Meet Stephanie Clairmont

Stephanie [00:00:01] And there’s this aspect that we just can’t give our clients 1 to 1, which is probably why you’re carrying the burden on your shoulders is because it’s just you. You’re all they have. And when you can build out communities as a part of your service offerings, you don’t have 100% of the load anymore. They can share that with other people. And it’s also an interesting way to create boundaries to but still provide ongoing consistent support. 

Linzy [00:00:28] Welcome to the Money Skills For Therapists podcast, where we answer this question How can therapists and health practitioners go from money shame and confusion, to feeling calm and confident about their finances and get money really working for them in both their private practice and their lives? I’m your host Linzy Bonham, therapist turned money coach, and creator of the course Money Skills For Therapists. Hello and welcome back to the Money Skills For Therapists podcast. So today’s guest is Stephanie Clairmont. Stephanie is the founder of The Leveraged Practice, which supports health practitioners to grow their private practice with online programs. Today, Stephanie and I dig into how to supplement that one-on-one work that we do with online programs. We talk about this bind that we can get into as health practitioners and therapists where we are already at the max capacity of the amount of clients that we want to see each week. And we’re both maybe feeling that like edge. Maybe we’re seeing more clients already than we need to see. But financially, that’s where we’ve kind of landed. Maybe you’ve already increased your fee and you’re sitting in kind of the highest fee that you think is feasible or that you feel comfortable with. And now you’re starting to think about other options for how do you bring more revenue into your practice, but also how do you get more of your gift out into the world? There’s a natural limit on the amount of folks that we can support, regardless of what type of work that you’re doing, when we’re just doing one on one. And so if you have really honed a niche and you know, you have a real gift to share with the world, this is also a way for you to start to think about how you can reach even more people and affect even more people’s lives far beyond any amount of one on one work that you would ever be able to do. As you can tell, I’m a little passionate about this topic, and Stephanie really digs into some specifics today of how different online programs can look or what kind of people they would best serve so that you can reach more folks and share the gift that you have and help more people solve the types of problems that you solve. Here’s Stephanie Clairmont. Stephanie, welcome to the podcast. 

Stephanie [00:02:48] Thank you so much for having me, I’m really excited to be here. 

Linzy [00:02:50] I am so excited. I think that what you offer, which we’re going to dig into more about what you do, but so many students that I teach in Money Skills For Therapists, folks listening to the podcast can feel so exhausted and trapped in the work that we do. That’s basically like, to put it really bluntly, right? Like the work that we do can be hard. So, you know, a lot of folks listening to the podcast are mental health therapists or physios or acupuncturists or massage therapists. And I feel like when we’re in healing professions, as you are, there’s such a love for the work. But also the work can get exhausting. It can be a lot to see clients week after week after week for like years and years and years. And I’m so excited to have you here today because you have some other models that you can share with us, some other options that we have available as health practitioners. 

Stephanie [00:03:36] Yeah, absolutely. And I come from dietetics for those of you listening and don’t know who I am, but I was a dietitian for 12 years and I was doing 1 to 1 and then started my practice very quickly. So I had that private practice. I saw people in person, I did the 1 to 1, and I never thought I was going to get into the 1 to 1, but I just ended up getting in there. And I loved I love how you just said we have this love and passion for the work and the change and seeing people when they when they get cross that line to the other side, that’s where the love is. And very quickly, I just found myself repeating myself over and over again. It’s driving me crazy, like very early, you know, I just repeating it over and over again. And so that’s when I started to explore, Gosh, what else can I can I do to serve my population? And very early got into online programing myself as a practitioner in 2013. So I get where you guys who are listening are, because I was in it. And in a different way though, in dietetics, we are all a little different. We do a little differently. But if you feel that you can feel something kind of in your soul that you like, you love the people and you love the work and the outcome. But it’s also just too much to do it all the time. And I was there and I get it. And that’s why I get so excited about the work that we do here at The Leveraged Practice is because we work with you, those practitioners, to help you break out of that. A lot of our people still love to do the 1 to 1, like they have that 1 to 1 and it’s not that you let go that completely, but you do less of it and still make an impact. So I totally get that that problem area that we lie in where you’re looking at your heart and your soul is almost like, Gosh, I got to be able to impact lives and do this work, but there must be different avenues or ways to do it. 

Linzy [00:05:16] Totally because yeah, a lot of folks listening, Stephanie, they probably also resonate with like the idea of being highly sensitive or just kind of lower energy or they do really heavy work, you know, like you do work that it’s like it’s really hard to have that same conversation 20 times a week or to like deal with heavy subject areas, you know, for 20 hours a week. And I think for a lot of folks, they might feel that they’ve kind of hit their wall like they can’t see any more clients in a week or they’re already seeing too many already. They can feel that like this is not sustainable, even though they love the work. It’s like it’s starting to take too much and you have some options for us when we find ourselves in that place. 

Stephanie [00:05:50] It’s like you can see it coming, like they’re not burnt out. Like you’re not burnt out, but you should see it coming, right? You’re like, Oh my gosh. Like, I don’t want to end up over there. You know, that’s primarily who you’re probably listening and that’s where. 

