How Do You Know You're Moving Forward?

I've been rolling around ideas for this end-of-the-year blog post. But then I got a lovely card from Marjorie Brook with the following quote. It sums up, for me, the simple truth of life. Thank you for reading me in 2013. I will continue to try to give you something worth reading in 2014.

Kelly Bowers LMT

“I hope that in this year to come, you make mistakes. Because if you are making mistakes, then you are making new things, trying new things, learning, living, pushing yourself, changing yourself, changing your world. You’re doing things you’ve never done before, and more importantly, you’re Doing Something.”

—Neil Gaiman

What Language Are You Using?

Which of these words would you like your clients to use to describe you? Professional or generous? Knowledgeable or interesting? Efficient or thoughtful? Wise or funny? Organized or warm? Insightful or happy? Experienced or open? Smart or nice? Patient or friendly?

Which did you pick more often, the first word in the par or the second word? The first words are words that make more sense in a professional relationship. The second words make more sense in a personal relationship.

Is there something wrong with being nice or friendly to our clients? Possibly. That doesn't mean that you have to be not-nice or un-friendly. It means placing a higher value on being professional, knowledgeable, insightful, etc.

When we are more strongly motivated by the kind of ideals that come from our personal life, we are (consciously or not) asking our clients to feed the needs of our personal life. Our friends and family are meant to feed the needs of our personal life. If your personal relationship needs are not being met by your personal life, then you need to work on your personal life, not focus that energy on your clients.

It's stunningly easy to fall into this trap.

• Being uncomfortable with thinking of ourselves as business people.
• Having a negative association with the phrase "professional".
• Being uncomfortable with getting paid for an intimate relationship.
• Not really understanding / not being sufficiently trained to be both intimate and professional. 

• Working too many hours for a personal life.
• Working a schedule that doesn't sync up with our friends and family (so we rarely see them).
• Struggling to make ends meet so we don't have the money to go out, go on vacation, etc.
• Doing work that can be emotionally / psychically / spiritually draining.
• Being culturally trained to value nice and friendly above all else.

In my experience, ethical challenges arise for one of two reasons:

• you don't know any better / weren't trained properly
• you have a (legitimate) personal need that isn't being met by your personal life

A good sign of either of these conditions is what kind of adjectives you would like your clients to use when describing you.

What language is more dominant in your head today?

Giving It Away for Free (or not)

Question: how effective is it to give massage for free as a way to attract clients?
My experience: it's not

How many times have you heard a massage therapist suggest (or have thought it yourself) that you should give away free massages to "market" your practice. I suspect the thinking looks something like this:

• Once people get a massage, they'll pay anything to get it again since it feels so damned good.
• The benefits they experience from that free session will be so great that people will gladly shoe-horn it into their budget.
• They'll be so grateful that you gave it to them for free that they'll happily pay you for it forever after that.
• People don't know hardly anything about massage and need it to be free to get over any reluctance they have to try it. But once they do....(see above).
• It will raise your profile higher than any other local MT so it will give you a competitive edge.

I suspect there is also more-deeply-buried thinking that might look something like this:

• I'm not comfortable with what I'm charging / massage is too expensive / I could never afford these prices so I have to lure potential clients in with freebies.
• I can't believe someone would pay me that much money.
• I love massage so much I'd do it for free so why not do it for free? After all, it doesn't cost me anything.
• I can't talk about massage well (much less talk about myself and my practice) so I'll attract people by giving stuff away (and everyone loves free stuff).
• I am deeply uncomfortable with marketing / sales but giving things away is easy and feels good.
• I'm too new / inexperienced / not good enough (and/or the market is too tight) so I've got to give it away for free.
• People will feel guilty if they don't pay for a session after getting one for free.
• Nice people give things away; greedy/mean people demand money for it.

I know there are MTs who have used free massage to successfully promote their practice, I know many many more who have found it to be a terrible way to promote their practice. I'm one of those.

Why doesn't free work?

Going from $0 to $60 / $70 / $80 is too big a leap.

What if a merchant gave you something new for free, you discovered it was something you really wanted, and then the merchant said "yeah, next time it'll cost you $70." How would that feel? I know the technique works well with, say, heroin or cocaine but would it work as well with chocolate or a cable package? Or massage?

Budgets are not bottomless.

I don't care how much I love that tricked out high end luxury car. Or even how much easier it would make it to do outcalls (on board nav and it will parallel park itself? Be still my beating heart!). I can't afford it. Go ahead, let me drive it for a week and really fall in love with it. I still can't afford it. Giving it to me for free -- once -- does not make my budget magically grow large enough to accommodate it.

Once a product is in the "free" section of our brain, it's hard to move it out of there.

What happened to Napster when it went from free music sharing to for-pay?
What happened when newspapers went from offering their content for free online to trying to charge for it?
Do you order water at a restaurant if they don't give it to you for free?
Do you donate every time PBS / NPR asks for money??

Once we've gotten used to getting something for free, we discover how much we can live without it when we have to pay for it.

Most business don't give away valuable services for free.

I charge $90 for a hour of massage. Here are some comparable services and products in the DC area:

Dinner out for 2:  $85 (includes tax and tip)
Virus Protection (one year): $95
Cable: $100
Washington Gas: $88
5 sets of sheets @ Target: $90
Haircut + tips = $80
monthly cell phone bill: $70
3-hour ethics class: $75
National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center: $75 (good seats)

How many of these companies are giving their services away for free to entice you in and then honestly expect you to pay full price? HBO does it but only when there's a really popular show and only for a limited amount of time. The gas company never does it. Target offers sales but not freebies. I might be able to find reduced price tickets for the Kennedy Center but it isn't going to give them to me for free, hoping I'll then want to plunk down $75 every week / month.

They know the value of what they offer. They know people can and will pay for it. Not everyone but enough people to keep them in business. Maybe they've even learned that too many consumers do this kind of math: 

free = not very valuable
free = desperation
free = not important

Or worse (think of pharmaceutical reps):

free = very deep pockets, can afford to keep giving it to me for free

Free is worth nothing if I can't get to you

"Geographic desirability" is not just for dating. If it's going to take me an hour to get to you (and then an hour to get home) then "free" will not convert to "paying". Especially if that hour of driving is during rush hour or bad weather.

If you don't practice in my part of the state / country / continent, then a free massage is never going to lead to a paying massage. Take note of that when event organizers are saying you can "market" your massage to an event that draws from a wide geographic area, like marathons, walk-a-thons, or other big-name fundraisers.

Let's say you provide free massage at a corporate event. But your hours of operation are Monday - Friday 9-5. The people you're providing massage to can't come to you during your office hours because, hey, they're already working those hours!

One hour of massage may not be worth it

Look at that list of comparable services, above. Is one hour of massage worth  more than a month's worth of gas for my home? Will it give me more pleasure / entertainment than a month's worth of cable TV? Which one will I regret most if I skip it this month -- a massage or a haircut?

Massage doesn't exist in a vacuum. It exists in the larger context of our (potential) client's lives. It is always going to be measured against the relative value of something else. Even if you give it to me for free, I am not forgoing my next haircut so I can get another massage (because skipping a haircut makes me look like a Yeti on a bad hair day).

Free / deeply discounted massage tends to attract deal-hunters.

Ask most people who've tried Living Social / Groupon / etc. There is a huge group of people who cruise these sites looking for deals for things they will never pay full price for (maybe that includes you?). When people are in the market for a massage therapist, Groupon / Living Social / etc. is not where they start their search.


Does that mean we can never give massage away for free?

No. But you have to do it strategically.

• Is this being offered one on one to someone who has expressed a solid interest in your work? And has a history of paying for this kind of service?
• Are you offering a free massage to introduce an existing client to a new modality?
• Is the person actually able to pay full price for a massage? Do they know what massage can do for them (meaning they already assign value to it)?
• Is there a very specific population who won't find you any other way?

Instead of free, think about this:

Is there a way to offer discounts rather than freebies?

Can you charge for your massage at a volunteer event and donate all the proceeds to the event? Then people experience your work in the context of money leaving their hands (and you look like quite the philanthropist).

Can you make the free part an add-on to a session someone is already paying for?

