The AAMFT Blog

Costs for Starting a Marriage and Family Therapist Practice

This content is provided by zynnyme, an affinity partner of AAMFT. This information is not necessarily the view of AAMFT and should not be interpreted as official policy. 

You have your degree, supervision hours, training experience, and licensure… but what about a Marriage and Family Therapy private practice? Even though you’ve already invested a LOT of money into your education to become the kind of therapist who makes a real impact on clients, you feel completely out of your element when it comes to the business side of things.

And then there’s the dreaded question:

How much is a Marriage and Family Therapy practice actually going to cost!?

The good news: Much less than you might expect. In fact, all of the money spent on getting you to where you are today in your profession is the greatest expense you’ll need as a therapist. Yes, it’s true that you’ll need to invest some money into private practice, but it’s totally doable.

In fact…

Your Marriage and Family Therapist practice costs LESS than most businesses.

That’s right — you don’t need hundreds (or even tens) of thousands of dollars to start a successful, values-aligned private practice. It’s all about starting for a low cost and growing as you build a steady caseload of ideal clients to learn from and serve.

So, let’s get right to it!

Here’s how much starting a Marriage and Family Therapist practice really costs…

Checklist: Cost of Starting a Marriage and Family Therapist Private Practice

To make this easy for you, we’re going to cover things one at a time. You’ll be able to check off each of these items once you have what you need, so you can avoid confusion and overwhelm.

Alright, here we go…

1. A Physical or Virtual Marriage and Family Therapist Office

Whether you prefer to see clients in person or with secure, HIPAA-compliant telehealth software for online sessions, you need some kind of private space to practice therapy.

If you choose to go the in-office (or hybrid) route, look into subletting an office for $100-200 or less per month. The specific number depends on the area you’re practicing in, of course, but you’ll likely find it’s a lot more affordable than you might’ve expected!

Plus, you won’t have to pay for expensive furniture and may even negotiate a deal where you only start paying for office space after you start seeing clients. My personal experience as a Marriage and Family Therapist was that I only paid for the space when I had clients, and there was an hourly fee that only went up to a max of $75 for a couple night’s worth of rent per month.

Investment: $200/month
> Download our free Office Space Checklist for your private practice 

 

90 Day Business Plan for Private Practice Therapists

Guest Blog: by AAMFT affinity partner zynnyme

As a private practice therapist, you need a business plan.

But not just any plan. You want to create one that grows with your business and reconnects with those deep parts of you that give you the energy to make your plan a reality. Because private practice success looks different for everyone, and you want to be in genuine alignment with who you currently are — NOT the “you” from months (or even years) ago who had different goals.

Many therapists in private practice who develop an initial business plan, focus on a business plan that outlines broadly what they’ll do over the next 3-5 years. Then, that business plan collects physical or virtual dust as they start actually running their business. Often, the business plan and the day-to-day operations are completely disconnected from each other.

That is why we recommend starting with a 90-day business plan. It keeps things focused on things you can achieve and implement over the next 3 months. It helps reduce the overwhelm. And finally, it turns it from a dusty document to a game plan, so you know what you’re doing and WHY -- week by week and month by month. 

An effective 90-day business plan involves eight key elements:

• Your vision for life and practice.
• Your schedule and organization.
• Your documentation.
• Your processes.
• Your financial plan.
• Your niche and messaging.
• Your private practice website.
• And your marketing plan.

Let’s cover each of these areas in more detail…

Private Practice Vision

This is the foundation of your business.

As a reminder, it’s okay to change. In fact, depending on how long you’ve been in solo or group private practice, that might be exactly what your business needs to reach that next level!

When you’re creating your ideal vision, you want to include not just time for your practice but also time for your life. Journal about your one-of-a-kind strengths as a therapist — or, if you have some people in your life you can ask, share a survey with them (even if it’s anonymous).

It’s all about identifying (or reconnecting) with your core values.