Linzy [00:06:04] You’re on a path that you know is not sustainable. You can’t do this for another 20 years. 

Stephanie [00:06:08] Absolutely. We work with quite a few eating disorder therapists and dietitians in the dietitian field because that is such heavy work and it’s such a loving work, like they love it. But we’ve built a few amazing programs with our clients in that area because there’s so much room for group conversation, community, or supporting parents. Like if you work with pediatrics, you know, building a support program for the parents is really, really exciting and fun and it fulfills a different side of you that wants to do that good work. So yeah there’s hope, just know that there’s hope. 

Linzy [00:06:45] I feel hopeful and something that you mentioned that I think is also a neat part of this is the problem is not just that like we have our own limits in terms of how many one on one folks, but it’s like there’s so many more people out there who probably need to hear our message or experience our gift and our approach and our way of dealing with whatever topics that we’ll just never be able to serve in a 1 to 1 model. Like we’re always going to be serving only a fraction of the folks who can benefit from the gift that we have in the work that we love to do. 

Stephanie [00:07:11] I had someone refer to me today, a therapist. I know this is a variety of people listening, but especially for you therapists like she had such a good therapist, she’s like, Please go call Stephanie like the world needs what you have to offer. So whether you’re a therapist or someone else and you feel that power in the work that you do, I’ve had a therapist forever. Love it. So important to my life. But you know, when you’re around someone who’s really good at what they do, whether it’s therapy or dietetics or acupuncture, whoever you are, and you’re around their presence, you’re like, Oh my gosh, can you share this with the world? So if you feel that inside of you, that you have this light, but it’s still going to kind of get dwindled with all of that heaviness of the client load. The world is your oyster. There’s so much for you to be able to do that. 

Linzy [00:07:52] So if that is our situation and if folks listening already feel like, okay, I’ve hit my capacity, I need some other way to make money, or I have this thing I want to share, and I want to share it with more than just 16 or 20 or 30 people a week. Tell us our options. What are different things that we can do to expand beyond 1 to 1 work? 

Stephanie [00:08:10] Yeah. So let’s start with our models here at The Leveraged Practice. So one of the things is you’ve probably heard about courses, or programs, DIY, like, you know, maybe, maybe you’ve even written a book or you’re thinking of writing a book, but you’ve thought about transferring your knowledge in some other way. I have been in online programing since 2013, a very long time, and so I built everything from DIY self-study courses to memberships to mentorships to masterminds, professional development and clinical, because they come from the digestive health world. And where we land in The Leveraged Practice, and what we’ve really focused on in the last four years, is helping our clients to build comprehensive and results driven programing. So less about that book on the Internet, that course that people just watch or videos, which, to be honest, right now people aren’t really paying for anyways. There’s so much free information that your people don’t need more information and you probably already know that like they don’t. They come to you with information and be like, Which of these three things is right? You know, I don’t really need a lot more of that, but what they need is a supportive, organized, step by step program. And so that’s what we teach with a lot of practice. We have four core models, actually, three core models and some secondary models that we teach our clients. I’d love to share that with you guys here on the podcast. If that sounds interesting for you, it’s going to help you visualize what it looks like. And I find that’s tricky for most people in the 1 to 1. What does my program look like? Like, how do I even do that? And so let me share with you the three core models. So we’ve found after working with hundreds of people, that a collection of technology and deliverables and ways to support people together, now formed three models with the work we’ve done with clients. Super cool, something that I’ve developed, but in in partnership with the clients they work with, here’s the three models. The first one, which is exceptional. If you are someone who finds yourself repeating yourself like I was in my practice just all day long is a 1 to 1 hybrid style program. And so this program blends the 1 to 1 work that you’re doing but helps you reduce it so it’s needed less often, or your appointments are shorter along with online education and digital programing. So what we have is, let’s say, a six month program where instead of seeing someone weekly, you see them biweekly, or instead of seeing them for 45 minutes for a follow up, you actually only see them for 15 minutes of a follow up because all of that repeatable education component is available online and is dripped out over those four months or six months and they’re accessing it in between your appointments and your appointments are purely for customization and not for the education part. We can also build in a community, or guest experts, email support, other features into that style of program. But generally it can very quickly, like if you build this into your practice today, it can reduce the 1 to 1. You start to have the same amount of clients. You still have 30 clients, but instead of spending an hour with them every week, it’s like half an hour every week or it’s every other week instead of that. So the your time, you can cut your time in a third, like right now, by implementing a program like that. And then with that time you can take it back, you can go make more money, do whatever you want to do. So that’s one model. We call it the hybrid model, and it integrates 1 to 1 in. And it’s for that practitioner that still wants to include or feels like they need to include a 1 to 1 private session with their clients. What most people find is that with that model, there’s also room for another model because there is a group of clients and maybe you’re not seeing them right now in your practice. So if you’re just providing 1 to 1, what we have found is there’s a whole other group of people that want to give you money and want to work with you, but just don’t want that high level of 1 to 1 ness. Maybe they don’t want to pay that money. Maybe don’t have that money. They don’t want to pay it. They don’t want that intensive work. And so with one of the other two models, our clients will implement both of them and then have a whole new group of people coming in for services. So the next model is something that we call small group cohort model, a small group cohort, and it’s just as it’s described as a maximum number of participants. Our clients find that between five and ten is about the average number of people that you can have in a small group. These small groups generally meet every week and in small group they get enough attention from the facilitator and practitioner, but they also benefit from the group setting because so many of their questions overlap or problems overlap. 