Can you create a sliding scale / Pay What You Can / etc. to help people who genuinely have trouble affording massage?

Get creative, think strategically, think prosperously, and don't automatically go to "give it away!" as a way to promote your practice.

You're a small business (or possibly not)

If you've read this blog for any length of time, you'll know I believe it's important for massage therapists to take themselves seriously as businesses. Just think carefully about calling yourself a small business.

When I look at products or services targeted to small businesses, I become baffled. How would I use that? When would I need this other thing? What would I do with that doohickey? There are so many offerings that are still too big for me.

If you're working on your own, you're a micro business. And there aren't a lot of products and services specifically targeted to us.

I've been researching bookkeeping software the last few weeks. The two big names in the field are Quicken and QuickBooks. When people recommend QuickBooks, they often say it's the "most popular bookkeeping software for small businesses". While Quicken is "only" good for the home.

QuickBooks is a good package for a small business. But, holy cow, I can't imagine using it for my practice! For a one-person practice that doesn't bill clients, prepare estimates, etc. it looks much too complicated. I use Quicken for home finances and I find it also works just fine for my practice.

Why does this matter? Often (too often) I hear MTs say they're going to use [fill in the blank] because it's "best for small businesses". If it doesn't work well for them they often blame themselves. They must be using it wrong. Or perhaps they're just not smart enough. Or maybe they are fooling themselves to think they are a "real" business.

The odds are: no, you're not (using it wrong, dumb, or foolish).

When you are having trouble finding products or services that are "right-sized" for a micro business, don't be surprised. Be critical of small business products / services; by that I mean really evaluate whether it will work for your business. Be willing to say that a popular "small business" product or service just isn't right for you.

Even though you are really and truly a business (and need to take yourself seriously as a business!).

In this economy......

Over the weekend I was talking business with a woman who runs a very popular (as in "waiting list" popular) craft class. She's pondering raising her prices but, like so many of us, waffling about it. Unsure. Uncomfortable with "asking" for more money. Feeling a little guilty about her success I think.

As she was laying out her concerns, she said "and, of course, in this economy...."

In this economy.

Have you said it? Have you thought it? Did you really mean it or was it just a way to justify your own reluctance to raise your rates? Did you say it without finishing the thought, trusting that we all know what it means?

I'm not saying our entire economy is plump and rosy. There are a lot of people -- waaaaaay too many people -- struggling or just making ends meet. What I've noticed, though, is how often massage therapists and other small business owners toss the phrase out as part of a laundry list of reasons they shouldn't / couldn't raise their rates.

Are you using it as a shield against the decision to raise (or not) your rates? Or is the economy still so shaky in your target market that it is a reasonable consideration?

Do you even know how your target market / client base is doing economically? How your community is doing? Beyond the dire reporting in the evening news (which is rarely the full story)?

The decision to raise our rates gives many of us heartburn. It runs hard into our desire to just be all helpful, considerate, giving, etc. etc. etc. We think we're not being those things -- helpful, considerate, giving, etc. -- by setting our services at a higher rate than they are right now. We think we're "taking" something from them. Something they can't afford.

Do we really know they can't afford it? Do you know how your client base is doing economically? Or does "this economy" really mean "I'm not doing so well financially"?

If you find yourself saying "and of course, in this economy...." do a quick body scan. Is that phrase arising from your brain, from your observations, research, and calculations? Is it rising from your heart? From your gut? What feeling accompanies it? Is it fear? Is it anxiety? Is it discomfort?

You and I know your body will tell you truth while your mind is happily spinning elaborate webs of distraction and deception. Learn the truth. Then make your decisions accordingly.

The Truth About Getting Started

This blog post by Stephanie St. Clair is funny while also painfully true about the realities of going into business to do the thing that you love.

Here are some of my favorite bits from the post:

Your success (and financial stability) will come from expertly running your business — not teaching yoga, life coaching, writing copy, or making jewelry. In other words, you will spend 15% of the time doing what you love (your gift..in my case coaching and writing) and 85% of the time marketing, administrating, selling, strategizing your business, and answering a shitload of email. Survival will totally hinge on how quickly you adopt this role of Business Owner first, creator of pretty things, second.

Your trajectory for success will take as long as everyone else’s, even though you’re special and brilliant.

Our enemy is not lack of preparation; it’s not the difficulty of the project, or the state of the marketplace, or the emptiness of our bank account. The enemy is resistance. The enemy is our chattering brain, which, if we give it so much as a nanosecond, will start producing excuses, alibis, transparent self-justifications, and a million reasons why he can’t/shouldn’t/won’t do what we know we need to do. (Though this is actually a quote from Steven Pressfield that Stephanie uses in her post.)

I thought marketing = slimy sales letters with big arrows and opt-in boxes and I couldn’t! I wouldn’t! So I put my head in magical fairyland sand, stubbornly insisting that my customers would be tractor-beamed into my budding practice by the pulsating, heavenly light that radiated from my vision boards and 4 blog posts. And then I ate canned food and spaghetti for a long, long time.

Do not price your offerings around your personal ability to pay for it — you are not your ideal customer.

Money! Money? Money. Money........

Notice something about yourself....

*  When you think about your work, how does that feel in your body?
*  When you think about making money from your work, how does that feel in your body?

Are these two feelings compatible? Incompatible? There are a lot of MTs who are uneasy / uncomfortable / twitchy around the subject of money. I just read a great blog post about this from Mark Silver, who is worth following if you want the heart that guides your hands to also guide your business.

Here's an excerpt:

Your best work has nothing to do with getting paid. When you’re in flow, you give, and it flows, and whoosh-waba-waba, your clients and customers receive yowsa good stuff.

What a high. That feels great. Love it. But it’s only half the story.

The other half is you on your knees, needing support, help, caring, and cash. The trick is remembering that the money is attached to actual, live people.

It’s a subtle distinction. You don’t want to see people as money faucets, but you do want to respect them as people who have received money themselves and have it to give to you.

The subtle shift is in identifying the endpoint. If you’re thinking “connect-create-offer” to receive money, then money is the endpoint, and the heart will not rest there, it will want to keep moving.

However, if you’re thinking “connect-create-offer” to serve and help people, and money is part of the “connect,” that puts money in its place.

Here's the whole post.

Just Booked

I just booked a long weekend for myself at a state park in West Virginia in January. One of my favorite places.

Yes, it's time for my annual business retreat! 4 days I devote to the business side of my practice, getting ready to pay my taxes, close out the books for 2013, think about what I want to accomplish in 2014. Get a massage, maybe have a soak at the tiny national park. Visit some favorite restaurants.

I feel like I'm a solo voice in a vast maelstrom that is the massage therapy profession. So many of us. whirling and spinning, keeping our practices moving forward, just trying to keep one step ahead of the next thing. And then the next thing. Who's got time for four whole days away??

You do. If you're serious about growing a business, you do. Here's why:

If you take a 2-3 hours to quietly close out your books for 2013, tax time will be easy-peasy because you'll already have all the information you need for your Schedule C (and associated forms). Without panic. At 11 pm. On April 15.

If you take 1/2 day to quietly think through who you want to market to, it will easier to see good ways to reach them. You're less likely to waste time and money on marketing efforts that don't work.

If you take 1-2 hours to really look at the numbers for your business (income, expenses, growth, etc.) you can set realistic goals for 2014. "Make more money" is accurate but stupid.

You can spend an hour reflecting on the types of clients you've been seeing and contemplating what continuing education you need in 2014 to best serve them and yourself. That beats blindly grabbing at whatever comes your way the month before your license renewal is due. (I already know it's lymph drainage for me next year. It's the missing piece to make the other modalities I've learned truly the best they can be.)

You can spend 20 minutes making sure you're on track for your next license renewal! Ethics? CPR? HIV? Enough hands-on hours? Spread the costs out so it's not all heaped into the last few weeks before license renewal.

Believe it or not, if you don't have a business plan you could write one in 3 days. It would be a simple one, a one-pager, but a huge percentage of us only need a one-pager. I've said it before, a business plan helps you see clearly and honestly what your business is and what it can be. It keeps you honest, with yourself.