Schedule and Organization

Just like your vision — you’ll notice a trend here! — you want to create a schedule that includes time for the impactful work you do AND your personal life. Figure out a way to organize your plan and tasks that works for YOUR brain and learning style. This isn’t one-size-fits-all!

And don’t forget to get your calendar organized. If you have multiple calendars, ensure they’re all in sync with each other. We personally recommend software like Google Calendar where you can have a virtual record of everything you need (and want) to do and easily make updates.

Private Practice Documentation

Do you have a way of doing your notes that allows you to finish in 5 minutes or less? Do you have a clear informed consent with a clear cancellation policy?

We recommend a 48-hour cancellation policy at minimum, but feel free to set up something like 72 hours in advance if that works better for you. The goal here, like with all the other parts of your 90-day business plan for private practice, is to create something sustainable.

And speaking of sustainable… we recommend a paperless office.

The less you have to lock away in filing cabinets, the more ease of access (and, for many private practice therapists, peace of mind) to your business and clinical documents.

Setting Your Therapy Private Practice Salary

Guest blog post by: Miranda Palmer at zynnyme

Let’s face it, you were called to do this work. You believe in the power of relationships and systems, and you’ve invested years and tens (or hundreds) of thousands of dollars into your training to deeply help heal systems and families.

But what happens when you sit down and do the math and realize what you’ve trained and worked so hard for won’t actually pay the bills (much less give you an option for retirement or reducing your hours at some point)? The truth is, most of us haven’t done that math. In fact, some of you chose this career so you could AVOID all that math. And yet, here we are. You’re noticing that your paychecks aren’t stretching as far, and your savings account is dwindling.

If that’s you, you aren’t alone. Marriage and Family Therapy and other counseling degrees are among the worst paid Master’s degrees in the United States. But, it does NOT have to be this way. In fact, many therapists make a sustainable income with their degree in private practice as either private-pay or an insurance-based practice.

So, what’s the big difference between therapists who are paid well and ones that aren’t? Is it their value as humans? As therapists? Their outcomes? Their location? I’m going to go out on a limb and say no. While location and other factors may impact insurance reimbursements, cost of living, etc., the biggest impact is therapists’ understanding of finances and making conscious choices about what they say “yes” and “no” to.

Therapy is priceless. Each one of you is priceless. However, when the bulk of therapists say “yes” to insurance reimbursements that fall below the poverty line, then insurance companies have no reason to increase reimbursements. When therapists shame other therapists who’ve done their math and charge a sustainable fee, then we lose as a profession both in connection and in our ability to do the work if those therapists feel shamed out of the profession.

Unlike work at nonprofits, it’s the responsibility of the owner of the practice to set the salary and benefits in their private practice. Unfortunately, many private practice owners set the salary without accounting for expenses, time off, time required to work on the business, retirement, or other benefits that are built into W-2 employment for other agencies or businesses.

So, a therapist who sets their income goal at $100k annually, for example, might consider that their salary. But, in a business, gross income and net income are VERY different. Many therapists average close to 40% in expenses, which drops that quickly down to $60k in a salary. However, that $60k salary in private practice is NOT the same as $60k in W-2 Income. You’re taxed at a higher rate for that income AND that $60k needs to include benefits.

Therapists often also set their available hours to work with clients based on their responsibilities while working for another organization. In most organizations, billing, scheduling, cleaning, bookkeeping, marketing, etc. are outsourced to others. In a private practice, however, it may initially be just one person who’s responsible for all aspects of running the business. A therapist who easily saw 30 clients a week at an agency and worked a total of 35 hours may find that even 25 clients a week translates to 50-60 work hours per week.

So, how do you set your salary in private practice?

You need to get clear on the number of hours you want to work per week both in the chair and out of the chair. If you want to work 32 hours per week, for example, I’d recommend starting with a clinical goal of no more than 60% of those hours. So, in this case, a max of 19 clients a week.

