STP 168 | 5 Website Bottlenecks That Keep Therapists From Getting More Clients w. Daniel Fava
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Daniel Fava : What are those, those key things that hold websites back from being, you know, the fuel that they can be in a practice.
And so we've really seen over the last year to two years just a, a really big shift when it comes to search engine optimization and the rise of AI and how people are finding and using websites.
James Marland: Hello and welcome back to the Scaling Therapist Podcast. This is the show where we help mission-driven leaders and professionals turn their experience into meaningful courses, programs, and resources. And I wanna help you put your mission in motion. And today I have a special guest, Daniel Fava from Private Practice Elevation. Hello, Daniel.
Daniel Fava : Hey James. How's it going? Thanks for having me.
James Marland: Yeah. Well, thank you so much for coming on. I always enjoy talking with you and, uh, talking about, um, webpages and marketing and, uh, sometimes ai. [00:01:00] Um, we're gonna talk about, uh, bottlenecks that, webs that, uh, good website helps private practice owners breakthrough. So we're gonna, I'm really excited to dig into that. You always have some good notes. Um, before we get in, uh, how's, how's life? What's, what's going on? What's new with you?
Daniel Fava : Life is good. Life feels, feels busy, and I'm really trying to just embrace that busyness with our, our two young boys, uh, nine and soon to be five on Monday. So yeah, it's, it's kind of a cool season as they're coming into things that. They love or do well, such as our five-year-old is really good at soccer and he just started soccer again his second season.
Uh, and so yeah, it's just fun to kind of see them come into their own. So it's, it's definitely keeping us busy, trying to balance, you know, business ownership. And my wife has a private practice as well. Um, you know, so she's got a business too. And so, yeah, it's just a lot, a lot of stuff going on, but it's, but it's all [00:02:00] good.
It's all good.
James Marland: And, uh, thanks for taking the time to carve out to, uh, speak to us and to the listeners. And when your kids play soccer, is it still like a bunch of grapes running around or do they stick to their position?
Daniel Fava : Uh, it's mostly, it's mostly chaos, but kind of the, the cool thing and the thing that I was so proud of, like just watching my son's Caleb, was I could see him like. Really calculate where the ball's going, especially when it's like defense, like the ball would come outta that pack of chaos and he would like cut it off at like a trajectory.
I'm like, oh my gosh. He knows how to play defense and like, haven't even, I haven't taught him that. And it's just, it's just very natural for him. So it's really cool to see.
James Marland: Neat.
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: uh, I was, I was never very good at soccer. I didn't, I didn't understand it until I, like, I started watching some of it and I'm like,
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: how, that's how it's supposed to be played. But that was, it was too late for me.[00:03:00]
Daniel Fava : Yeah, I played my, I played until, uh, about, uh, middle school when I got cut from the team and I said, okay, I'm gonna start doing lacrosse now. So that was my, that was my journey. Lacrosse was really my sport growing up.
James Marland: Well, uh, uh, basketball was mine. I was six two, taller than many people,
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: me to get rebounds even
Daniel Fava : Great.
James Marland: good.
Daniel Fava : You're still, you're still important. You're still,
James Marland: I
Daniel Fava : part of the team.
James Marland: yeah, I, I showed up on the, the rebound stat, not necessarily the scoring stat or anything else,
Daniel Fava : Nice.
James Marland: so. All right. Uh, so let's, let's, uh, talk about webpages. 'cause webpages are very important for how people find you these days. And, um, there are bottlenecks to those webpage and you help private practice owners break through.
Why don't you tell us a little bit about private practice elevation and then just jump into the bottlenecks. What, uh, what does
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: elevation do?
Daniel Fava : Yeah, sure. So, private practice [00:04:00] elevation. Uh, we are a small agency. We have about, uh, nine employees now, which is crazy for me to say. Uh, you know, I really started, uh, really my, my journey came from helping my wife in getting her private practice online back in 2012, you know, design and launched a WordPress website for her when she was first starting that.
