Overheard conversation:

Theraprenuer Wannabe:  "I really am burned out and fed up with working for the man. If I had more business skills and knowledge, I would start my own therapy practice. God just didn't bless me with a business mind. I mean, I can't even do long division. It's hopeless, so I guess I will just stay where I am."

Actual Theraprenuer:  "Have you thought about reading a few good books? I can recommend some that will get you started. I hear Scott Harmon has a good podcast and website that you can check out. I remember when I first started out. I didn't know much, but I have learned a ton about business since I started my clinic."

Theraprenuer Wannabe:  "Yeah, but that's you. You have a knack for that stuff. Not me. I'm hopeless. I can't go back to school to get a business degree."

Actual Therapreneur:  "You don't have to get a business degree. That would actually be a stupid thing to do. There is so much good information on the internet.  Plus, by reading a few really good books about business you could give it a go and get out of the rut you are in. You know, a lot of these big time business people never went to business school."

Therapreneur Wanabe:  "You really think I could give it a go? Yeah, maybe so. Imagine me...therapy practice owner. How cool would that be? No more working for the man. What did you say the name of that podcast was?"

OK, this was a fabricated conversation, but I am sure it has happened. Therapists who are riding the fence about starting a private practice are simply struggling with initiative. This is why I created this episode.

After I read a few articles about specific traits and characteristics that entrepreneurs tend to have, I wanted to expand on them and filter them through the lens of a therapy business owner. I also give a few book recommendations and a music review of therapy songs I recently came across on Youtube.

Here is some of what I cover in this episode:

• 3 Must Read Books
• The "One Thing" that should motivate you
• What type of Mindset should a Therapreneur have?
• Specific Traits of a Therapreneur
• OT and PT Songs - Hey, what about Speech songs?
• The Enneagram Personality Test - How do Therapreneurs score on it?

Dr. Karen Crilly is a physical therapist who owns and operates Casa Care Pediatric Therapy which is a brick and mortar private practice in North Carolina.

Karen has been a PT for 17 years.  She worked in a variety of settings before opening her private practice, the last of which was a women's and children's hospital as the lead PT.

 Some of what we cover:

• How she started small and smart with no debt

• How she did a business plan

• How she did a market analysis

• How her practice differed from the competition in her area

• How she wanted to start cash only but was not able to

• How she marketed her practice in the beginning

• What she found worked best with marketing

• The class she gives to the community that helps her marketing and revenue generation

• How she does billing to insurance

• What she uses to process credit cards and what Scott recommends

Paul Potter is a physical therapist who has been in private practice for over 30 years. His practice specializes in manual orthopedic rehabilitation and medical fitness programs for special populations. I spoke to Paul when he was in the process of selling his practice in order to go on a different adventure in his life: helping other PT's start and run their own therapy practice.

Paul has his own podcast called the Functional Freedom Podcast where he interviews other leaders on practice issues and strategies to facilitate the professional effectiveness of therapists.

Paul gives an awesome marketing tip that generates almost an

80% conversion rate of prospective customers to actual customers.

You can download the tool he uses to do this for free in the show links below.

In the world of start ups, having a mentor is essential. Paul had strong mentors early in his career, and now he is offering his services for mentor-ship.

Paul's motto is "win the day and finish strong." Listen in to this episode and learn more!

Here is some of what we cover:

• How Paul started slow and small

• Why it is important to have a specific niche

• How to determine your niche

• Timeless principals of marketing a practice

• The importance of relationships in your marketing strategy

• What to do about your competition

• How to pick up business skills to start and run your practice

• How to get more referrals

• Tracking referrals - how and why

• Paul's gold star referral generating tool that has an 80% conversion and get it for free below

• Paul's PT Pad App that he developed to help PT's do their job faster and better

Rebecca Cook is an occupational therapist and owner of a private therapy practice called The Right Step. She has 25 years of specialized experience in therapy and teaching horseback riding lessons. She has a slew of certifications from courses that she has taken over the years. Rebecca also provides Myofasial Release and Craniosacral Therapy. What she really enjoys though is providing therapy using a horse or "Hippotherapy".  Unlike therapeutic horseback riding which teaches the skills of riding a horse, Hippotherapy uses the movement of the horse as a means to therapy treatment and to reach specific therapy treatment goals.

Be sure to listen to the very end of the podcast for a little inspiration

What you will learn

• Difference between Hippotherapy and Therapeutic Riding

• How to become a certified Hippotherapist

• How to become a certified Therapeutic Riding Instructor

• Why Rebecca chose private practice to provide Hippotherapy

• How she transitioned from her full time job to private practice

• How she marketed her practice and aquired Hippotherapy clients

• Her biggest source for referrals

• Why Rebecca dissolved her partnership with her business partner

• The part she played in Hippotherapy research at the University of Michigan

• What type of documentation system she uses for her paperwork

• Does private insurance cover Hippotherapy?

• How she branched out and provided other types of therapy

• The different types of therapy packages she offers

• The automatic online scheduler she uses

• Her experience billing Medicare for Hippotherapy

• Her published research in AOTA on the effects of Hippotherapy on patients with Parkinson's

• The books she has written about how to open a Hippotherapy private practice

Mirla has done interesting work in California, specifically at UCLA, treating hard cases of children in very tough situations. She later moved to Arizona and started working and gaining experience in her sister's private practice for about 9 years before she opened her own in 1990.