You need to explore the weeks you’ll work per year. How many weeks do you need to plan on being out due to illness, vacation, taking care of loved ones, attending clinical trainings? Setting your fee based on this can have a HUGE impact on your bottom line. If you work with families or children who take summers off or you find you have a summer slump, you might also work this number into your total weeks worked per year.

You need to get clear on the costs of starting a business and expenses, including your need for a salary and benefits. Technology, internet, office space, malpractice insurance, retirement, clinical training, etc. There’s a LOT to starting a private practice – it’s a business, after all. Simply setting a random fee without understanding what’s involved is not going to have the impact you hope for! Take some real time putting costs together for your unique situation and practice to develop your gross income goal.

You need to understand the tax implications of being a business owner so you don’t end up with 15% less than you thought you would after accounting for self-employment taxes!

As a VERY rough starting point, you need to look at your gross income and divide that by the number of weeks worked per year. That lets you know what income you need to bring in weekly on the weeks you work on average. After that, you take the weekly average and divide it by the number of clinical hours you want to work.

Feeling a little overwhelmed? You’re completely normal! We believe this is something best done with support and as part of a community. Our next AAMFT-sponsored training, we’ll dive into this for an hour in more detail with lists of expenses to plan for and answering your burning questions about insurance, sliding scale, and more! Click here to register today.

3 Ways to Market Your Private Practice for $0

This content is provided by Brighter Vision, an affinity partner of AAMFT. This information is not necessarily the view of AAMFT and should not be interpreted as official policy. 

No private practice has an unlimited budget, no matter if you’ve been open for six months or six years. Marketing your practice website is one area where the costs can really pile up if you’re not careful.

For example, you can spend as much money as you want on Google Ads but there’s no guarantee that you’ll see a return if you don’t consider your strategy carefully. (And even then, there’s no guarantee!)

That means it’s important to make the most of your money wherever possible until you get a better feeling for what works for you and your unique practice. Here are our quick suggestions on zero-dollar ways to market your private practice website. 

Free Ways to Market Your Private Practice

Social Media Marketing

One of the best things about social media marketing is that it’s totally free to get started. Social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter don’t charge you any more than an individual person to open an account for your private practice and start making public posts.

Not only that, but a regular and thoughtful social media marketing strategy can build awareness for your brand and even improve your website’s search engine optimization (SEO), making you more visible to Google search engine users.

Click here for more great Social Media Marketing strategies!

The Ultimate SEO Checklist for Therapists

This content is provided by Brighter Vision, an affinity partner of AAMFT. This information is not necessarily the view of AAMFT and should not be interpreted as official policy. 

When you’re taking the steps to grow your practice with online marketing, one term you will inevitably come across is 'Search Engine Optimization' or SEO. 

The term ‘Search Engine Optimization’ can be in and of itself overwhelming, let alone learning the specifics of how to understand it.

In this post we’re going to break down the details of what it means to have a website that is optimized for search engines, leaving out the typical ‘tech jargon’ that tends to do nothing but complicate things. 

What the Heck Is SEO, Anyway?

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization and is essentially the practice of following a series of steps so that Google will show your site in its search results.

You want your website to show up on the first page of Google when a user types in a query that applies to your private practice, right? Of course you do! You work hard at what you do and your practice deserves to be found.

At the end of this post you will find a bonus SEO Checklist that you can print off to help you improve your own web pages one step at a time.

Do I Need HIPAA Compliant Email & Contact Forms?

This content is provided by Brighter Vision, an affinity partner of AAMFT. This information is not necessarily the view of AAMFT and should not be interpreted as official policy. 

If you work in the field of mental health, chances are you should be using HIPAA compliant email to communicate with your clients. This is especially true if you send and receive protected health information (PHI).

And if you’re using contact forms to collect information from your clients on your private practice website, they should be HIPAA compliant as well.

But how do you know for sure if you need HIPAA compliant email or contact forms? And what exactly is considered HIPAA compliant?