And that really helped kind of fuel those first, you know, clients that came to her and, you know, start things in motion. Now she's got a full, you know, group practice growing you know really well. And so she's always been kind of like my Guinea pig when it comes to online marketing. And so in about 2016 I launched out basically as a freelancer, building websites for therapists.
Just kind of using that experience to help others. And so that has really grown into what private practice elevation is today. And so we, our, our three main services are custom website design and development. And that could also include copywriting. We have the copywriting piece as well. And then WordPress care plans.
So, you know, if you don't [00:05:00] want to be the one who has to take care of your website and your on WordPress, you just want a team to make sure that everything is secure, backed up working well, plus. You know, making changes to the website as well. Hosting, you know, that's our care plans. And then also search engine and now AI optimization work.
So, you know, getting you really established, like helping you reach that next elevation in your online marketing, you know, with a great website. And then kind of feeling that with the, the SEO work to, to get more folks. So that's really, that's really the, the gist of what we do here at PPE.
James Marland: So, yeah. And so that means you've seen a lot of, a lot of web pages and gone through a lot of data,
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: what some of the, the, the barriers or the bottlenecks are for people with their websites. And that's gonna be
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: today. Um, what are the, what are, what are the bottlenecks and, and why do they happen?
Um, when, when you examine [00:06:00] webpage.
Daniel Fava : Yeah, so I think this was a, this was a great, you know, topic idea that, you know, when I asked you, Hey, what, what would your audience want to hear about? You mentioned about bottlenecks. That really got me thinking about. What are those, those key things that hold websites back from being, you know, the fuel that they can be in a practice.
And so we've really seen over the last year to two years just a, a really big shift when it comes to search engine optimization and the rise of AI and how people are finding and using websites. And it used to be that. And I'm having the same conversation with just multiple people every, you know, week in, week out.
And they say, I've had a website for a while, and it worked. It was fine. And then suddenly about a year ago, you know, when these shifts really started to happen. It's just really dropped off. You know, I'm not seeing a lot of traffic, I'm not getting a lot of leads, and so I think it used to be okay that we just kinda, we just had a website.
This is our home, this is my digital [00:07:00] brochure. But now that is often not enough. And there's some key things that we need to do to make sure that, you know, website. Break through these bottlenecks that we're gonna talk about and help you reach, you know, those ideal clients. So ~the~ the four bot, I have four bottlenecks that we can talk about today.
And so number one. Is that people can't find you. It's, it's that bottleneck of, of traffic. You're kind of held back and, you know, people aren't finding you. Number two, people aren't sure you're the right fit. And so that is kind of a, a connection bottle bottleneck that can happen. Uh, people, number three, people visit your site but don't actually reach out, and that's, uh, trouble with conversions.
And number four, bottleneck. Comes a little bit more close to, you know, the actual therapist and that's you spend too much time. Answering the same questions, and so that actually can help, you know, uh, hinder your conversions as well. It's, it's kind of related to, [00:08:00] uh, the other pieces. So, you know, I think a really great website is gonna help reduce friction in all of these areas.
And the good news is that you could have maybe just one of these present and so you can really focus in and, you know, really improve that. Uh, some people might have a few, few of these present, and so, you know, these are all kind of. Layered one on top of the other that we can continue to, you know, move a website forward and, you know, make sure that it's really performing for the private practice.
James Marland: Yeah, and it, it's really cool that there are people who, who have like you, that understand the problems because sometimes if you're not in it day in and day out, you, you understand I have a problem.
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: not getting the conversions or, um, people visit me, but there's, there's no, there's nobody's clicking the form.
You know, you have a problem, but you don't know how to solve it.
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: uh, having somebody on your, in your corner that helps you through these things is, is really [00:09:00] key.
Daniel Fava : Yeah,
James Marland: owners, sometimes not the best person to do all these things. Like, you can
Daniel Fava : absolutely.