It's also a chance to celebrate everything you accomplished in 2013, mourn the stuff that didn't work, and just pause to realize you're still here, you're still moving forward, you're still providing quality service, you're still in business. (And get a massage)

I'm going to a state park lodge in West Virginia. $80 / night. Simple, quiet, effective. Where can you go?

Why I've Given Up On Exchanging

note: "barter" has specific meaning to the IRS which is why I use "exchange".

I've been trying to find someone to help me get my website on a new platform. My go-to person for web services insists on exchanging massage for her services. She says it's a way to make sure she gets the massages she loves so much.

However, she's been "working on" getting me some information about this platform change for 8 months. I'm not waiting for my website, I'm waiting for information about the process!

When you are "paying" another professional for their services with massage, you are always going to be a lower priority than a client who is paying them with cash. And I can't blame them. I'm a small business. Getting paid, cash flow is a high priority for me too. I understand. I just hate having to wait. And wait. And wait. And, no, withholding the massage doesn't seem to make any difference.

I've also given up on exchanging massages. Like exchanges for service, it's too easy to cancel the exchange massage when a paying client calls and wants that time. Wouldn't you choose a paying client over an exchange client?

I want the freedom to try lots of therapists or to hang in there with just one. When I'm paying, I get the massage when I want it, not when there's no one else angling for that time.

I get massage every 3-4 weeks now and I pay for it. Something I've come to realize is that paying for my massages has an added benefit: I'm reminded every time what it's like to be a paying client. I have a new chance to empathize with my client's experience. That's (almost) as valuable as the massage itself. It's very humbling to have a therapist do something you dislike when you know you do that very same thing!

It's good to stay humble.

So, if you want my services, be prepared to pay. Because, no, I'm not interested in trading massages for them.

The Challenge? Do Less.

Too often, I find myself in the midst of a crazed schedule that has me mapping out every waking hour of the day. I hate these periods. I don't quite know how I end up in them but I'm in another one and it's screwing up my sleep, my health, and my attitude.

Clients. Health care appointments. An AMTA event for massage therapy awareness week. And I'm leaving Friday morning to watch my niece compete in the national junior rodeo in Waco.

How busy is this week? I'm still trying to figure out when I have 45 minutes to pack for the weekend. I may have to do that tonight because I don't see any other open spaces on my calendar before my flight leaves Friday morning!

It's an ongoing challenge for me, this over-scheduling. I see a blank space on my calendar and say "yes, I can put xyz in that slot. It's empty after all."

I have a chalkboard in my bedroom and I write inspirational phrases on it. These phrases are meant to be good for months or the year. Two weeks ago I wrote "Do Less".

Does that phrase panic you? Are you convinced you will go out of business / starve / live out of a shopping cart / sleep till 2015 / lose all your friends / go bankrupt / die? If the phrase causes panic, then the odds are you are fearing one of these things or something like it.

I've learned over the years that when I Do Less, I do better -- better work, better sleep, better finances, better friendships. Our lives, like our tissue, needs space. Sweet empty space. Sometimes I'm better at allowing that sweet empty space to occur than others. This, clearly, isn't one of those times.

I could give you a lot of reasons -- a (finally) blossoming private practice, building a new training company, some confounding health issues that require me to experiment with treatment options, a desperate need to have a social life every now and then, a desperate need to spend some time with my husband, a genuine love of travel, the deadline for a seminar I'm teaching in (gulp) in 2 weeks. Those are all good reasons, right? Right?

Doesn't matter. I'm only one middle-aged (tired) woman. In 2008 I wrote on this experience for my client newsletter:

I've realized that as a middle-aged woman I honestly and simply can't do as much as I used to. I can’t multi-task like I used to. I can no longer be hyper-functional. 

What?! A grown woman refusing to be hyper-functional?!? I mean, hyper-functioning middle aged women are, I think, what really holds our society together sometimes. Won't that crash our economy faster than the sub-prime mortgage crisis?  

Well, perhaps we should find out. I realized that since I was 18, I've been living the life of two full-time women. It’s time to cut back to just living the life and doing the work of one full-time woman. How do I do that?  

I miss deadlines. I don't step up. I don't sign up. I don’t join in. I don't come through in a pinch. I don't go above and beyond. I don't take one for the team. I do respect the 24 hour day and 8 hours of sleep. I don't rise to the challenge. I don't make it happen. I don’t excel. I don’t push through. I do what I can and then I stop. I don’t volunteer to be a savior. I accept being in the middle of the pack, not at the head of it. 

I disappoint people.

That sounds pretty good, huh? Yet here I am again 5 years later. Obviously, this is going to be a life-long challenge. Running my own business makes it even harder. I can't assume someone else is going to pick up the slack if I don't get something done. There is no one else.

We all know the effects of running too hard. We see it on our tables every day. It can kill us, it simply can.

So I have to decide to Do Less. I have to write it on a big chalkboard that I see every morning because it's darned difficult for me!

How do I do less? Spread out some of those medical appointments. Don't take on a new class (or maybe a new client). Don't volunteer so much, even for something truly awesome. Say no, no matter how painful. It's difficult to do this. It requires trust that everything will turn out OK anyways. Trust is a scary word.

But if our clients are going to thrive, if we are going to thrive, the answer is often to do less, not more. I don't know what your sane limit is but I hope you know it (or would at least recognize it in a police line-up) and have a decent working relationship with it. Like most important relationships, you and I will probably be working on it our whole lives.

Busted! (by my own client, no less!)

Is there anyone out there who hasn't had a client ask "and when does the massage therapist get a massage?", usually with a twinkle in their eye? And you don't have a good answer? It's sooooooo embarrassing when our clients catch us out like that.

I have a client who has been seeing me weekly 5 or 6 years. As you can imagine, we've gotten to know each other pretty well. She knew I was having some frustration with a professional relationship, that I wanted to end it but was dragging my feet about it.

She proceeded to lecture me about setting professional boundaries, taking care of myself, having faith in my practice, and making sensible business decisions. All of which she's learned from......reading this blog. Yes, she quoted my own [blankety blank] blog back to me!

Damn.

So (sigh) in the last week I've given notice and the relationship will be ending in a timely manner in a professional manner. I don't know whether to be proud of her or embarrassed at myself!

MTs and the ACA

Read this. That's all I'm going to say (because she says it so damned well!).

http://www.lighthold.org/fish-or-cut-bait/

Are You Smart Enough?

Next week I'm teaching a 4-hour class on business plans for massage therapists. It's at 8 am and I've got 35 people signed up. Let me say that again: at 8 am. They must want this bad. I often see clients until 9 pm or later so there's lots of days I'm just waking up at 8 am! I'm going to have to get a good night's sleep the night before this class!

I'm pretty confident I can deliver material that will be useful to everyone in that room. I'm passionate about making business knowledge accessible to MTs, explaining things in language we can understand. Translating "standard" biz concepts into something people like us can work with.

I would like to say that it's the result of my degree in business or my extensive experience managing obscenely profitable businesses. I possess neither of those. I have no formal training in business. I have (1) real-world experience in building (and re-building) a modestly successful practice and (2) a gift for learning new stuff and translating it to the general public.

10 years ago I knew virtually nothing about business. Then my alma mater, the Potomac Massage Training Institute, got desperate for someone to teach business practices and asked me if I'd take it on. That request gave me a moment's pause (see: "uneducated in business", above) but then I thought "what the heck, I bet I can figure this out" and I proceeded to do just that.

In the process I discovered I'm really fascinated by the subject and (more importantly) by making the subject accessible to other MTs and microbusinesses. I was born to teach, baby!

What about you? What are you not doing right now because you don't have formal education in it or didn't go to college or "only" have a GED? What have you convinced yourself you're not smart enough to do?

(Note: I do not mean passing yourself off as competent in something you've never studied, like lymph drainage or visceral manipulation! Don't go there, don't do that.)

In our culture right now we are absurdly obsessed with the idea that a college degree is the way to health, wealth, and happiness. You must get a college degree if you don't want to end up hungry and homeless.

I have a college degree (BA, Journalism) and I have this to say about that: bullcrap. I know way too many people who are brilliant at what they do who do not possess a college degree.