In this post, we will help shed some light on the ins and outs of HIPAA compliance so that hopefully, by the time you’ve made it to the end of this article, you’ll have a better understanding of whether you should use regular or HIPAA compliant email and contact forms for your private practice website.

 What Is Encryption?

We’ve all seen how excited little Ralphie was to finally receive his Orphan Annie Secret Society secret decoder ring in A Christmas Story. We all laughed at his unmistakable look of pure disappointment when, after spending a few torturous minutes decoding his first secret message, he finds out it’s only a crummy commercial telling him to “Be Sure To Drink Your Ovaltine.”

Well, today’s encryption services that are used to keep our online information private is actually very similar to encoded messages such as Ralphie’s. When you send an encrypted email, you’re essentially jumbling up all of the message’s content and assigning it a random assortment of letters, numbers, and symbols. To anyone without the “key” – the digital world’s version of Ralphie’s decoder ring – the message is indecipherable which means the information in its contents remains private.

With Hushmail’s email service, sending an encrypted message is as simple as checking this one box:

For a more detailed explanation, take a look at this article: What is encryption, and how do I know if I need encrypted email?

Who Needs HIPAA Compliant Email and Website Contact Forms?

Any HIPAA covered entity (as defined in the chart below) and/or any healthcare practitioner who wants to protect their clients’ or patients’ privacy should be using HIPAA compliant email and website contact forms.

Any HIPAA covered entity (as defined in the chart below) and/or any healthcare practitioner who wants to protect their clients’ or patients’ privacy should be using HIPAA compliant email and website contact forms.

A Health Care Provider	A Health Plan	A Health Care Clearinghouse
This includes: Doctors Clinics Psychologists Dentists Chiropractors Nursing Homes Pharmacies …but only if they transmit any information in an electronic form in connection with a transaction for which Health and Human Services (HHS) has adopted a standard.	This includes: Health insurance companies Health maintenance organizations (HMOs) Company Health Plans Government programs that pay for health care, such as Medicare, Medicaid, and the military and veterans health care programs	This includes entities that process nonstandard health information they receive from another entity into a standard (i.e., standard electronic format or data content), or vice versa.

Source: https://www.hhs.gov/hipaa/for-professionals/covered-entities/index.html

What Kind of Information Should Be Encrypted?

The short answer is – any information that could be considered protected health information (PHI).

HIPAA guidelines define Protected Health Information as “anything – vague or specific – that could reveal the identity of a patient.” So, a newsletter you send out to participants of your ADHD Support Group would be considered PHI just as much as the results of a Depression Screening Test you send to a single client would be. If a client’s identity is connected with the information within that message in any way, you should definitely be sending it through an encrypted email service like Hushmail.

To learn more about all the different types of PHI, check out this post: HIPAA Compliance on Social Media: A Guide for Private Practices

How Is HIPAA-Compliant Email Different from Regular Email?

First and foremost, it is important to remember that maintaining HIPAA compliance online – whether it be a website contact forms or email – is dependent on good user habits, such as verifying email addresses and not including sensitive information in the subject lines of your outgoing emails.

HIPAA compliant email gives you the ability to send emails that have been encrypted with OpenPGP encryption to protect its contents during transit – similar to the way how your bank secures exchanges on their website – plus continued protection upon opening, and in storage. This provides an extra layer of security on top of the TLS encryption that most other standard email servers support.

A HIPAA compliant email service will provide you with a signed Business Associate Agreement (BAA) that places the responsibility for securing the PHI you send with the email provider. HIPAA audits are scary, and violations can be potentially devastating to a private practice. But, by choosing a company that provides you with a BAA, you can legally ensure your business is protected.

Finally, a HIPAA compliant email service should also provide email archiving that serves as added backup in case of an audit or a question. All of our HIPAA compliant email accounts automatically include a separate archiving email address for as long as you’re a customer. This will ensure you always have a full record of all communications – both sent and received – for any email address on your domain, should you ever need it in the future.