James Marland: of it with guidance, and I know you have guided, uh, courses and things, but sometimes it's just not you're you, you add value when you are doing your best work.
And I don't think sometimes your best work is fighting with A-H-T-M-L code or.
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: some of those things. Like there's people out there who love that
Daniel Fava : Mm-hmm.
James Marland: they, they get their joy from solving these problems and they
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: um, so much, so much more faster, quicker, better than
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: I, if I had to do some of this, I'd have to like, watch a course, learn how to do it, with the program,
even though I, I actually like doing some of those things.
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: It's as a practice owner, you gotta think, is this worth my time? So anyways, that's, that's a
top level.
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: a I'm, I'm really. I'm [00:10:00] pro delegation.
Daniel Fava : Yeah, absolutely.
James Marland: delegation because I struggle with it myself. And I know when I do, when I do
delegate these things, a lot goes a little smoother and I'm happier and
things get done better.
So anyways, let's, uh, let's dive into some of the, the, the bottlenecks here. How about in a bottleneck? Number one, the right clients can't find you.
Daniel Fava : yeah, yeah. So I mean, this really comes down to, to SEO and visibility. And so, you know, like I mentioned in like that scenario that we're seeing. Kind of play out is that, you know, people have a website. It's just kind of been there, it's worked in the past, you know, now we're some people, maybe they're relying more on referrals or other websites, directories, psychology today, local networks, stuff like that.
But we wanna make sure that the website itself too is, you know, constantly referring you organic traffic and, and new clients like, 'cause that could be a really. You know, fuel for your practice. Uh, in my wife's [00:11:00] case, she's got, you know, more than, more than half of her new clients come from organic traffic, people finding her online.
So we wanna make sure that you don't have. Your ex all, and you know, that basket of just, you know, referrals, word of mouth or just psychology Today, we wanna make sure that organic is, organic traffic is coming to you, people can find you. And so, you know, that comes down to SEO. And so some of the things that we want to make sure happen and just kind of some, some tips or some approaches that you can make, uh, it really comes down to like that shift that we talked about with AI and SEO and how Google is now doing these AI previews.
What they're doing is they're no longer really just showing you like, Hey, here's the top 10 websites that answer your question. But now they're pulling from trusted sources, and so your goal is to not. To think about it, not in the terms of how can I rank for this keyword, but how can I be the most trusted source on a given topic?
And so those topics can come down to [00:12:00] your spec, your specialties, or the services that you offer and the populations that you work with. So we recommend that you structure your website around those specific issues and populations you work with. And so you wanna make it as clear as possible to Google and your website visitors.
Who you help and how you help them and where you're located. And so a lot of times when people say like, Hey, I just, I'm not getting any traffic from Google at all. Or I used to get some, and it's really dropped off, you know, we'll see that they don't have those specific pages, devoted pages for each service or specialty that they offer because Google can't trust you and even ideal clients can't trust you fully.
When you just have a landing page that is just like, here's all my services. Here's a bulleted list. It's just a lot of confusion. But if you have a devoted landing page for couples counseling in a Nashville or. Specific, like super specific trauma therapy for women in Atlanta or you know, [00:13:00] trauma therapy for new mothers in Atlanta, like very specific on that page.
You can answer those really specific frequently asked questions that those clients have. And it's those types of questions and sections on those sub on those pages, on those sub pages that get pulled into those AI previews. And so there's kind of just a, a big shift happening in how we approach SEO. It used to be like we just, yeah, we, we just write an article based on a keyword.
We check that off. Okay, great. It's on our website now. Let's just wait. Hopefully we will show up, maybe get some back links to it, that sort of thing. But you know, now we're really focused on topics like really topics and digging in, and you can even expand your content surrounding each of these specialties.
By doing more longer for form articles related to those specialties that answer specific questions on your website, they link back to those specialty, uh, service pages. Uh, [00:14:00] so, you know, that's kind of just one tip for when it comes to the SEO piece is make sure that you have that structure in place and you're kind of thinking about it a little bit differently going forward.