Linzy [00:12:39] Oh, always. 

Stephanie [00:12:39] And our clients use this cohort model to facilitate. So quite a few of our clients use it for a group that they facilitate conversation and discussion. And it’s less about teaching, less about kind of giving those lessons, and more about presenting experience or exercises or options or teaching a concept and then allowing people to integrate or implement their lives. So that’s a model for all of our clients that all of our clients that use that, it’s so close to their heart. They just they love facilitating a small group. Still can be super profitable, like we’re not talking about the biggest scalable model. It’s still super scalable. Still a model you could build six figures, multi six figures with our clients that are moving and scaling up and growing their programs in that small cohort have hired or trained other colleagues to help facilitate the programs. So that’s our small cohort. That is something like a weekly group, small group max, ten people with one practitioner. And again, we have an online education library. We can have resources online. Some of them will have a monthly guest speaker that comes in so we can still integrate some of those features. 

Linzy [00:13:48] Right. Yes. 

Stephanie [00:13:48] And then the third model is more for that practitioner that wants the biggest impact possible. How do I help hundreds of people or thousands of people? And that is with a community group coaching model. So we call it a community group coaching model because the community is so powerful and you really are growing a large community of people. And in this model we have more recorded education. So you’re not teaching live, you’re really having recorded bite-size lessons or modules that people are working through. And then you have some sort of office hours, which would be maybe live Q&A. It could also be pre submitted questions and recorded Q&A. It can also be email support or a forum or community where people are asking questions. So you always want to have a way for people to to get that private support and ask questions when you’re having such a volume in there. I think in health it’s important to have a privacy option. So I really encourage email support in that option. But no repeating yourself. It’s all recorded. And then you come in and offer these great calls that are group dynamic and conversation. So this is what I eventually scaled to with my IBS business, had hundreds of people, actually thousands at one point, into the IBS program, and I found really beautiful experiences that I wouldn’t have guessed with the community sharing different like recipes or sharing things that were working for them. And there’s this aspect that we just can’t give our clients 1 to 1, which is probably why you’re carrying the burden on your shoulders is because it’s just you. You’re all they have. And when you can build out communities as a part of your service offerings, you don’t have 100% of the load anymore. They can share that with other people. And it’s also an interesting way to create boundaries too, but still provide ongoing, consistent support. So those are three main core models. The fourth model I was talking about, we call it our secondary model. And where we find that program comes in is we call it a maintenance membership model. So after your initial program, whether that’s a group or 1 to 1, so if you’re seeing clients right now and they have a problem and it takes four months for them to kind of get through that initial problem, but you find that they want to see it forever because they really just need to either keep the change or they have like a new level of the problem that kind of just keeps coming up in life, which is literally everyone who comes to a health practitioner, you can build an ongoing model that’s more like a membership. But after that initial service, ongoing on a monthly basis, they have access to things like the community, like email support, like office hours, but it’s a lot less. It’s not as much about comprehensive program. 

Linzy [00:16:25] Like their maintenance package. 

Stephanie [00:16:26] Totally. Less of your time, those people don’t usually require any 1 to 1. They just have access and they don’t want to be alone when they’re stuck. So those are the four programs that our clients are building into their practices to really do more than one thing. The first thing you and I talked about was to decrease your 1 to 1 facing hours so you don’t get exhausted, you don’t burn out, and you still have that passion for work and life. But also the models help them increase the profit of the practice. And you and I were talking about money a little bit in that we have a certain maximum we want to charge or we’re allowed to charge or it feels reasonable in our area. And I think there’s this difficult mindset thing that I’ve seen in practitioners is like going above that rate. For me, it was 150 when I was in practice and once I hit 150, I was like, I can’t go over 150. Like, who am I. 

Linzy [00:17:16] You’re at the ceiling. 

Stephanie [00:17:17] Oh, my gosh, yeah. Like forever till you die. And so, you know, I was like, what else am I going to do? And so if that’s, you know, that you can still keep your rate at 150 or whatever it is, but you can have another stream of revenue with your programing that you can charge for, and that people are willing to pay for, because it’s more positioned as a program, not a service. And sometimes people do have in their mind like, one hour you want me to give you $200 for an hour of your time? Like, sometimes there’s kind of like a separation there. But once we’re selling a program, a three month program, a six month program, it feels different. And so, one, we can charge different amounts for that. But two, it’s so much more profitable to your bottom line revenue, which I think is so important, because if you have a practice, it costs money and maybe you’re charging 150 or 130 an hour or whatever it is. But the profit you get to take home, you’re probably looking at your salary going like, Is this enough? It’s probably not. And so that’s how you act to increase your profitability of your business, which is incredible. 