Need help marketing to your Ideal Client?

Take our Ideal Client Quiz now to receive your custom marketing tips!

Why Can’t a HIPAA Compliant Email Be Sent Using Google or Yahoo?

It’s about how comfortable you are with the level of security. HIPAA stipulates that covered entities are required to implement technical safeguards of the “electronic protected health information” of their clients and patients, but it doesn’t specify the use of X or Y type of encryption, and there is no list of what technical safeguards you should use.

Should a breach happen, you need to convince HIPAA officials, and maybe even a judge, that you did everything you could to safeguard the information. However, keep in mind that TLS only secures your email if it’s supported by the recipient’s email servers as well. Although most servers do support TLS, this isn’t guaranteed. If you are comfortable saying that you sent the information protected in transit only, reliant upon the recipient supporting encryption, then TLS may be all you need, and Google or Yahoo might be fine.

The extra layer of security with OpenPGP encryption provides evidence of due diligence in case of an audit or a breach.

Can My HIPAA Compliant Email Work with Outlook or Mac Mail?

The short answer is yes, most encrypted email services can be set up to work with a third-party email app. However, using the encrypted service’s webmail or smartphone app is usually a good idea for ease-of-use and security reasons.

With a standard webmail platform as well as a dedicated mobile app, Hushmail makes it extremely easy to maintain HIPAA-compliance while emailing your clients from any of your devices.

Click here to schedule a call today.

 

Wait! You Don’t Have A Private Practice Website Yet?

 

Brighter Vision is the ultimate marketing package for therapists, centered around the best therapist website you’ve ever had. Contact us today to get started.

Using Video in Your Content Marketing Strategy

This content is provided by Brighter Vision, an affinity partner of AAMFT. This information is not necessarily the view of AAMFT and should not be interpreted as official policy. 

While the concept of using videos in your marketing strategy is nothing new, what has changed over the last couple of years is the prevalence of video content on nearly every platform – especially when it comes to social media!

When done correctly, video content marketing can be one of the most influential and cost-effective ways to promote your products and services. 85% of businesses use video as a marketing tool, and 92% of marketers believe that online video is an integral part of their marketing strategy.

Video content comes in many forms and can be anything from an explainer video to a brand video. Even event and webinar videos can be used in content marketing.

Video marketing has a unique ability to immediately capture the attention of your viewers, further engage with them, and bring broader concepts to life, making for a more effective marketing strategy.

In this blog, we will walk you through our top video marketing tips and provide information about how to implement video into your current marketing strategy to to expand your audience, build your brand, and grow your practice.

Looking for more super-charged marketing tips?

Sign up for this free e-course: 8 Unconventional Ways
to Market Your Private Practice

Video Marketing Tips

It’s not too hard to see why video is so popular these days — for one thing, it’s an easy way to give your viewers important information while also giving them rest from having to read any long-winded text. Video is fun, but it’s also really one of the best ways to get up close to your audience and give them a more in-depth look into you and your practice, and not to mention it’s easy to share across multiple platforms.

By adding a video to your website, you can boost your SEO and increase the chance of a front page of Google by 53 times. You can also attract more viewers and increase engagement. Audiences are about ten times more likely to engage, embed, share, and comment on video content than blogs or related social posts. If you are still not entirely convinced that video marketing is right for your practice, recent research shows that 71% of marketers say video conversion rates outperform any other marketing content.

Now that we all know video is the future of marketing, let’s talk about how you can start to incorporate it into your content marketing plan. Here we’ll outline some best practices for you to start creating and sharing videos that are likely to capture your audience’s attention.

Why Your Therapy Website Needs a Tagline, Slogan, and Mission Statement

This content is provided by Brighter Vision, an affinity partner of AAMFT. This information is not necessarily the views of AAMFT and should not be interpreted as official policy.

Therapy comes in all shapes and sizes. There’s behavioral therapy, hypnotherapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, physical therapy, massage therapy… the list goes on and on.

