Positioning and specialization = the keys to the kingdom.
Ran into a therapist recently.
Does family therapy.
Does not call it family therapy but has a fine, fancy name...
And argues that her stuff is not about family therapy but family reunification.
And she only gets clients who have a court order to go into family therapy... People divorcing, whose children do not want to see one of the parents.
The judge / court says the family has to hire someone like her.
She gets chosen by the attorneys... So, the client, the family, gets a recommendation from their divorce attorney to hire her... The attorneys do not present options, just her, usually.
The going rates for family therapy in her area? $140 to $200/hour. with most doing $160/hour.
Her fees? $240. She charges that. And she gets that.
So, why isn't everybody specializing and positioning themselves creatively?
She does only family therapy, which she does not call family therapy... And she promotes not herself but herself as the Team Leader (she's partnered up with a few other therapists... She assigns one to each member of the family...
She has a nice brochure where she describes her process... She makes it sound like it's different from other therapists... But, it's not. Not the therapy part... What's different is the intake... Session with her for each member of the family, separately. The parents get the 'We are different" speech and the brochure; then they have a session together, then with whoever she's assigned them to.
She speaks about developing a strategy a lot, in the beginning.
I know a few other therapists, who are not paid as much as her: they do not talk about strategy, they talk about what they're going to do and what the first step is and what the short-term goals and the long term-goals are.
They accomplish the same thing, they just present it differently and they do not focus (specialize) like her. And let her be the only one who gets 240 or 150% or more in fees.
If you've not specialized and spent a lot of time on positioning, are you going to do it now?
Does family therapy.
Does not call it family therapy but has a fine, fancy name...
And argues that her stuff is not about family therapy but family reunification.
And she only gets clients who have a court order to go into family therapy... People divorcing, whose children do not want to see one of the parents.
The judge / court says the family has to hire someone like her.
She gets chosen by the attorneys... So, the client, the family, gets a recommendation from their divorce attorney to hire her... The attorneys do not present options, just her, usually.
The going rates for family therapy in her area? $140 to $200/hour. with most doing $160/hour.
Her fees? $240. She charges that. And she gets that.
So, why isn't everybody specializing and positioning themselves creatively?
She does only family therapy, which she does not call family therapy... And she promotes not herself but herself as the Team Leader (she's partnered up with a few other therapists... She assigns one to each member of the family...
She has a nice brochure where she describes her process... She makes it sound like it's different from other therapists... But, it's not. Not the therapy part... What's different is the intake... Session with her for each member of the family, separately. The parents get the 'We are different" speech and the brochure; then they have a session together, then with whoever she's assigned them to.
She speaks about developing a strategy a lot, in the beginning.
I know a few other therapists, who are not paid as much as her: they do not talk about strategy, they talk about what they're going to do and what the first step is and what the short-term goals and the long term-goals are.
They accomplish the same thing, they just present it differently and they do not focus (specialize) like her. And let her be the only one who gets 240 or 150% or more in fees.
If you've not specialized and spent a lot of time on positioning, are you going to do it now?