There's so many things we have to learn on our own in this industry. Our training programs are struggling to keep up with the changes in the profession and the rising expectations put on us. We simply need (and want) to know more than we did 20-30 years ago. It's a natural problem to have as a profession matures but it means we often have to educate ourselves about things like research, business, new insights into how the body works, etc.

Telling yourself you're not smart enough or educated enough to do that is like tying your shoelaces together and then trying to go for a walk! Not going to get far.

If you are a practicing massage therapist, if you finished a professional training program, you are smart enough. Find places to learn the things you need to learn. Find people with the information you need and learn from them. Find the books, websites, journals, blogs, and conferences that can feed you the info you need.

Go out there and get yourself smarter. I know you can do it!

You've Asked, I've Listened.....

You've asked, we've listened, and The Healing Core is bringing her back in time to get yourself ready for your taxes: Margo Bowman! Our favorite massage therapist + accountant.

You have three (3!) chances to let her help you be a smarter (and more profitable) business owner (and the Early Bird Discount for all three of these ends in two weeks):

If you already know your stuff pretty well but just need to know what's changed in 2013

If you're just starting out and need someone to help you get started well and correctly (and save you money!)

If you are ready to really own your responsibilities for your bookkeeping, deductions, and financial decision (and, no, having an accountant is NOT enough).

If you've been thinking about it, now is the time to sign up and reap those early-bird discounts.

Define "Employment"

In the last 24 hours I've run across two places where massage therapy organizations (one of which was the AMTA, sigh) were using the term "employment" incorrectly. Drives me batty so let me lay out a simple truth here.

Are You Employed? 

Employed means you work for someone else as an employee. It has a specific legal definition. It's not just a general term for "I work for pay" or "I work within an organization as a massage therapist".

Do You Work For Yourself?

When you are an employee you have an employer who files W2s and W4s for you, withholds taxes (and submits them to the government for you), etc. An employer has greater control over your day-to-day work world (schedule, dress code, work protocols, etc.) than you do so they take greater responsibility for you (providing tools, space, clients, etc. you need to do your job).

Are You Self-Employed?

When you are an employee you don't get to claim any of your work-related expenses as business expenses. This is important!

Are You An Employee?

If you are not an employee, you are self-employed. You may work out of your home or a rented space; you may work in someone else's organization as an independent contractor.

If you are working in your home or office space, no one provides you any paperwork to show how much you made this year. That's your job. If you are an independent contractor (and you receive more than $600 from an organization in a year), that organization will send you a 1099 to use when filing your taxes. In either case, you have to withhold your own taxes and mail them to the government quarterly.

You get more control over your work environment (or should insist that you do) because the organization you are working with is taking less responsibility for you.

When you are self-employed, your work-related expenses are tax-deductible.

Where Do You Work?

Am I just being a fussy word-geek? I certainly can be but I'm not in this case. The words we use have the power to define our reality. They also represent how we understand the world. If we use the word "employee" or "employed", the odds are good that the subconscious picture in our head is of, well, traditional legal employment with all the rights, privileges, and restrictions thereof. Odds are if that's the picture in your head, you will act accordingly. 

Who Do You Work For?

 

 

If you don't embrace the reality of being self-employed -- in all its permutations -- you risk not recognizing when and how to stand up for yourself, to say no, to draw healthy business boundaries. Even worse, you risk sounding like an ill-informed fool when you bitch and moan about not getting the kinds of benefits and support due an employee when you are not an employee.

 

We hate it when people use the wrong word -- masseuse -- to refer to our profession. If you care enough about language to care about that, then you also need to care enough about language to use "employed" and "self-employed" correctly.

 

The Oddly (or Un) Structured Day (especially for the new MT)

If you are new to being a self-employed / independent contractor massage therapist, you will discover something odd (especially if you came from the world of traditional employment): when you don't have a client, you don't have to do anything if you don't want to.

In traditional employment, if you don't immediately have something you have to do, you still have to sit / stand / walk / talk as though you did. You can't just......leave. You can't take a nap, go home and bake cookies, or take yourself out to a movie. You can if you're self-employed.

What freedom!

Except....

Except you're the boss. Which means you're the one that has to ensure that phones get answered, email gets answered, business cards get ordered, bookkeeping gets entered, linens gets laundered, supplies get bought, trade pubs get read. That last sentence was chock-full of the passive voice ("gets answered / ordered / entered", etc.). The beauty of the passive voice is that is avoids saying who is going to do all these things.

You are.

So you've got conflicting realities: the reality that when you have no clients booked you're free to do whatever you want and the reality that because you're self-employed there's always something more that needs to get done. How do you structure a day? All free time or all work time? What are your working hours? When does your day end? When does your day start?

Some of you will remember that I started this blog when, thanks to my husband's job, I lived in Australia for a year (2010-2011). I wasn't practicing massage, I was working on my writing. Talk about a day with NO inherent structure to it!

I created a chart for each week. Each day had 3 categories: morning, afternoon, evening. At the beginning of the week, I wrote down what I wanted to do / accomplish / work on in each segment of the day. I went a step further (because, yes, I am that kind of nerd) and color coded the boxes / tasks. Purple for "work" and blue for "personal". That allowed me to see at a glance whether my week was overloaded one way or the other. Here's an example of what it would look like now.

I can look at this chart and realize Tuesday and Wednesday are very long days. But I also notice that I have a chance in the middle of Tuesday to watch the America's Cup races in the afternoon. I also notice that I plan to get a swim in on Wednesday afternoon while I'm at the gym. So maybe those days are just fine the way they are.

 

This is one way to bring structure to an un-structured work life. Any other way that works for you is good. You run your own business. Do what makes sense for you (including take a nap in the middle of the day if you want to!).

The Self-Employed / Independent Contractor Economy

On Labor Day I was listening to the Diane Rehm show on NPR and heard a speaker mention that 1/3 of the US labor force are freelance / self-employed / independent contractors. The speaker expects that number to rise over the coming two decades.

33%. Between 10 and 42 million.

In my experience, it's closer to 95% in the massage therapy profession, at least here in DC.

We aren't unique. We aren't unusual. Heck, we're cutting edge!  :)

But our economy has not yet caught up to that reality. Too many benefits, too many tax laws, too many expectations are still wrapped around the idea that the vast majority of the workforce is a standard employee / standard employer (and that we're 9-5 but that's a conversation for a different day).

You can listen to the 50-minute show here. There's a lot of good info in there about how to do well for yourself as a freelancer / independent contractor / self-employed person.

You may also want to check out The Freelancers Union. It's a gathering place for the self-employed with information on things like buying your own insurance and writing a good contract.

Just One More?

When I travel, I like to get massages. I'm out of my own area so I'm experiencing people who didn't go to the same school I did, may not be operating under similar state legislation (which does affect how a practice operates), and are in a different community of MTs who often have a different perspective on massage. It's good to broaden my experience as both a client and as a fellow MT. I always learn something.

I was in Calistoga California recently. Calistoga is known for its mineral springs so there are quite a few places offering mud baths, soaks, and massages in a spa setting. A good time to try something new!

The mud bath is a completely new experience for me. It's a trough of thick black mud in which I reclined for about 15 minutes. Hot and smelling ever-so-faintly of sulphur, it was more relaxing than I expected, though rinsing the mud out of all the nooks and crannies it had found on me took a little while! It was followed by a soak in a jacuzzi (I do love a good jacuzzi!) and 10 minutes wrapped in a warm burrito-like ensemble in a darkened room.

 

Which is all to say that by the time I got to the massage room, I was a shambling pile of warm readiness. My MT asked a few questions; I mentioned the lingering soreness in my biceps and elbows and asked for a little extra attention there. 
 

He did a good one-hour massage. When he got to my upper arms, I could tell he was trying to  address my soreness but it wasn't very effective. He didn't seem to be able to focus on specific tissue. I got the sense that he couldn't “talk” / “listen” to the tissue. He felt....fatigued. But he did give it a little extra time and I give him full points for that.

He mentioned afterwards that he 'd wanted to go over the hour a little bit so he could do more work on my arms but he was booked back-to-back and he couldn't. I certainly understand. I had that same challenge just last night with a new client. But I know I wasn't his first appointment of the day and I know I wasn't the last. I wonder if the number of clients he had that day affected his ability to connect with my sore arms. 