James Marland: Yeah. Um, about how to show up when with those AI recommendations, um, like it's, it's, it's another level that I quite, I, I figured. I, I knew how to show up in the page rank. Like if you get you in the top 10 you, that, that seemed to make sense. Like if you, if you do these things,
your page will show up, your keyword and your page will show up higher and higher. So keep doing those things. But when it comes to ranking with ai, like my brain hasn't connected to how to do that yet.
Daniel Fava : Yeah. Yeah. I think it really comes ba down to making sure that you're, you are answering [00:15:00] specific questions like we really want to dig in. I. I'll kind of take a step back. A lot of what we've done in the past still works, but now it's really just kind of digging in a little bit further on the structure of your website, making sure that.
Everyone understands who you are, where you are, what are your certifications, you know, uh, you know, Google talks about like making sure that you, you showcase your expertise, your authorit, your trustworthiness, you know, all that stuff. And so having just information on your website. You know, related to symptoms of anxiety.
You know, just kind of, we, we don't want people who are just looking for information. We're looking for people who have the intent of actually working with a therapist, private practice. And so they've got specific questions on, what does it look like to work with you? Why should I trust you? You know, like, so we want to really showcase those elements on the website rather than just providing [00:16:00] information.
And so we're really digging into frequently asked questions, and those are kind of spread throughout. Those service pages or taking a frequently asked question and writing a whole blog post about that and really, you know, connecting that back to those specialty pages to really create that, that authority
James Marland: a,
Daniel Fava : that Google's gonna then cite you.
James Marland: So you're, you're creating a page specifically for a question somebody might ask that links back to what you do.
Daniel Fava : Yeah, exactly.
James Marland: Okay. It's a little, it's a little for, for the human. It's like, oh, that's a lot. But for the computer, it's like, well, this is what I need.
Daniel Fava : Right. Yeah. And Google and AI is looking at like not just. One page. It's looking at your whole website now and how does content work together on these topics to, to show that you are, you know, a trustworthy source. You have lots of resources, you know, connected to these, [00:17:00] these topics and these questions that these clients are asking.
James Marland: Before, before we move on to bottleneck number two, your visitors aren't sure you're the next fit. I'm, I'm wondering is it worth it? Like I have hundreds of blogs. Would it be worth it to go back to those blogs and link them to, um, create a page for the question and link those blogs to that page and then link that page to the service?
Is it worth it to go back? Or do you have to just rely on new stuff?
Daniel Fava : It's always worth kinda looking at the data and seeing like which pages are performing and which pages aren't. Like there's, there's been a few of our clients who. Have, you know, written blog posts for years and years, and it's almost like there's too much information. And so, you know, now Google's looking at quality over quantity really is what it comes down to.
So, you know, sometimes there could be, you know, lots of content that's not really performing. You might want to, uh, maybe [00:18:00] combine some blog posts together. We've done that for, for some folks. Um, but it really, you know, takes looking, looking at the data, you know, if one.
James Marland: Mm.
Daniel Fava : Blog post is working really well, just kind of ~re~ re-op optimization and yes, connecting, connecting those links together can be helpful.
James Marland: Okay. Uh, how about, uh, bottleneck number two, visitors aren't sure you are the right fit?
Daniel Fava : Yeah. And so, you know, if, if someone comes to your website and, you know, let's say you are doing SEO, you're getting some traffic. Really the next question that they're gonna be asking is, is this the right therapist for me? And this is
James Marland: I.
Daniel Fava : that trust bottleneck. And we kind of talked about this as related to SEO.
So a lot of therapy websites we see, you know, they unintentionally make this harder 'cause they, they're focusing, or in the past they focus so much on the therapist, on the modality, like I said, like the information, like here's how. Here's, here's what I'm [00:19:00] trained in. You know, it's good to mention like what you're trained in, but it shouldn't really be the focus, you know, so people might say like, we use CBT or EMDR for blah, blah, blah, and some people are, you know, in, in tune and aware with those terms.