Linzy [00:18:22] Yes. Yeah. And in like scalability, I mean, there’s so many thoughts that I’m having as you’re talking because I’ve I’ve walked some of this path. Right. And first of all, creating Money Skills For Therapists, which first I started doing one on one and realized that it was obviously not scalable to do one on one work. But also I found that it wasn’t as effective. Right. Because as you say, you can’t give somebody community. Right. And so I think especially when you’re teaching something that people might have a lot of like emotion or shame or whatever around, unless in mental health you’re actually doing like depth work with them and you’re helping them process those feelings. Those can actually be a barrier, I think, to them making progress with you, it was just the two of you. But when they’re in a group, suddenly you have this magic that’s added where they see like other, in terms of the folks that I serve, in terms of therapists working on money, you see these other amazing badass therapists who are so good at so many things, but they struggle with money and you’re like, Oh, wait a second, maybe I’m also a badass, and maybe this doesn’t mean that I am failed because I’m not good at money. But just like, ha, I’m learning about money and I can learn like about money. Just like she’s learning, right? And it gives you something that a practitioner or a coach individually just can’t give you, right? Which is that experience of walking with people and being peers with people and growing together with people, which I think is so powerful and can help people actually, like stick to making changes and motivate people to make changes in a way that an individual practitioner is just never going to be able to do with you. Like they can’t replace a community. 

Stephanie [00:19:44] Yeah, absolutely. It reminds me of my very first job as a dietitian and I developed into a kid’s cooking program. And so for anyone who has kids, this may hit you. 

Linzy [00:19:53] Yes. 

Stephanie [00:19:54] Now I have three kids and they’re all 7 and under. I don’t know if you will know this or not, but for me, I was the cooking instructor, so they came to the after school program or they came to the summer program and I taught them how to cook. Well, I was a dietitian, so it was a secret, healthy cooking here. But what I found was, in community with nine or ten of their friends, those kids will do anything good or bad. You got a lot of good or bad. But parents would come in and be like, she ate a tomato, like he had a broccoli. Like their minds are blown. And I didn’t even know tomatoes or broccoli was a problem for them. We just made pizzas and I made them put one vegetable on it to try, or we had salad with like fishy crackers in it or something, you know, like we just did some fun things and they watched other kids put a tomato in their mouth and they did it. And so there’s something about that power, that we can use for that evil or for good. I prefer good use, good when we’re around our peers and we’re around our colleagues and it’s motivating, inspiring, and it keeps that energy going, especially in health, when you can get so down. Like you can get so damn down on making change in your life because change is so hard or it’s it’s rocky, right? You fail. You’re going to succeed and you’re also going to fail one day, or you’re not going to work out at some points. But to be around people who are like, that was me last week or last month, like, here’s what it looks like on the other side, is just so powerful. Like if we all just included online programing. Oh my gosh, the better off- Linzy. 

Linzy [00:21:30] Is that your dream for the world. 

Stephanie [00:21:32] We could learn in community. We could stop repeating ourselves. We could have these accessible ways for our clients to remember. They’re not going to remember what you say when they leave your office, right? Then they are going to actually do the work and they’ll watch it. Like when I was a dietitian and family health team, like in local practice, government paid for. I’d see people every four weeks. And when they came back in four weeks, they were like, the first week was great. I did all these things and then I don’t know what happened and I haven’t done anything for three weeks. 

Linzy [00:22:00] Right? Yes. 

Stephanie [00:22:01] And I think part of it is memory. They care about so many things that were their lowest priority. So when you put things online, people can go back to be like, wait, what was I supposed to do? What was that exercise, or what was that reflection journaling thing, that prompt. And so it’s just like such a better way to learn and remember the poor people. So I truly think every practice could have a program, even if it’s just removing the repeatable stuff right now. 

Linzy [00:22:27] Right? So giving a program that has like some teaching content because it also makes me think about how Money Skills For Therapists, my course, has recorded teaching content. A lot of that content I made in 2018, I don’t remember exactly what I said in all of them, but people will quote me back to myself and I’m like, Well, that was good. I don’t have to be actively teaching it. It’s kind of like you get to bottle up. In some ways, you’re best teaching material, right? Because you’re teaching it in a very intentional way. You’re really thinking about, What’s my best way to explain this? You’re saving your best take. And then they get to watch your best version and absorb, like, your best explanation of the information, not the explanation that you gave on like a Friday afternoon when you were tired. And this was like your 20th time saying this this week, and you’re like trying to, like, make it fresh, but it’s just not feeling fresh. 

Stephanie [00:23:09] So funny. I’ve never heard it put like that. And you know what’s funny is my team’s always like, Oh, do you remember how you said it like this, exactly like this when you did this, you do that over here. And I was like, No, I have absolutely no memory of what I said. It is gone, but I love that. So for me, I do really well. I’m not a morning person, but for some reason, like in the morning, like I’m talking ten, guys, not six o’clock. 

