she could help with pet bereavement. Yes of course many people will need help with this but putting it on your front page made no sense. All this did was put off potential clients who wanted help with their marriages or depression. Frankly it made her seem just that little bit flaky and her potential clients moved on elsewhere.

What about another therapist who called her website something that had nothing to do with hypnotherapy at all. When you arrived at the website you had no idea at all of what she was offering. It was incomprehensible to me and I knew what she did for a living so goodness knows what potential web searchers thought. Again she came to see me because she wasn’t getting any business. Not a great shock and one that was really easily rectified.

Oh and don’t get me started on the number of therapists who have god awful pictures of themselves on their websites or bad videos. Photoshop is there for a reason to make you look better. I have seen so many bad pictures of therapists who would frankly frighten a small child. People coming across your website will see your picture and think, no thanks, and head off elsewhere until they see something they like. If you don’t look photogenic then choose a different web design and leave the picture out. Be self aware and understand that looks sell and dreadful ones don’t. Harsh I know but a reality that you need to be aware of.

Remember Alan Sugar made his millions for a reason. He understood the products that people wanted to buy and manufactured them. We can do the same. Research what is likely to bring you in a good income and start advertising for clients who want that service. Smell what sells and you will find that your hypnotherapy marketing becomes significantly easier and you will be considerably wealthier.