So I'm not saying, you know, leave those off completely, but don't make that really the first and foremost thing. So we, we really want to. Focus in on the ideal client and their challenges and where they're at. So, you know, at first they're coming up to, you know, to a page. They've got, you know, anxiety or they're nervous about the process.
So they wanna know, like, do you understand what I'm going through, the challenges that I'm going through, and do I feel safe reaching out to you? So we want to build trust by speaking directly to the client's experience and where they're at. Using warm human language, you know, making sure that our website isn't a lot of therapy speak or just, you know, informational.
And we wanna also just really [00:20:00] be clear, like clarity is the most helpful thing that you can do for, uh, connecting. Converting and even SEO. Like you have to make it clear so. Make sure you're clearly explaining who you help and how you help them. So just kind of shifting that language can make a really big difference.
You know? So like, you're, you're, you're saying things like if you're, if you've been feeling constantly on edge, overwhelmed, stuck in cycles of anxiety, you know, stuff like that, not just. We treat anxiety in Atlanta. Here's how you get started. You know, like we really want to connect with people. Um, I know that you are, you're familiar with StoryBrand and Donald Miller and that sort of approach and that kind of hearkens back to that, is that your ideal client is the most knowledgeable expert about themselves, and so we want to let them know.
We know exactly what you're going through. Here's how I help, here's the ways I help, here's how you get started. And that, uh, that [00:21:00] also kind of goes back to that SEO piece. Having those individual service pages allows you to really dig into that sort of language because a couple's therapy client is gonna be way different than someone who's coming to you for individual trauma therapy.
James Marland: so what I, what I've learned is that you, you gotta connect with them by starting with a problem or starting with something at the top that they see that they can see like, oh, they, they understand me, they get me.
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: your example of asking that question. Do you feel on edge? Do you feel like you're stuck in this cycle of anxiety? Like that's speaking their language. That's sort of like the first. Date, you know, like you're not asking them to buy from you right away.
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: them to get to know you,
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: then mo.
The longer they look, stay on the page, the more information you can give them about what you do.
Daniel Fava : Right.
James Marland: about how many years of experience you [00:22:00] have or what degrees you have until they feel like, oh, they understand me and they can help me.
Daniel Fava : Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Yeah. And this, you know, and just kind of go back, going back to SEO, what I said about clarity. Like we also don't want, we want it to just be very clear, like when someone lands on that service page. The first thing they're gonna see is couples therapy in Atlanta. You know, like, not like big, bold text.
It's like you feel like you, you've drifted in your relationship. You know, like we, we, we'd still want it to be clear of like, this is the service that we offer. You know, and people kind of understand that. And it goes back to that intent of, I'm looking for a couples therapist. And then we go into that connecting with their current situation, whatever that might be.
Like you said, like that helps them. You know, feel seen and like we understand where they're coming from.
James Marland: Yeah, it's, it's really important. Um, uh, [00:23:00] so. What, how does this connect with, uh, bottleneck Number three? People actually visit the website, but then they don't, they don't reach out. They don't fill out the form. Nothing, nothing happens.
Daniel Fava : Yeah. So ~we~ we're kind of building layers here. Like we're, we got the visibility piece, that means traffic is coming in. Then we're working on how do we connect with that traffic with those ideal clients. And so we're talk, we talked about kind of copy and language, and the next step is really making sure that people actually convert.
So sometimes people do get traffic to the website, but inquiries are still low. And this is a lot of work that we do with our, our SEO clients because we're sometimes, when we're looking at the data and the KPIs sort of between the funnel from. Seeing you on Google, then clicking on your, your listing there on the results page to then landing on the page to actually converting.