But no matter which type of therapy you provide, the reason is always the same – to help people heal.

 Does your private practice website depict this right off the bat?

There are, of course, many different ways to ensure it does. Among the most obvious are your business name and website URL.

But then there are all of the smaller pieces of your brand that truly attract your ideal client to your website and ultimately, your business. These include the visual aspects of your site such as its color scheme, fonts, and imagery, as well as the branding aspects of your practice such as your brand’s tagline, slogan, and mission statement.

In today’s post, we’re going to cover these important branding aspects – mission statements, slogans, and taglines.

Because these terms are often used interchangeably (or combined in an effort to save a little time), let’s take things from the beginning and start out by making sure we understand the difference between these three types of branding texts.

Mission statements are more descriptive and commonly consist of a few sentences making one short paragraph that explains the ‘how’ and ‘why’ of your business as a whole.

Slogans are shortened versions of your mission statement that say in about 12 words or less what you do, who you do it for, and/or why you do it.

And finally, taglines are written representations of your brand that summarize your practice in only a few words.

Now let’s dive in a little deeper and talk more about what each of these are and what makes them effective so that you can build a truly successful private practice.

5 Ways to Attract New Telehealth Clients

This content is provided by Brighter Vision, an affinity partner of AAMFT. This information is not necessarily the views of AAMFT and should not be interpreted as official policy.

When the effects of COVID-19 began to reverberate through the country at the beginning of this year, private practices everywhere had to quickly pivot away from in-office appointments to utilizing Telehealth as their primary method of seeing clients. For some clinicians, this change’s swift and dramatic nature may have led it to feel temporary, but it’s clear now that Telehealth is here to stay. While this new way of running your practice may seem overwhelming at times, there are a number of surprising benefits you may not have considered.

Struggling to move your therapy practice online?

If you’re finding it difficult to move your practice entirely online, or just not sure where to start, sign up for this free email course to learn the 5 most important steps you should take when transitioning to Telehealth:

Sign Up Here 

One of the most significant advantages this new digital environment offers is even more ways to connect with potential clients online. With people spending more time online reading, doing research, and looking for mental health resources, there are several easy things you can do right now to stand out from the crowd and connect with your ideal client.

In today’s blog post, we’ll cover the top 5 things you can do right now to attract new Telehealth clients.

1. Determine who your ideal client is, and target your messaging to them

Before jumping into the advice offered later in this blog, it’s important to consider who your ideal client is.

Why, you may ask?

By first determining who your ideal client is and what issues they are facing, you’ll be much more successful in creating marketing initiatives that allow you to connect with them. When looking for a therapist online, people often ask questions such as “how can I overcome this?” or “who can help me deal with this?”. If you or your practice can be the one to provide answers to these questions upfront, it immediately builds trust and encourages someone looking for therapy to set up an initial consultation.

Time Management Tips for Therapists - Make More by Doing Less

This content is provided by Brighter Vision, an affinity partner of AAMFT. This information is not necessarily the views of AAMFT and should not be interpreted as official policy.

Time Is Money. You have probably heard this phrase before, but these words become exceptionally relatable when it comes to opening and growing your private practice. 

A day in the life of operating a private practice consists of a wide variety of jobs. As a private practice owner, you wear many different hats, from seeing patients to handling billing and marketing your business, it can quickly get very hectic and overwhelming. With so much to be done and only so much time to do it, your time really is money! 

In this blog post, we're going to walk you through our top time management tips so that you can spend your time focusing on what's most important - making a more significant impact in your community and growing your practice. 

 

Don’t Take on Too Much

There is always so much to do. And as a driven clinician, you may be tempted to take it all on yourself. But, to maintain a balanced life and avoid burnout, you mustn't be taking on too much. The added stress of doing this will only overwhelm you. 

Not taking on too many things at once allows you to direct your focus on the more important tasks and help you be more productive overall. 