Linzy [00:23:30] Right. Okay. Yeah. 

Stephanie [00:23:32] But I like ten or 930. That’s when I feel the freshest. That’s when I do my hair and make up. That’s when I do my recording. That’s when I make my training. Like four, or five, six at night is not the best time. So I love that you’re talking about like get it out of you in those situations on Tuesday morning. Before you feel dead on Friday. Like that is perfect because it’s it’s not always the same. It’s not always consistent. We can capture that and we teach our clients to outline it, you know, kind of script it out, make a couple slides if you want to that are going to trigger you or remind you, but don’t teach over a giant slide deck. That’s not what you do in practice. Like be personable about it, but highlight some of those specific things that you want to cover, like you said in that kind of best version of it. I love that you said that. I’ve never heard it like that before. It’s so true. It’s so smart. 

Linzy [00:24:19] Yeah. I love what you’re saying about, kinda do it in the way that you would do it in person? So like something I know with teaching and video that I’ve very quickly realized is like little short videos. I have videos, my videos are like 5 minutes. It’s only if I’m deep diving into something and teaching how to do something that it might be up to 20. That’s like Max, Max, Max. Right. Because I know too, like you got to think about your audience and like, what where they’re at when they’re watching it, how much are they going to be able to actually absorb? Right. And when we’re talking to somebody in a session, we don’t just talk at them for 45 minutes. We know that’s not effective. Right. And so you get to translate that over and record it in a way that people are really going able to receive it. Knowing what you know about the folks that you work with. 

Stephanie [00:24:55] The industry type wording is mic learning and that’s you get between two and 8 minutes. That’s like standard. However, I’m always telling my clients like, how are people learning right now? All they’re looking at is 15 seconds. Like, so, I’m not saying make 15 seconds lessons. 

Linzy [00:25:10] TikTok has changed us forever. 

Stephanie [00:25:12] But that 2 to 5 minute is even more important. And my team just had me rerecord like I just restructured our entire course. One of our courses we have three core courses on three core areas that you need to build a leveraged practice. One of them is that scalable asset. So it’s that product like we’re talking about with the models. So I just redid the course training this all under 6 minutes, all of it, even if I wanted to deep dive, I broke it up into like three or four videos. Like, Stephanie, stop telling all the stories. So some of my videos are two and a half minutes. And that’s what we need to give our clients. That’s how they’re learning. That’s what’s helpful when we think about one hour appointments to listen, to assess, to coach, to instruct. I just think like probably less and less people are going to book that and more and more people are available and willing to do programing that they can learn in 15 minutes a week or half a week instead of these one hour consults that they’re going to drive to. So the one thing that I want everyone to remember about programing is that what we’re talking about today is a scalable asset for your business, a program that you can scale into the hundreds of thousands or more if you want to, that’s helping you impact people. But it’s not just a course on the Internet. It’s not just information. It’s truly support, feedback, and a smart way to educate people. That is really the key and that is the future. It is here right now in 2022, but it is the future for the next years of people learning how they’re going to access health care, how they’re going to want to learn. They’re going to still want 1 to 1, or they’re going to still want customization. So if anyone’s listening who is has tried to launch a program and it’s failed, it’s probably because of the offer. You know, if you try to just sell a course now, and you’re like come buy my program, or come buy my course, no one’s going to buy it. They need to know that there’s still assessment and customization and someone who knows their name and they’re not just a number. That’s really important and we will need to do that. We can leverage so much expertize and technology to make it easier to help people that, like you and I were talking about, we don’t have practitioners burning out and changing professions because they just can’t do it anymore. 

Linzy [00:27:21] Yeah. So to give some examples for folks who are listening, who are like, that sounds great, but I’m a I’m a trauma therapist, I am an eating disorder therapist, I’m a physiotherapist. Can you share with us some different examples of programs that you’ve supported folks to make or seen folks make that might replace some of that clinical work that we’ve been doing? 