Well, if that conversion is lower than what we really wanna see, then we kind of figure out, okay, what, what's [00:24:00] going on? What's causing people? From not taking that step. And so, you know, again, this really comes down ~to~ to clarity. Like we really wanna clearly guide people towards the next step. And some of this is, you know, pretty, pretty simple stuff.
So just a few tips, you know, clear calls to action, like figure out what is the one next step that someone can take in order to. Get started, you know, and become that, that next client. And a lot of, a lot of people we work with do that sche, you know, schedule a consultation. So just clear buttons and, uh, whatever that call to action might be.
So like for, for us, we've got on the ev pretty much every website we build, we have, you know, clear, simple menu navigation on the top, and then a button on that top right. Schedule a consultation, you know, and it's there and it's constant and people can see it, it stands out a little bit. It shouldn't get, you know, washed away in, in the colors of your website.
And then another thing to do is, oh, and before I get onto the next point here, [00:25:00] make sure that that one thing that you're gonna ask people to do is carried throughout the website. So you want it to say, schedule a consultation, like throughout the website, not. Call now, schedule a consultation, uh, fill out this form, you know, having these different buttons that ask them to do different things.
It's okay to have different buttons, but we want to make sure that consistent. Language and color really helps 'em know, Hey, this is the next step I take. And another thing to do is just to make sure that it is just easy to find your, your contact info, such as your, your phone number or your email address.
Uh, you'd be amazed how many times that it's like buried and people can't find it. And this is something really important on mobile. You know, a lot of people, they're busy. They, we wanna make it, we wanna remove like any friction from someone actually reaching out. And so. One thing that we love to do on our client websites, on our client's websites is to have a constant bar across the bottom.
You know, it says call now a schedule. You know, [00:26:00] and so when someone's on mobile, they're able to just call and, you know, and that goes, you know, right to the practice. Or if you've got an intake coordinator, you know, even better they can handle that. Other things we're doing as well is text to get started, you know, or call to get started.
We can have those two buttons on the mobile. And so that works really well with my wife's, uh, clientele because they're. They're busy, they're working professionals so they can just text and say, Hey, I am interested in this, this, and that kind of starts that process. Uh, another thing you want to do is just explain exactly what happens after someone's gonna contact you.
Like, don't leave it up to them to wonder what's, what's gonna be the next step. And you could include that on those service pages. Like, here's. Here are three steps of how we're gonna get started. So it really paints the picture. And this is really helpful. You know, people are, especially if they're going to a therapist for the first time, they're nervous, they're, they're anxious, they don't know the process.
And [00:27:00] that creates more anxiety when you're like, oh, I, I, I don't know if this person's gonna reach out to me. Uh, my, you know, having a lot of trouble in my relationship and I really need to find somebody quickly and, you know, we, we, this is a way we can serve our clients by making it clear about what's gonna happen.
And so when, when someone feels taken care of. The, that builds trust, you know, and this is also just another trust factor. When people feel taken care of, like they're more likely to then become, you know, your next client. Uh, another thing is just keep, if you have contact forms on your website, keep 'em simple.
Don't make them too, too long. You know, especially if this is a new person just reaching out. You might have longer forms when you kind of get. A little bit further in the process when somebody needs, you know, specific help. You might have other intake forms, obviously, but for just, you know, those first people, the first time reaching out, you know, make 'em simple and then just, yeah, really just reassuring people about what, what does that first session look like?
What to expect a [00:28:00] lot of the time when it comes for our SEO clients, our monthly SEO clients, going back to that strategy of just building. That authority and trustworthiness, we'll often write articles related to like, here's what to expect in your first session. Of, you know, anxiety therapy for your teen, like getting really specific kind of including like who we're working with, that sort of thing.
And so, you know, on those service pages, you know, we can make sure that people can, can link to that article. And so we're, we're just making sure that we're building trust and we're just removing any friction from someone converting on the website.
James Marland: Imagine somebody first time looking for a therapist and they're not even sure they want as a therapist, and they see a form that is, you know, 10, 20 questions long, and they're like, out. I'm not
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: I'm not gonna fill that out.