There  comes a point in the day when I just can't give my full focus to one more body. I can keep moving, keep rubbing, but I can't give them my creative focus. There's none left. For me, I've learned that my limit is between 4 and 5 hours. Your limit may be different.

We sometimes convince ourselves we can keep going, seeing as many clients as we can physically accommodate to be financially successful. What we shouldn't do is try to convince ourselves that our clients won't notice when we've gone past our attention-limit. They may not know why but they may well notice that the session wasn't as good as they've received from us before or that they've received somewhere else.

That's one of my biggest complaints about the national chains, like Massage Envy. They are frequently owned and run by people who don't get these subtleties of good service. For them, one massage is as good as another and if you are physically able, you should keep going. Their pay scale also tempts MTs to try to make up the difference in volume. It's not true of every large spa or national massage chain but it is far more likely to happen there than with an individual therapist.

You want to be able to deliver a high-quality service as often as you reasonably can. Going past your natural limit will not allow you to do that.

The Scapula Obsession

What is it about a stuck shoulder blade that we just cannot resist? Sore elbows, achy arches, we can ignore these if the client has asked us to work elsewhere but if we find a stuck shoulder blade, it almost takes divine intervention to get us to pass it by.

I'm just back from a 2-week  vacation in northern California. I arrived in San Francisco with two goals: check out a practice I'd heard great things of and get some relief for my aching upper body. I must have been doing something terribly wrong with my body mechanics lately because I hurt in my fingers, my wrists, my elbows, my biceps, and my mid-back. I knew my neck and traps were tight but they didn't hurt so they didn't make the A-list. I scheduled a 90-minute massage.

I was upfront about being an MT and explained where I hurt and why. I was particularly concerned about my right elbow. I couldn't seem to get any improvement working on it myself. My MT asked a few questions and then had me get on the table, prone.

He started, as many of us do, with the back. Couple of warming strokes and he discovered that my scapulae were glued tight to my ribcage. Not surprised but, remember, they didn't hurt so they weren't on my A list. He couldn't resist. He spent easily half of the session (successfully) getting them un-stuck. Yeah!

But that meant he only had half a session left for everything else, including the stuff I'd said was  important to me. So he couldn't give everything else the full attention it needed.

Did I stop him? Did I speak up? No, because he really was doing good work and I didn't want to micro-manage the session. I also didn't realize how much of the session he'd spent on the scapulae. I have been in his shoes, encountering a body part so stuck / dense / whatever that I dove in without really paying attention to the time or my session plan.

In my practice, at the end of an intake I outline how I'm going to approach the session with the client, especially if we need to prioritize some aches/pains/issues over others. The client has a chance to re-direct me and to know what to expect. It allows me to be clear on what outcome they're hoping for and reassure myself that my plan will address that outcome. If I encounter something during the session that makes me reconsider my plan, I talk to the client about it and get their OK.

The work I received was good, let be very clear about that. But we owe it to our clients to stick to the plan, unless we get their permission to do otherwise. I had a specific goal for the session – relief of some specific aches and pains. The work on the scapulae did little to alleviate those other areas of discomfort. I don't regret spending the money because I did get solid value for my money but I didn't get  what I came in for and that's a shame.

And my elbow still hurts.

Take Care of Myself, Take A Business Deduction

I leave on Saturday for a 2-week vacation in the San Francisco Bay area. I just booked a massage for myself on Sunday in San Francisco. I'm taking it as a business deduction.

How?

I will, of course, physically benefit from massage (been working hard, body mechanics have not been what they should be...). But I'm specifically choosing a place that comes highly recommended by a fellow MT. He used to work there and loved it. I want to see what makes them such a great place to be a client and to work. I want to see how their business runs and I want to see how they approach a session and how they approach the work.

With any luck, I'll learn something I can apply to my work and my business. I also hope to learn something I can impart to my students in my business classes. If it's really good, I'll be posting it here.

That's how I'm making it a business discussion -- with my intent. It really is a huge part of how you justify a business expense.

I learned this from someone I consider the master, Margo Bowman (LMT and accountant). If you'd like to learn some of these secrets of the trade, she'll be in Washington DC in October. I can't recommend her classes enough!

Thursday, October 24: How the 2013 Tax Changes Affect You (2 hours)
Friday, October 25: Getting Your First Year Started Right (7 hours)
Saturday & Sunday, October 26-27:  Taxes & Bookkeeping for the Healing Arts Professional

CEs are available for MTs.

Guest blogger: An Antidote for Self-Employed August Panic

I subscribe to Mark Silver's blog. He's writing wise for people like us, doing business motivated by our hearts. His post last week was so good, and so in line with some things I've written (so you know he's brilliant!) that I asked for his permission to share it with you. You can sign up for his e-newsletter as well, which is free and well-worth the 20 seconds it will take you sign up.

An Antidote for Self-Employed August Panic

by Mark Silver, August 6 2013

August is a strange month for the self-employed. In July you can still say you’re only half-way through the year, but by August you begin to feel the year ebbing away already.

There are goals you had hoped to be much further toward. Plus, it’s holiday time for many people, and so depending on your industry, clients can be a little thinner on the ground than usual.

Maybe “panic” is too strong a word- that probably won’t set in until October or November when you realize the year really is drawing to a close. But some anxiety, some hint of unsettledness… wow, are things ever going to change?

In our culture we are so addicted to breakthroughs and quantum leaps. Progress needs to be measured with a meter stick, anything less we tend to ignore.

Speed has a certain allure. With the windows down and The Clash (requested by my 4 1/2 year old son- raising ‘em right!) blaring from the speakers, the wind in your hair is exhilarating. For awhile.

Then the noise of the road gets to you. You wonder, do I really need to travel this fast? What is an organic rate of growth?

Our tomato plants have grown tremendously huge, large numbers of tomatoes all over them… all of them green. Not one red or yellow ripe tomato yet. Still waiting. It’s been months.

I’ve been working with a client for over a year. Given where he started you’d think results would have happened a lot faster for him.

Yet the work we did at first was the same work I did in the garden early this sprig. I double dug garden beds, loaded in lots of compost. Planted small plants with lots of room.

He had had an exhausting experience with a high-octane coaching program. It took time to recover. It took time to regain his sense of himself. It took time to bring healing to his business.

Wisely he chose, and I supported him, to move slowly, to not push, to not go into exhaustion. Slowly, being compassionate with his tender heart he took steps into strength and clarity
.
Now things are moving more quickly. Now results are happening. But the preparation took time.

In Sufism it is said that sincerity is the most necessary quality for the seeker. It is a precious gift of the heart that allows you to seek only the truth, to cut through story, drama, fears. It is sincerity, not cleverness, that will ultimately bring us to our most yearned-for destinations.

It’s never too late to slow down. It’s never too late to rest. It’s never too late to let your heart turn away from the noise of the road and toward the tender garden of your soul.

I invite you to allow the sincerity of your love and desire to serve to slow you down, even bring you to a full stop, so that you can take careful stock this month.

You may not have seen the results you had hoped to yet this year. Question: Are you trying to move quickly and ending up paralyzed or with scorched earth syndrome in your soul? Or…

Are you slowly, gently, step-by-step putting the pieces in place, double-digging your beds, gaining clarity on what you really need to do?

Take a moment now to stop. Just stop. Put it all down. Breathe in. Let go of the road you’re on. Ask: what does your heart say about this year?

There are so many messages to move quickly. But what is your organic pace? We often have to slow down to find it, to connect to our own hearts again. Then we can move from the deep sincerity we find there..

With love and appreciation,

Mark

Us Talking to Us

My practice has the August doldrums. Like the rest of DC, it's slow and sluggish. I had exactly one client in my home-based practice last week. I have exactly one this week (and it's the same client!).

I am taking my own advice about the down times, especially rule #1: get the facts. The facts are that August is usually a sluggish month, so I'm not worrying.

I decided to use this sluggish time to market to an under-served population: other massage therapists. I already offer massage at half price to other MTs. So I put the word out, reminding the local community that I'm available and affordable. Couple places on Facebook. Local AMTA listserve.