Before starting a new task, you should always begin by considering the final result. Have a clear target to hit, outline the appropriate steps you need to take to complete the task, and focus on doing the most important things first.

Once you have determined which responsibilities are most important, you can dedicate particular times to handle each item on your to-do list (e.g., when to answer emails, make phone calls, fill out reports, etc.). Blocking out time in your day to focus on specific tasks can help you be much more productive overall. 

When it is time to dive into a scheduled task, cut out any unnecessary distractions. Try to minimize potential disturbances ahead of time, especially when it comes to something else you'd rather be doing, but that isn't going to help you complete the task at hand. For example:

• Close all tabs on your computer except the ones you'll need for the task at hand. 
• Shut your office door.
• Set your phone to do-not-disturb.

You likely already do all of these things when you are in session with a client. Carry those in session practices over to everything else on your schedule as well.

Delegate Tasks Out

With so much that goes into keeping a therapy practice up and running, it's also important to remember to ask for help. There are tons of resources available to help you achieve success in your business. Delegating tasks out to employees, technology, or even family members can save tons of time.

When you delegate specific tasks to others, you become free to focus on higher-value activities and use your time more productively. We understand that it can be nerve-racking trusting others with important tasks, but when you delegate appropriate tasks, you can trust that others might have more time to dedicate to that task, helping you in the long run. 

Here are some of our top suggestions on how you can delegate everyday tasks:

Hire a Virtual Assistant

Hiring a virtual assistant for your private practice is one of the quickest ways to reclaim time in your schedule.

Virtual assistants (or VAs) are completely remote administrative assistants, many of whom even specialize in helping mental health clinicians. While hiring any employee is an investment, you would be amazed at how a VA can help complete all of the crucial tasks in your day – from calling back no-show clients to logging your session notes and even assisting with billing.

If you don't have the resources to hire a full-time Virtual Assistant, there are now companies that offer similar services as a subscription. Therapist Admin is one solution that provides administrative assistance for a reasonable monthly rate.

Get a Bookkeeper

We all know handling your practice's financial side can get confusing and frustrating and take up a lot of your time. Luckily, tons of tools can help take the stress and time out of your practice's financial planning. One of our favorite tools for online bookkeeping and tax help is Wellness Fi.

Wellness Fi can help you keep track of your finances, help with your taxes, and give you suggestions to help save your practice more money. Hiring a bookkeeping service ultimately saves you TONS of time and money in the long run. 

Outsource Your Insurance Billing

Something we often hear from our clients is how confusing insurance and insurance billing is. Trying to figure out the ins and outs of how medical billing works can take tons of time and is not an easy task. That is why we suggest outsourcing your medical billing. One company we like to use is Greenpoint Med. 

Greenpoint Med focuses on billing for behavioral health services and is experts in billing for mental health, reimbursement, and overall compliance. Their billing services were designed to ensure you collect maximum value from your insurance claims, while also saving you hours from dealing with the insurance madness.

Hire Someone to Build & Maintain Your Website

These days, having a website is essential to the success of your practice. It’s how your clients will find you, where they’ll learn more about how you can help them, and ideally, where they will go to schedule a session with you.

For those in the mental health field, a website can often appear more of a burden than a fundamental marketing tool. Having a website can seem overwhelming, and creating one on your own can be extremely challenging, not to mention the ongoing up-keep a good website needs to stay relevant. Add in concerns such as potentially exposing private information, advertising sensitive issues, and knowing what it takes to ensure you comply with all HIPAA rules and regulations, and suddenly having a website feels like way too big of a headache.

While these concerns are legitimate, they are nothing an experienced web developer who is intimately familiar with the mental health industry can't handle. Hiring someone to develop and maintain your website can help push your online business in the right direction and save you a lot of time in the long run.

Find Ways to Automate Processes

Technology, while sometimes is a massive pain in the butt, can also be a saving grace. There are hundreds of different platforms that you can use to automate various everyday tasks. That way, you can focus your time dealing with more important things. 