Daniel Fava : Yeah. Yeah, that happened, uh, recently to me. 'cause we, we were looking for an [00:29:00] occupational therapist for our oldest, uh, and they had everything just pointed to this big long form. And I got, we just had a few general questions. It was like, how do we get somebody on the phone every time we called? It went to voicemail, like no one was picking up live.
And so, you know, that, that kind of created a bad taste in our mouth because they kept trying to send us back to this forum. Like, we just wanna understand like. We want you to understand our needs and let us know like, is this a good fit? Like should we be seeking out occupational therapy? You know, we had those sorts of questions and so that was frustrating.
James Marland: Yeah, a little bit of friction there.
Daniel Fava : Yeah,
James Marland: That, that leads us to the last bottleneck where the, uh, practice owner is doing, doing too much, uh, back and forth. Uh, you
Daniel Fava : yeah.
James Marland: information deck, information desk. So
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: what's this bottleneck all about?
Daniel Fava : This is, you know, like a really true bottleneck. You hear a lot of, a lot of the times when we're talking about [00:30:00] entrepreneurship, growing your business, you know, like you're constantly, I know I am recognizing where have I become the bottleneck in these different systems. And so if you have a lot of, if an ideal client has a lot of unanswered questions, you know, that's gonna put more on you to then answer those questions to.
To convert them, and this is kind of, you know, when you're coming off of the website and maybe you're starting to, you know, have those conversations on the phone or you're doing those consultations, you wanna make sure that you are quickly getting into how you are most suited to help. Those ideal clients, rather than spending all this time on those consultations talking about do you take insurance?
What are your fees? What's gonna happen in the first session? What issues do you treat? How do you work? You know, all those things. So we, we can use our website to answer those FAQs in a few places on the website, making [00:31:00] sure that it's, it's very clear before somebody reaches out. So. We can get right into, Hey, what's your challenge?
Okay, here's how I typically work with folks in that challenge and, you know, really getting into the heart of serving their challenge, you know, and, and where they're at. And so, you know, this is, this is great 'cause it helps you save time and helps you prepare those potential clients to understand more about what is it going to look like and how you work.
Uh, even building rapport with them on the phone rather than, here's my list of questions, and you just answer it. And it, it is always, it's always more, you know, beneficial or easier, I guess I'll say, to convert somebody who already has a sense of how you work, what is it gonna look like, what's they know the process.
It's just more about kind of creating that connection and, uh, and that rapport so they understand. Whether they're a good fit and you understand whether they're a good fit too, and you can, you know, weed people out that maybe aren't
James Marland: [00:32:00] Yeah, you can answer that question. You, you, people are afraid to put that on their page because, well, I, I want, I want the opportunity to see everyone, or I need every last client,
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: a client that's a bad fit is worse than a no client at all.
Daniel Fava : Oh yeah.
James Marland: And this, uh, am the, this type of page like I, I. I subscribe to somebody who's like, I have a, am I a good fit section? Like,
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: fit here? They and somebody, you can turn it into a page or you can like embed it into some sort of FAQ,
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: um, that, that you wanna send the signals that you, this, you are at the exact right spot,
Daniel Fava : Mm-hmm.
James Marland: you wanna set the signal, are not at the right spot and
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: Stop wasting your time
Daniel Fava : Yep.
James Marland: move on.
Daniel Fava : Yeah,
James Marland: you're shaking your head. What do you agree about that?
Daniel Fava : no, I just, I mean, I've seen that in my own, in my own business too, like [00:33:00] have you, as you gain experience and you serve more people, you understand. Who do, who do I do my best work with? Like, who do we serve best? And there's also the sense too of like, who, what types of clients do you want more of?
You know, for, for us, when, especially when it comes to SEO, the, the websites and the practices that get the most, get the best ROI or the best in performance are the clients who kind of keep their hands off. They just trust us, you know? And so you, we wanna build that trust. You know, and make sure that people understand this is how we work and this is what we're doing, you know, so that we can, we can, you know, get those, those ideal clients and get the results for them.