Got one MT booked so far.......    :)

I Cried During A Sesson This Week

I cried during a session yesterday. I don't think the client noticed, which is good. Let me tell you why.

Sunday

Every month I do seated massage at my church for the Latino congregation that worships there. Freewill offering. I give all of it back to the pastor's discretionary fund. It's part of my "volunteer to market myself" year.

Most of members of the Latino congregation are working low-paying jobs. They may or may not be legal immigrants (I don't ask and don't want to know). Most of them don't speak English. I don't speak Spanish.

It's my favorite massage gig of the month.

Why? They are so fully over-the-top grateful for the work. The smiles, the changed posture, the blissed-out faces at the end of the massages tell me everything I need to know, with or without a common language. Most of the clients have never had massage before (sometimes the pastor is there to translate). They can't afford it now in time or money.

This past Sunday at the end of a massage, a woman turned to the pastor and said something in Spanish. He smiled and translated: "you have the hands of an angel". I smiled and said "she's right and I am thankful that this is one of the ways God uses me."

Monday

I saw a client yesterday that I've now seen 4 or 5 times. The client came to me with a very unusual problem and request. The client has scarring inside an orifice from surgeries. The surgeries are impeding the healthy functioning of that orifice. I don't work inside orifices. However, the client's naturopath suggested craniosacral therapy. The client found my name on the Upledger website (I've taken level 1) and came for work.

This work is tricky on a number of levels and, trust me, no one has ever taught you how to deal with this particular problem in any class you've ever taken. I could only rely on my little bit of craniosacral training, my intuition, and my fervent desire to be of assistance.

We did some experimentation and found we got the best results with a combination of craniosacral therapy and myofascial release. I'm using MFR in ways I never envisioned when I took the certification course. I even talked to the instructor about this client. His response? "Boy, you really get some interesting clients, don't you?"

How good are the results? Best night of sleep in years. Least amount of discomfort and restriction in this orifice in years. Able to tolerate some much-needed meds for the first time in a long time.

Last week we tried something different. The client came in on Monday and said it had been an awful weekend and we definitely needed to go back to the way we'd been doing things before.

I found myself tearful during the session. The person -- this stranger until a month ago -- has literally put body, pain, and hopes in me and my hands. And I'm guessing about what to do. Seriously folks, guessing. When I guessed wrong last week, this client had a terrible 5 days.

As I sat there with my hands on the client's body I was overcome by the enormity of that truth. This client's entire life  has been sidelined for years with this problem! If I failed to be of assistance I was just another in a long line of failed "remedies".

I felt so small and inadequate; I also felt so grounded and strong. It's not just my training and my technical skills that make a difference. It's my fervent desire to be useful, my willingness to talk to the client's body and listen to it, and it's that root system of deep professionalism that was a gift of my schooling, my association with other MTs, and my years in practice.

You couldn't just slot any massage therapist into this situation and have positive results. It really did matter that it was me -- my specific combo of skills, my confidence in myself, my ability to talk with a body, my willingness to experiment, and my belief that some kind of "better" was possible.

The work you do, your business, at the end of the day is all about you. We aren't interchangeable. You are as unique as I am. When you are telling the world about your practice -- in person, on your website, in a blog, or wherever -- don't be afraid to let them see you. Because it's YOU that is going to make the difference when they are on your table.

With A Little Help From A Friend

Spent all of last week on a business retreat. Went to the home place in WV for the first 7 days before the heat wave drove me home (no working a/c and even in the mountains it was too hot to sleep, think, or breathe!). While I was in WV I worked on putting the finishing touches on the business plan course I'll be teaching at the AMTA convention in September.

Spent the remainder of the week (this past weekend) working with my business partner Kitty doing our mid-year review. In my massage room, which is air-conditioned!

I'm blown away by how far Kitty and I have come in running our little business. It was only two years ago (next month) that we began going for walks on Friday afternoons and talking about whether we  could build a training company. It's been 18 months since we started. We're small but it's working!

Two years ago Kitty was full-on numbers-phobic. This past weekend she became the company bookkeeper. We also spent time analyzing how we were actually doing financially and she was the one suggesting how we could work with our bookkeeping to get our answers. We were able to make an important business decision about finding an alternative to one of our fixed costs.

We spent a few hours on exercises to help us further refine our business plan. It's been somewhat skeletal up to now, based on what we knew and could reasonably say about ourselves. We added more meat to that skeleton and have a much more robust picture of our values, goals, and purpose.

I have felt for a while that I was carrying the lion's share of responsibilities on my shoulders. Kitty was feeling the same way but also feeling helpless (useless?). We couldn't grow because I was worn out. So we listed all the responsibilities and activities required to keep us going. We found ways we could re-distribute the load. I felt lighter, Kitty felt more engaged, and we can grow.

Our company offers courses in bite-sized fundamentals of business and of the energetic body. We've focused on the business courses this year. We want to add the energy courses next year. Together we figured out how to re-work a weekend energetic body course into four "bite-sized" courses. We wrestled with the material together and came up with something we think will be attractive to our client base. Neither one of us would have come up with a good answer on our own.

We looked at our business course offerings for 2014 -- what to repeat, what to add. I have a powerful imagination and am strongly prone to over-committing myself. I get excited by the idea of doing something and forget to weigh the cost in time and energy. I pitched some new ideas for next year and Kitty refused to agree to any of it until I could show her how I would have the time and energy to do them.

Kitty was adamant that we change our name. We are called The Healing Core because Kitty already had that name (website, logo, bank account, etc.) and she wasn't using it. It was quick and easy to re-purpose it but it doesn't really say anything about who we are and what we do. We planned a "baby naming" day, came up with a long list of creative people (both MTs and not) to invite to help us re-name our company, and sent out the first invitations.

We decided we need to meet like this quarterly, not just semi-annually. We scheduled a one-day quarterly biz retreat for October as well as our next semi-annual weekend biz retreat for January 2014.

There was more; it was a very productive weekend. I learned (re-learned?) a few things:

It is incredibly valuable to set time aside at least once a year -- more often if you can -- to step away and just think about your business. It can't be done (at least not well) in the dribs and drabs of time you have between clients / courses.

It makes such a difference that I've got a partner in these endeavors. I've known for years that I wanted to offer continuing education but I had the good sense not to try to do it by myself. Frankly, I talked Kitty into this adventure and she has gamely followed me. However, we are turning ourselves into great business partners and it makes such a huge difference to not do it alone.

Numbers are the muscle and bones of your business. If you want to know your business, you have to be able to look at your numbers. Which means you have to keep up with your bookkeeping. You don't have to be an accountant or an MBA but you do have to be able to answer questions like "are we actually making a profit?", "where are we spending money and is there a way to spend less of it?", and "how much money do we really need -- and want -- to make?"

You can grow into being a business owner. In fact, for most of us there really isn't any other way. You don't have to know everything when you start out but you've got to be willing to learn as you go.

A good business partnership is a lot like a good romantic relationship.

• Speak up when things aren't working for you.
• Wrestle problems to the ground together (not just your way or his/her way).
• Be with someone you trust.
• Be with someone you respect.
• Be open about your own shortcomings.
• Ask for help.
• It helps enormously to actually like the person!
• Make time for the relationship.
• Commit to the work necessary to keep your relationship afloat.

I can't tell you how excited I am for the year to come and for the potential our little business has! Thank you Kitty for being an awesome business partner and, still, an amazing friend.

I cancelled clients so I could take a nap

On Mondays I work at a gym. This week when I walked in there were three people on my schedule and they were nicely spaced. I was pretty content. I was tired from a long series of events but I figured I could power through three and sleep in on Tuesday.

At the end of the first massage I went out to the front desk and told them to cancel the other two appointments. I was done for the day. I was going home to sleep.

Am I crazy?? How do you turn away scheduled (guaranteed income) clients? Especially one who made a point of booking with you that day because she was leaving on a trip the next day? Was I being indolent, lazy, unprofessional?

When I began the first appointment I realized as soon as I touched her that my fatigue was deeper than I'd realized. I was exhausted. I had trouble "reading" my hands. I had to stop (just for a moment) in the middle of the massage to remember what I was doing and why I was doing it. Shoot, I had trouble remembering what body part I was touching!