Stephanie [00:27:38] So let’s talk about manual people. So someone like the physiotherapist who’s listening and I think you also said acupuncturist, and quite a few massage therapists, you’re a physical therapist. This is what I would encourage you to think about. I’m closing my eyes, I know you guys aren’t watching me but I’m closing my eyes. This is what I want you to think about what is the problem that your client comes to you with? Let’s say you’re in massage or physio or any of those, and it’s back pain. Probably the most common pain, right? We’re coming to you with back pain. So you do some physical work on them and they feel a little bit better and they’re going to come back a few times. Now, you know, there are some reasons why they got that back pain in the first place. And you might take a couple of minutes to explain it to them, maybe sitting in the chair, maybe like how they lift things. Like there is actually a lot of education to either prevent that. Maybe there’s some treatment where they can go home and do certain things that you can build a program around. So one of the physiotherapists that we worked with during COVID, so she was like, Ah, I got to get online right now. And we were like, okay, let’s do this. Was on ergonomics. So as a physiotherapist, she has a magical gift of healing the back and healing the body. But she had information and knowledge that she could put into a program that helped people to reduce that back pain and even prevent that back pain with the way that they work and the way that they sit in all settings. So that’s an example of a program that one of our clients made, Sasha, sets an example, but for all of you listening, if you’re in that physical space, the question is what are people coming to you with? What’s that problem and what- how can you support them in that way? Another one I think of is for me, when I was pregnant, I always had back pain. I did lots of physio and now I’m doing pilates and I’m all good. But so other people have taken my money and taught me different courses to make my back better, no one wants to have that forever. But pregnancy and like that group of human beings who are doing exceptional work, probably have a lot of different issues and pain. So if you’re physically supporting them during pregnancy, imagine what you could be teaching them that they could be doing at home to keep that change or to feel good in their bodies. So that would be the way that I would look at that. In therapy, again, I think I mean, we could talk about eating disorder, we could talk about trauma, we could talk about the intuitive eating space. There’s quite a few people over there. Some of that is needed 1 to 1. So that hybrid program works really, really well. But actually, when I was working with one with my therapist, I know that she she taught me a lot about parts work. She gave me a book like there’s like a whole bunch of stuff, I don’t even remember. 

Linzy [00:30:10] Internal Family Systems. 

Stephanie [00:30:12] There was no program on it. 

Linzy [00:30:13] Yes, yes. 

Stephanie [00:30:15] Think about those educational pieces in therapy, especially for those of you in trauma or those of you that are in like disordered eating or that like those kinds of things where there’s underlying issues you do teaching on that, right? So you could be sitting with a client for 30 minutes unraveling what’s going on and then prescribe them a training on parts work or on like what you were saying, like family. And there’s a family thing, right? 

Linzy [00:30:41] Internal family systems. Yeah. Which is parts work. 

Stephanie [00:30:44] Which is parts work. 

Linzy [00:30:44] Probably the parts work you did. It’s the most popular right now. Yeah. 

Stephanie [00:30:47] I am not the expert on the subject matters. That’s you wonderful people. I am the expert on the putting it all together into a structure that will sell. But those kinds of pieces, no matter what health practitioner I’m working with, but in therapy, specifically, understanding is like crazy, right? Like that’s changes your life is someone who understands to you some kind of system like you were explaining about the family. Like that influences why you’re acting the way you are. It’s just it’s amazing. And so with, I would think, like with some of our programmers that are doing, I mean, even weight loss, but intuitive eating, disordered eating, trauma. We have some individual consults, but then we have the learning underneath, which is dripped out either on a weekly or monthly basis or it’s prescriptive where the library of resources, and in that you’re saying, okay, this week I want you to look at this chapter. This week I want you to look at this chapter. We’ve also had, like I was saying to someone, not just one person, but several people create parental programs. If you’re working with a teen population around again, like I’m thinking of disordered eating, but any kind of any kind of trauma or any kind of behavior issues. Having a program that educates and supports the parents so the child is in the 1 to 1 work, but the parent is in a comprehensive program that supports them in how to support the child. That has been really well received by our clients, clients who have bought into those parent programs. That has been amazing as well. 

Linzy [00:32:19] Saying something that’s coming up for me and like I don’t know if there’s any basis in this, but I guess one question I have is, Stephanie, have you encountered any professions where in their like licensure or with their college – we’re both Canadian, in Canada, we call it college – your regulatory body doesn’t allow them to sell courses to clients. 

Stephanie [00:32:37] Yeah, absolutely. I think it’s a good time to ask this question because you may be thinking, yes, I’m going to do this. I’m excited. Oh, no – my college. 

Linzy [00:32:46] Oh, yes, I’m from the College of Social Workers in Ontario and I’m like, I don’t think I would be allowed to do that. 

Stephanie [00:32:51] So we’ve worked with a lot of people, especially in Canada, who start within their own province. So if you’re in the province of Ontario, for example, you can practice outside of just your own city, right? I’m in the city of Hamilton. I can practice. I mean, if you’re just going to drive. Actually, I was in Kitchener-Waterloo when I had my practice and I had people drive up to 3 hours to visit me. Now, they wouldn’t have driven from Ottawa or from Sault Ste Marie. Way too far. And we weren’t doing virtul back then. So your practice could at least expand to your provincial lines. That’s the first place to think about it and look at it. You could help more people that are just in your city and you could even help the people in your city in a bigger capacity. So some of our clients are literally just practicing in their state and increasing their profitability, decreasing their hours, and growing their revenue just within their state or province lines. So I would first start you there. 

Linzy [00:33:44] Yeah. 

Stephanie [00:33:45] Yes, you’re right. The licensure for mental health professionals, dietetics, physiotherapy, for many of them, it’s going to be you are licensed in that province or state for that particular title. Okay. And so you can still do some of this stuff and work larger than just your local city. So that’s where a lot of our clients will start. Outside of that, what I have found and I know everyone has a different licensure, so here’s just some thoughts for you now. Disclaimer: My lawyer says I cannot give legal advice, so this is not legal advice. Always go and talk to your own college and your own lawyer. But some other ways that people are doing this is they get licensed in more than one state or province. We see this in Canada, we can do this in the US. I find it’s more affordable for our U.S. friends, for them to get licensed in different states. And also in the US, there are some states that don’t require a license. I know that, especially for dietetics. 