One thing you should be utilizing is a scheduling automation tool. Online scheduling on your website can help take out the tedious and frustrating phone tag you often get caught playing with clients. Avoid the ongoing back and forth, and let your clients book whenever they want to, even at 2 AM. 

Some of our favorite online scheduling tools are:  

• Therapy Partner
• SimplePractice 
• ScheduleOnce

If you are interested in taking a deeper dive into these practice management solutions, check out our past blog post: Top 5 Practice Management Solutions for Therapists in 2020.

Another task you can easily automate is to set up email templates for emails you send out frequently. Whether that is new client emails, confirmation emails, reminder emails, or anything else, you can set up a template. That way, you never have to waste time re-writing the same information repeatedly. 

Automate your social media and blog. Marketing is essential to attracting new clients and growing your practice, but often when things get busy, marketing is put on the backburner. Understandably, marketing can feel overwhelming. A lot goes into keeping up with your marketing efforts, especially when it comes to your social media pages and blog. 

That is why Social Genie can be a big help. With Social Genie, you can set aside time once a week or even a month and schedule out all of your social media posts and blog posts for that month or week in just minutes. Once scheduled, they will post on their own, and you can focus on more important things. 

Ready to see how Social Genie can help you automate your content marketing?

Get started with a 2-week free trial of Social Genie,
the best social media automation software for therapists!

Sign Up Here 

Honestly, tons of other automation features can help you complete everyday tasks. Too many to even list. I highly suggest looking into any automation features your EHR might have that you might not be aware of yet. Most EHR tools come with a wide variety of different features that can help you save time every single day.

If you are currently utilizing an EHR tool, here are some of our favorites to look into:

• Therapy Partner
• TherapyNotes 
• TheraNest 
• Doxy.me 

 

Final Thoughts

Overall, the biggest takeaway here is to make sure you take the time to take care of yourself. Burnout and stress are far too common for clinicians. It doesn't matter if everything else is in place. If you are not taking care of yourself, you won't make it.

Be realistic with your time. Too often, we see clinicians underestimating how much downtime they need. Make sure you know how many clients you can see back-to-back. Make sure you are setting aside a proper amount of time to focus on yourself. The best helpers can adequately help themselves, and with these tools, we hope you can save time, stress, and energy and ultimately help you become the clinician you can be.

Brighter Vision is a preferred vendor of AAMFT, specializing in making marketing simple for private practices. Their all-inclusive website design service helps therapists grow their practices with a variety of marketing tools and resources. All members receive their entire first year of a new website with Brighter Vision for only $49/month plus no setup fees; that’s a savings of $220. To take advantage of this offer, please click here.

Automating Your Private Practice

As therapists, most of you want a full client list. You want to be able to see as many clients as possible during regular business hours. But somewhere in the process of growing your private practice, something happens - you get busy. Not only does your caseload increase over time, so does the number of phone calls, emails, paperwork, and other administrative tasks to fulfill. All of a sudden, there just simply aren't enough hours in the day anymore.

During this 60-minute webinar, Perry Rosenbloom, President of Brighter Vision, will be discussing how to regain some of your time by outsourcing certain tasks for your practice and where to begin.

Topics he will be covering include:

• What virtual assistants and online business managers do and what you can expect from outsourcing each of these services.
• How to determine when it's time to begin and which tasks to outsource for your private practice.
• How to compare your options and find the right professional to hire.
• The importance of hiring someone with experience in the mental health industry.

Click Here to Register 

If you can't attend the event in real-time, don't worry. Everyone who is registered will receive a recording.

Brighter Vision is a preferred vendor of AAMFT, specializing in making marketing simple for private practices. Their all-inclusive website design service helps therapists grow their practices with a variety of marketing tools and resources. All members receive their entire first year of a new website with Brighter Vision for only $49/month plus no setup fees; that’s a savings of $220. To take advantage of this offer, please click here.