The massage went OK (believe it or not) but I knew three things:

1.  I could not give quality work to the next two clients.
2.  If I didn't go home and sleep -- a lot -- I was going to get sick.
3.  If I got sick, there was zero money coming into my practice for at least a week, if not longer.

#3 is the big one. The odds are you, like me, don't get sick leave. We don't get paid when we're home sick. If we're the only source of income our business has, that's critical.

I had to choose between cancelling two appointments or possible cancelling a week's worth of appointments (a good head/chest cold can take 3-7 days to clear enough to do massage responsibly). I'm the only real asset my practice has. Everything else -- everything else -- can be replaced. I can't.

Self-care is a critical business decision. Not just a high-sounding "we should all take care of ourselves" principle. It's how you have a profitable business. It's a business "best practices". It's the difference between short-term success and long-term failure.

You.Are.All.Your.Business.Has

The table? Replacable.
The linens? Replacable.
Your website? Replacable.

You?

When you are faced with taking care of yourself vs. seeing 1, 2, or 3 more clients, remember this: you are the only asset that can not be replaced.

p.s. I slept 11 hours Monday night and was able to resume a normal work schedule the next day.

So you're having a slow day / week / month / quarter....

I've spoken honestly here about the challenges in the last 2 years of re-starting my practice after being closed for a year. And I want to take this moment to say it looks like -- after almost 2 solid years of work -- my practice is hitting its stride again.

I'm meeting or exceeding my minimum financial goals most weeks. I'm attracting new clients every month. I have enough work in my home office to start to scale back my time at the gym across town. I can honestly see myself reaching my ultimate goal -- a private practice near (not in) my home in a space that I share with other practitioners -- in 2 years.

Yes, it's a relief.

But, remember, it took me two years of really working every avenue I had and could imagine to get here. Which meant I had plenty of slow days, weeks, months, and quarters. I've had days/weeks/etc. when I was very discouraged and anxious.

This week is going to be a slow/quiet week. With Independence Day in the middle of the week, people's schedules are out-of-whack. People are travelling. Thursdays are usually a busy day for me but I'm closed this Thursday.

Plus, I live in Washington DC. This is a city that takes Independence Day very seriously and formally. Folklife Festival down on The Mall. Big concert by the National Symphony Orchestra at the Capitol. Special bell-ringing at the National Cathedral. All the Smithsonian museums are open, including American History. The National Archives -- which houses the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution, and the Bill of Rights -- is open.

And let's not forget the fireworks!

Lots of distractions and lots of traffic. I'm closed on Independence Day because I'm 1.5 miles east of the Capitol. It's not worth it to try to get to my house after mid-day. In fact, I plan to be over on the Chesapeake Bay on Thursday, doing a little kayaking and watching the fireworks over the West River.

In short, it's not going to be a big money week.

When we have a low-money day/week/month/etc., what do we do (besides panic and/or get depressed)?

1. Gird yourself with facts to put the day/week/month in perspective.

How much money do you need to make per week / month / quarter to meet your basic needs (food, shelter, etc.)? If you don't know, you are vulnerable. If you do know, will this day / week / month put you in the hole? If not, quit panicking. If it will, decide what you're going to do about that.

Does this slow time signal a downturn in your business or is it a normal seasonal slump? If you've been in practice for more than 2 years, look at your schedule for the last two years and see if this is a pattern. Is the week of July 4th always slow? Is July always slow? Does it usually rebound next week or next month?

Is this happening just to you or to most MTs in your area? Talk to them. If it's just you then it's not the market. If it's not just you, then it's not your fault. In either case, talk among yourselves and see what the community's wisdom is around this slow time.

Many massage therapists place a lot of value in their intuition -- what does this situation feel like? -- but quite honestly our intuition around money and business can be clouded by fears, insecurities, lack of knowledge, etc. Undergird any instincts with facts.

2. Take the time to take care of your business.

Are there business activities / projects / initiatives you wanted to do but haven't had time for? Now's the time!

Does your website need to be updated? Or created????

Do you need to add online scheduling? Now's a good time to do the research and get that set up. How about accepting credit cards?

Is your filing a teetering tower on your desk? Time to reduce that fire hazard!

Is your bookkeeping up to date? Reeeeeallllly? (And I don't mean all your receipts are in a shoebox.)

Read the trade pubs lately? Massage Today? AMTA Massage Journal? Massage Magazine?

Have you been meaning to contact select PTs / chiropractors / orthopedists / dentists / etc. in your town? Time to draft a letter and schedule a visit / cup of coffee with them.

Got any books you've been meaning to get to? Business, anatomy, modalities, etc.?

Have you been wanting to come up to speed on the latest massage research (and, really, it would be a huge benefit to you and your clients if you did)?

How about self-study? Want to understand trigger points better? Need to review that stretching class you took last year? How about that marketing textbook you picked up at the last convention?

Is there a training class you've taken that you're still not quite comfortable with? Invite your clients, other MTs, and friends over for (low-cost) practice sessions. If you can get 4-6 sessions under your hands, you'll be a lot more comfortable (and it's a very subtle way to market the fact that you do this particular kind of work).

3.  Take the time to take care of yourself.

Self-care is an on-going challenge for all of us. All of us.

Gone for a long walk lately? Or bike ride? Or swim? Gotten your kayak in the water lately? Been camping recently?

How's your stretching regimen going? We're more credible when our clients learn that we practice what we preach. Same with massage. When was the last time you got a massage?

Has it been a long time since you've been to see your parents / grandparents / siblings / best friend? Is a road trip an option? Sometimes the best response to a panic attack about your business is to get the hell away from your business.

Are there good museums / theaters / artsy-fartsy offerings in your town? Are any of them free or low-cost?

Slept in recently? Tried any new recipes? Spent the whole day reading a good (non-massage-related) book? Caught up with the latest season of [fill in the blank]? What do you fantasize about doing when you're swamped by your schedule?


So, which of these three things should you do? ALL of them! Always start with #1. Too many of us are vague about the facts of our business. Don't assume, though, that you have to do #2 before you do #3. Sometimes, you should go straight from #1 to #3. We all know that we can't take care of anyone else (including our businesses) if we aren't taking care of ourselves.

A slow day / week / month / quarter is not the Kiss of Death. It's not The End of The World. It's just.....slow. What can you do with that (besides panic and depression)?

The Dreaded Elevator Speech

I first heard the phrase "elevator speech" in the early 80s. The idea is that you should be able describe your business / idea / work in 10-20 seconds (the amount of time you might be in an elevator with someone). But not just describe it but describe in such a compelling way (find just the right "gotcha" wording) to have your elevator-mate wow'd over by the time they got to their floor, begging you for more information.

Even as a word junkie, with a pretty decent vocabulary at hand, I found it an impossible task.

I've been coaching a therapist re-opening her practice after 6 years off. One of the first things she was anxious to do was write her "elevator speech". She was excited, thinking I would give her the exact right words to ensnare potential clients with the brilliance of her words. She'd just memorize it and shoot it out every time she got near a potential client.

She wasn't exactly right and she wasn't exactly wrong.

You may not call it an "elevator speech" but a lot of us have become aware that we only have a short amount of time (generally no more than 1-2 sentences) to describe our work in a way that engages the listener or piques their interest. When they are engaged / piqued they are open to hearing more. That's when you have the time to create a connection.

I teach a seminar on business plans (in July in DC, at the national AMTA convention in September). In discussions with a friend who's also a retired CFO (Chief Financial Officer) about executive summaries and mission statements, he said something that helped me get clear on this:

The Executive Summary is truly the "hook" or "pitch". Clearly it has importance if someone is looking for external funds but it's also the pitch that's used to "sell" to friends; it's intended to pull all the aspects [of the business] into a cohesive narrative. The mission statement is almost one level higher and where the individual (or management) is permitted to dream -- within the scope of resources identified in the plan.

So this is where the small business person / massage therapist usually freaks out but they need to see that they "speak" their Executive Summary every time they talk about their "business" to someone else.