Linzy [00:34:37] Oh, interesting. 

Stephanie [00:34:38] That you can practice dietetics and it’s just you don’t need to be licensed in that state. So every country, every state, every province, every industry has some different rules. So you want to talk to your college that you’re governed by first and then talk to a lawyer and understand it. So another, like I said, is that you can be licensed in different places. Another way to do it is some of my clients have partners in different prep in different states. So one of my clients right now has this goal of going national across the US. So she’s licensed in a few states and she’s just hired two professionals who are licensed in other states and together they’re licensed in 12 states right now. Right. So as you grow and scale them, you can actually grow your model because you don’t want it to be just you anyways if you’re serving all of the United States of America, so you’re going to need to grow your team. And that’s an amazing and very cool, very innovative way to do it that people are doing it. So that’s why I always say like, start in your own state or province or I know some of our American friends, they might be registered in New Jersey and New York and like a couple of them and build that up and get that working. And then once that’s working? The sky’s the limit. You can get bigger. Other clients might function with a different title, so they may be a registered whatever, but in their program they are a consultant, or they coach. That’s another legal question, ask your lawyer about that. 

Linzy [00:36:00] Yes. Ask your lawyer. Ask your lawyer. But what I’m hearing is there are creative solutions. Right. And like finding ways to do it creatively and then, you know, also thinking through for you and what you’re doing, what is ethical, you know, like what are the ways that you can expand that, you know, are meeting your client’s needs and ticking all the right boxes? 

Stephanie [00:36:17] I think it’s really easy to get overwhelmed. It’s really easy to leave this podcast and think of five reasons why you can’t do that. You know, it’s really easy to look at your schedule and think like, where am I going to find the time to build this out? It’s so- it’s it’s too easy to go that way. Which is sometimes why- and you know this because you’re a coach, like you need to hire a coach, you get into a program, you need to just do it. 

Linzy [00:36:37] Give yourself a structure. 

Stephanie [00:36:38] Yeah, give yourself that. But other times, like I just think with practitioners it’s so easy to give ourselves all these reasons and I want to encourage you to start at the beginning. You have too many clients. You can’t see people 1 to 1 for 40 hours a week for the next 40 years, like you cannot. 

Linzy [00:36:54] Right. 

Stephanie [00:36:55] They should have taught us in school, online programs are great and because this is not sustainable and you have the ability to build a sustainable practice, even if it’s local within your own city, I’ve seen it be successful or in your own state or province. Even if you don’t, even if you give me those excuses, you can absolutely do it locally at the local level. Because remember, one of the things I said, I know I’ve talked a lot on this podcast, but one of the things I said was the 1 to 1 clients that come in and do that face to face or Zoom 1 to 1. There is a segment of clients that will never do that work. And when you create another offer for them, another, you open a window, another opportunity for them to work with you. You will get more sales than you ever have, even if it’s within your own city or within a three hour area. And, you know, three states that you’re registered in. So it can still help you decrease your hours and increase your profit. Locally, the other part of it, is it can literally just- what if you just made the same money but you worked half the time? What if you just work like 2 days a week? But you made the same money because you stop repeating yourself. You leveraged community and online technology and you just worked less. Like that is absolutely possible. I just want to add, I can’t hear what you all are thinking, but I do. And I know there’s some reasons in your head that you can’t do what I want to offer you a few things to think about. Like what if all it did was decrease your hours? What if all it did was bring in an extra $10K a year and decreased one day in your schedule? Right. To me, that is totally worth it. That is incredibly worth it. 

Linzy [00:38:34] Yes. Like this doesn’t have to be your plan to become a multi-millionaire. It can still have very positive impacts on your financial life and your ability to reach people, even if you decide to make it something relatively small. 

Stephanie [00:38:46] Yeah, and it can be, but that’s a conversation for like once you do this and you’re killing it and you’ve reached six figures, then then we can talk about the million. That’s a different- bit of a different model. We definitely need a lawyer then, that like that’s a different- 

Linzy [00:38:59] At least. 

Stephanie [00:39:00] Start where you start. And you start with that first goal and then you keep going. 

Linzy [00:39:04] Well, thank you so much. I’m sure you’ve planted seeds with folks of like, oh, and that’s what I want to encourage is like, as Stephanie said, like I know sometimes, especially mental health therapists. I don’t know, Stephanie, if dietitians are a certain type of human, but mental health therapist we tend to be over thinkers, over functionaries. And it’s possible that folks are like, well, I can’t because X, Y, Z and I, yeah, I am with Stephanie. Like be creative. Start to think about like, well, but what if I just this little thing or what if this thing that I say all the time, what if I did just have a few videos instead that I, you know, shared with folks or sold as a little package, or educational materials for parents I love because therapists talk about that. Like you’re working with the kid, you really don’t want to actually have like, necessarily a ton to do with the parents, depending on what the situation is. And yet, you know, what happens to the parents is everything. So having like a course that those parents are going through at the same time as you’re working individually with that kiddo, like that seems like a huge added value, you know, to what you’re providing for that family. So many possibilities. 