And we really want to get great results. And just like, you know, any therapist wants to really serve people and make sure that we're, we're impacting their lives for the better. And so you could do somebody a disservice by taking on a client that's not a really great fit. So yeah, making it really [00:34:00] clear and even understanding for yourself so that when you have those consultations.
And it's gonna help you really kind of, you know, create that momentum and that fuel in your practice with, you know, great ideal clients.
James Marland: Great. So we've talked about the four bottlenecks. Um. You, uh, give us a summary of, uh, the, the, what you're recommending here for the listeners.
Daniel Fava : Yeah. So we, you know, we really kind of, we basically talk through like the journey, you know, that someone's gonna take, you know, from. How people find you. And that's the SEO piece. How do people build trust with you on your website? And that comes down to that language piece, the messaging on the website, putting them first and their challenges first.
How do they take the next step? Making it really clear on what they're, what you expect them to do and how to do it. And then the la you know, last piece is really understanding. What working with you is going to look like and you know, making sure that we are answering those questions on the website so that we can [00:35:00] have better conversations in those consultations or, you know, in those email exchanges when someone is thinking about working with you.
James Marland: Yeah. And I think when, when you do these things, uh, your, your website stops becoming something like that's static and people don't
Daniel Fava : Yeah.
James Marland: to, but it, it really becomes a growth tool or a growth engine for your practice.
Daniel Fava : Yeah. Yeah. And I think too, like it all comes back to serving your ideal clients. Like you think about your website as like, how does this serve someone, whether they work with me or not. Like we really want to, we want people to feel seen and known in their challenges. And then, yeah, obviously we, we, we want to use our website to grow our business, but you know, you can, you can kind of think of it in a different way and that.
Can help you create more blog content, it can help you increase or improve the content on service landing pages by making sure that it's really answering people's questions and serving them where they're at.
James Marland: Cool. So Daniel, if people [00:36:00] wanna find more about you and your services and what you offer, where can they go?
Daniel Fava : Yeah. Best place to go is uh, private practice elevation.com, and you can find our resources there. We've got some. Some free downloads that are gonna help you with different aspects of your online marketing. And uh, we also have a podcast as well under the same name, private Practice Elevation, so you can find us on Apple, Spotify, all those good places.
James Marland: Amazing. thank you. Really, thank you so much for, uh, being generous with your time, your information,
and uh, uh, just thanks for being a friend of the show.
Daniel Fava : yeah, absolutely. Thanks so much for having me, James.
James Marland: Listeners, uh, you've heard it from Daniel, you can use your webpage to help you, uh, find, help clients find you, trust you, and take the next step and understand what it's like to work with you. Uh, if you're struggling with your webpage and it's not doing all it should, I recommend, uh, checking out Daniel and Private Practice Elevation to get the support so you can continue to put your mission in [00:37:00] motion.
We will see you next time.
Before we go, I wanna thank our partners who help make this show possible. They are Humor Speaks, RevKey, The Practice Co-Lab, Arc Integrated, TheraSaaS CRM, Guest Compliance and Consulting LLC, Freedom Business Solutions, Bosco, and Profit Comes First. These are pro-level sponsors at the scalingtherapistservices.com.
It's a directory to help you break down your business bottlenecks. And one more encouragement for the week, if your website feels like a bottleneck, don't try to fix everything at once. Start with one simple question: Can the right person quickly see that I understand their problem and know the next step to take?
Work through some of the bottlenecks, and if you need help, get a professional like Daniel at Private Practice El-Elevation. They're wonderful, wonderful to work with, and they produce good work. [00:38:00] Remember, confusion slows people down, so break through that bottleneck. Take one small step this week to make your website easier to trust, easier to use, and easier to act on.
That's how you can put your mission in motion this week. We'll see you next time