While I can't wrap my brain around an elevator speech, I can craft a good mission statement (it helps to have good guidance; Jim Horan's One Page Business Plan in my case). A good mission statement says something creative, imaginative, and Big about how your practice will make a difference in the world. Mine is:

Help people live more peacefully in and with their bodies, while extending a spirit of acceptance, compassion, and hospitality.

I have this statement (or some version of it) everywhere in  my marketing material. My website, my FB page, my "new client" card, everywhere. It gives me a consistent "image". When it's a thing I speak, it's something like this: "I help people live in their bodies and I help people live with their bodies."

So, what do you do.......?



p.s. That's my mission statement. You'll have to draft your own!  :)

Biz Plans, Demystified

We've all heard of business plans. We've all heard they're "important". And most of us are more than a little nervous about them. The thing is, they can be an amazing tool - and friend - to help you take your practice where you want to go. And they can be relatively short and simple. Quite possibly even one page!

 

Are you going to be in / near Washington DC on July 10? Come join me for two hours on what a business plan is and how to make it work for you. We'll cover: 

 

 

• The basics of a "standard" business plan.
• What kind of questions you are trying to answer for yourself in a business plan.
• How to customize a business plan for your specific needs.

Not everyone needs a business plan but everyone can learn something important about themselves and their practice by working through the questions that are commonly found in business plans.

 

Business, Bite-Sized: Biz Plans, Demystified

Wednesday, July 10

6:30 - 8:30 pm

$40 ($45 at the door)

2 CEs for massage therapists

 

More Than "Just Enough"

Let's say you start up a practice that includes other practitioners. They all pay you rent or a split. As the owner, you take care of the "infrastructure" -- paying the rent, hiring and paying receptionists, marketing, furnishings, finding new practitioners when someone leaves, etc. Those "infrastructure" expenses are covered by the rent/split paid by the other practitioners. You also see your own clients.

Should you be making any money from your "owners" duties? Should you only be making enough from the other practitioner's rent/split to make ends meet for the infrastructure/business expenses, your own income coming from your own client sessions?

I'm surprised when I meet people who say yes, that somehow it would be unethical to draw a profit from the work of other practitioners, from the business you started, that you spend time and energy managing. That making money off other practitioners is somehow......greedy, not nice, ooky.

I learned recently of a local practice that has come up hard against this reality. Started many years ago and with a very good reputation, one of the owners wants to retire and would like to sell their share of the business.

Fair enough. The problem is, there's no profit to be derived from buying a share of this business. The owners charge the other practitioners juuuuuuust enough to pay for the "infrastructure" expenses but there's no extra. Consequently, there's no way you'll ever make your money back if you buy into that practice, much less make a profit from it.

A practice has to support itself and its owner. If there's only you, then all the money you  make has to pay your bills and the practice's bills. If you've got other practitioners working for you, the money they make has to pay the practice bills and it has to pay your bills. If you also see clients in a multi-therapist practice, then that money just rolls back into the business.

What does it mean for a practice to "support" you? In addition to paying its own bills, it should generate enough profit to:

• pay your living expenses
• fund your retirement
• create an "emergency" fund for you and for itself
• pay you when you're out sick or on vacation
• cover the "slow" times

That's the kind of basic calculations that go into figuring out how much money a practice should generate. There has to be more than "just enough".

Alternative Pricing Structures: Tabula Rasa Effect

Every now and then I meet a massage therapist who has organized their practice in a unique way. I recently met Charles Randall Monk in Woodworth LA and got a wonderful massage from him. He's doing things a little differently.

To cut to the chase, in each session he works as long as it takes to reach the client's goals, usually at least 90 minutes and it can be more than two hours. He charges a flat fee per session.

Why does he do that and how in the world does he make that work?

Charles was a nurse for more than 27 years, including 7 years as a flight nurse for the military, before he felt strongly called to become a massage therapist. Charles is a deeply spiritual man and most of his business and practice decisions are governed by what he believes serves God most.

"I could lock the doors tomorrow and the Spirit would lead me somewhere else. It's about being obedient to your soul." His prayer, he says, is "God give the discipline to meet my soul's desire."

While he was in school he was attracted to doing longer bodywork sessions. "You just knew that not every client had the same needs. The regular timeframe just didn't seem to work." Still, when he opened his practice he started with 60-minute sessions and 90-minute sessions. In his experience, a good session takes anywhere from 90 minutes to three hours.

He asks clients to clear a 3-hour window of time when they book an appointment to create a more relaxed, non-rushed atmosphere. My session was 2 hours and would have gone longer if I hadn't had to catch a plane. He stops at three hours; he finds that going more than three hours overloads the body.

Based on my session, the chief advantage of this approach (at least to the client) is that Charles can work as slowly and creatively as he wants. He is passionate about studying new modalities to incorporate into what he calls Integrative Body Therapy. My hip flexors are chronically shortened. He spent, I suspect, 30 minutes or more working just on my psoas, moving gently and slowly to ensure I wasn't in pain.

According to his website, "Tabula Rasa was born of a possibility to deliver a unique act of love to the Universe in an unconditional way." Tabula Rasa is Latin for "clean slate".

"I want to create a safe space for people to be themselves, to rest and be empowered to be present 'in the now' It is so powerful to sift out the things of this world that just aren't working for you."

Tabula Rasa is open from 10 am to 10 pm 5 days a week. Charles sees no more than 3 clients a day and gives himself 1-2 hours between them. This schedule gives him flexibility that he appreciates. "It allows me time to structure my day. It's about creating your own world, creating what you want, not what society tells you. There's something out there for everybody."

With a maximum of 15 clients he says "My schedule is as full as I need it to be." He advertises primarily by word of mouth.

He charges $100 for every session. "I'm blessed financially already" he says so he is not financially dependent on massage for his sole support.

"You do the right thing for the right reason. My attitude is 'it is enough'. That space allows an opening. I chose not to focus on 'what if's' because if you focus on those, that's what you get. I focus on the power of 'enough', not on fear and anxiety."

"I didn't have a business background so I had to feel around for what I was comfortable with charging. Because it is a gift of the hands it was hard at first for me to accept money."

He says he can't imagine any reason he would change this way of working. "I know what I wanted for my life. I never had a doubt it would work. I chose to live in a space of balance for myself and for my clients."

I can tell you I will be booking another session with him when I return to Louisiana and I will leave a 3-hour block of time open for it.

"It's Quick & Easy!"

There are so many things you can do for your business, so many services, so many social media options, so many ways to have a presence "out there" where all those potential clients are.

I've spent about 8 hours, so far, getting online scheduling set up for my clients. I'm pretty sure there's more to do but I think I've got it (mostly) set up now.

Eight hours.

That's one whole work day. It's not that I chose bad scheduling software. It's just that it takes time to work everything out, learn my way around the website, test it, etc.

An entire work day.

There are a lot of voices insisting we just have to do this, that, and the other thing. Right now! Preferably yesterday! It gives me jitters sometimes.

In business, everything seems to take longer than I expect it to. I used to beat myself up for being "behind" on my Grand Plans. I have to remember that there's only one person in this business and I have to do everything, including actually massaging people! And get some sleep and spend time with my husband and be involved in the community and stay in touch with my family and ... and ... and... well, you get the picture.

Is this you too? If so, be easy on yourself. You probably are really and truly doing the best you can. Perfection is not an option (and nothing is ever as quick and easy as they tell you it's going to be!).

A Piece of Bad Legislation Dies

If you are licensed or practice in Washington DC, here's some GREAT news from the president of the AMTA-DC chapter! The AMTA-DC chapter has been fighting this frustrating fight with the city for two solid years:

"Chairman Mendelson's office confirms that the Massage Establishment regulations are unenforceable, and licensed massage therapists are not required to obtain a Massage Establishment License for their practice operations in DC.

Additionally, the DC Council's passage of Section 524 specifies that any regulations pertaining to practice facilities for LMTs must be affirmed by the DC council."

This removes (in practical terms) the barriers to sharing our offices / businesses with other massage therapists and allied health professionals. I think that these collaborative kind of business arrangements are the Next Big Thing in our profession and I am delighted that we've defeated the Massage Establishment License requirements here in DC.