Stephanie [00:40:01] Everyone I work with is feeling overwhelmed and they’re also struggling with perfectionism. I think I could have a whole show on overwhelming perfectionism. 

Linzy [00:40:09] Oh, yes, yes, yes. 

Stephanie [00:40:10] So, yes. And I’m recovering. I was a dietitian. I’m recovering perfectionist. And I think the biggest thing for me and I think you would probably have great advice on this as well, it’s overwhelming to grow a business. It’s overwhelming to shift from a health practitioner to an entrepreneur. It’s always been exciting for me, though, like, I like chaos, so I’m okay, but it’s still overwhelming. And you have those overwhelming days. So having people around you, like you were saying, you have a community in your program, having that being around people who dream big like you and want to be an innovator and want to be a leader and having someone that gives you that structure and support, for me, that is how I changed my life. I don’t think I was there without all those supports. 

Linzy [00:40:51] Oh, Absolutely. 

Stephanie [00:40:51] So if you really want to do this, you know, do it, but like get some support around it. 

Linzy [00:40:56] Yeah. I mean, there’s that expression of like you are, you know, kind of the sum of the five people you spend the most time with. And I think that’s absolutely true. Like who we surround ourselves with really defines what’s possible and what we think is possible. And so if you are listening to Stephanie and you’re like your interest is peaked. I would say get around her and get around other folks who are doing the kind of stuff that you want to do and you might be surprised what possibilities open up for you and what becomes suddenly possible and might even seem like a no brainer once you get those right support. So Stephanie, on that topic, if folks want to get further into your world, where can they find you? 

Stephanie [00:41:29] Yeah, the easiest thing to do is check out my podcast. So my company’s called The Leveraged Practice, you can find The Leveraged Practice podcast on iTunes, Spotify, all the podcast places. And if you’re listening to this, then I know you’re podcast listeners, so you cannot, you cannot, you can’t. I’ll find you. No, you can find me, you have no excuses. So The Leveraged Practice podcast, find me there. We do episodes every week. There’s lots of really great stories. We have clients sharing what’s worked for them. So if you need a little more underneath to inspire you, it’s a great place. I share strategy and what’s working now as well. And then we run a free training. And so if you go to leverage your practice, go to leverageyourpractice.com, you’ll sign up for our next training. Sometimes it’s live, sometimes it’s just available right away on demand. So you go on over there and you’re ready to understand more about the frameworks that we teach and the different systems that you need to build into your practice so that you can do this. That’s a great place as well, but you can find me in either of those places or you can find me on Instagram @theleveragedpractice if you want to send me a message or you have a question. 

Linzy [00:42:29] Great. Awesome. Thank you so much, Stephanie. 

Stephanie [00:42:31] Oh, my gosh. This was my honor, everyone. Thank you for letting me jump into this podcast you listen to regularly. It’s just such a pleasure to share what I care about and I hope that it makes a difference for some of you. 

Linzy [00:42:42] Awesome. Thank you. I was so impressed in my conversation with Stephanie about just how many different kind of distinct models they have clarified and support people with creating for their online offers. And of course, I definitely recognize some of those models as Money Skills For Therapists has been a couple of those things over time. And I love that Stephanie specifically is for health practitioners and therapists because it is a little different for us. The work that we’re doing is a little different. There’s different considerations that need to be made of how to either translate what you do online or even thinking about how to integrate that effectively into the work that you’re doing. And ethically, you know, there’s there’s rich territory there. But if you did find yourself getting caught up as Stephanie and I thought that maybe you might be in thinking about why you- this can apply to you. I really do encourage you to almost put that aside for a second to think about if you could offer a program online, if that’s something interesting to you, what would it be about? What is that thing that you talk to your clients about over and over again? Or what is that topic that just lights you up that you would love to be able to talk about and just create specific content and space in your schedule to be digging into that with people? Being curious, letting yourself be excited is a really good place to start. Before we start to stop ourselves and tell ourselves why it wouldn’t work or why our college or licensing body would not allow it. And there are certainly lots of different options and creative options. And you could always talk to lawyers or talk to colleagues who are doing it to see how they are making it work, so that they can have different ways of supporting and helping people besides one on one. They can point you in all the right directions, but I hope that it got some of your wheels turning today. If it’s something you’ve considered before about what it might look like for you, if you decided to expand beyond 1 to 1 practice. If you enjoy the content that I’m putting out, you can check me out on Instagram. You can follow me @moneynutsandbolts. I am sharing free – of course, because it’s Instagram – practical and emotional private practice money content out there all the time. And if you’re enjoying the podcast, please head over to Apple Podcasts and leave me a review. Even if you’ve heard me say this like 20 times and you haven’t done it, let this be the time that you do it. I would love, love, love to hear your thoughts and feedback and get a review from you about the podcast so other therapists can find me. Thanks for listening today.