What you will learn:

• How she got started in private practice

• Her marketing strategy to pre-schools.

• An explanation on how insurance companies trap you into accepting lower and lower fees.

• How she diversifys her skills and revenue streams...and more

• The 4 books she has written which can be found on Amazon.

• How she began to write her ebooks in order to give parents what they wanted.

• How she does presentations and webinars on the subjects that her books cover.

• How she consults with other speech therapists to help them in their clinic skills.

• How she consults with parents to go over IEP's to see if they are the best they can be.

• How she consults with parents on how to implement different treatment techniques themselves.

Dillen Hartley is an Occupational Therapist and Co-Owner with Niel Visser, PT of Advanced Therapy Solutions which has 4 outpatient Physical and Occupational Therapy clinics and building number 5. Dillen is also a presenter for the certification course of Interactive Metronome and Interactive Listening Systems. He is also Co-owner of the Development Learning Institute which is a web-based language, reading and learning program for children and parents.

Dillen had somewhat of a slow start as a small child but has more than overcome that. He received Occupational Therapy as a child which began his interest in becoming an OT. Dillen is from South Africa and came to the states as a travel therapist and now resides in South Carolina.

What you will learn:

• How his time working for other companies paid off when starting his own practice

• How his business launched and acquired start-up money

• How they performed their market analysis for their geographical area before they started their practice

• How he and his partner transitioned from their full-time job to private practice

• How his business re-invented itself after 10 years

• How important personal mentorship is

• How his practice decreases therapist turnover in the therapists they hire 

• How to create a positive and healthy work atmosphere

• How to market to a client once they are on the caseload

• The different EMR's they have used and what they use now

• How they operate their billing

• How they went from almost 20% cancellation rate to under 10% 

• How the market their practice - So many tips here 

• Books that Dillen recommends

Jeanine has been in private practice for over 30 years and has even written a very helpful book titled The Small Patient Practice: A Beginners Guide to Starting a Pediatric PT, OT or SLP Solo Practice. 

Jeanine has been a physical therapist in multiple states in the U.S. which gives her a unique insight into how therapy is conducted, billed and paid under different state systems.

After her active duty as a Physical Therapist in the Air Force she began her private practice in the Early Intervention (EI) system.

Here is what you will learn:

• How she stumbled upon private practice by wanting to serve her local community

• What motivated her to write her book: The Small Patient Practice

• How to "get the coding right"

• How she bills insurance companies

• The main source she accessed to learn about billing regulations

• How she aquired therapists to work for her

• How she paid her therapists

• Her best marketing tool

• The importance of reading books about business

• How she worked in Spain for a year and how you could too

• The book that helped her realize how important her time is

• Why you should not go cheapskate on educating yourself about running a small business

Andy Dalziell (Pronounced Dee-EL) is a Neuro-Developmental therapist in Scotland who has had a brick and mortar practice since 2002. Andy specializes in providing specific home-based intervention programs for infants, children, adolescents and adults who have learning and/or behavioral difficulties, developmental delay or individuals who are under-achieving.

Andy has an eclectic practice and an exciting project in the area of movement. He calls this project “Better Movers and Thinkers” BMT.  This system was implemented by Andy with Olympians and Football players to train their minds and bodies for improved performance. He is now implementing this system in classrooms internationally.

Andy also likes to do on site practice and training at different facilities throughout England in Europe and Dubai. When I talked to Andy for this podcast he was fresh off a plane back from Dubai for a training that he had taught.

Here is what you will learn:

How he markets his practice.

Where most of his referrals come from

Andy’s other revenue stream.

What National Sport Named Andy a Movement Consultant for their team

The positive and negative affects of private practice on his family

The one thing that comes before money

Jo has been doing therapy for 20 years and has had her own private practice since 2008 in Sydney, Australia.

She is also a counselor and career development consultant.  Jo founded a consulting practice in 2009 to help other therapists in private practice.  Her energy is infectious, and she has a great message about private practice.

 Jo started her clinic by taking the hardest cases and the most involved clients.  Then, put simply, she gave superb service and got results. Her referrals grew from word of mouth, and she soon had a waiting list.

Here is what you will learn:

• The number one barrier for therapists who are just considering starting a private practice

• What pushed her over the edge to begin a private practice

• Why she doesn’t take or play the private insurance game

• What she considers when hiring therapists for her clinic

• What to put on your practice website

• Her take on treating clients all day, everyday

• How she helped implement an energy management training system that a corporation bought for $12,000

And so much more…

Carrie Clark is a Speech Therapist in Columbia, Missouri. She has a private practice clinic called The Children's Speech and Language Center. 

She also has a passive income website at speechandlanguagekids.com.

Carrie began her therapy career working in the public school system but became disillusioned due to the amount of work placed upon her and unreasonable co-workers. She began searching for a way out of her situation.  This lead her to both private practice and learning how to create passive income.

Here is what you will learn:

"Average people see money through the eyes of emotion. Rich people think about money logically."

This is a quote from an article at Yahoo Finance.

Fear is an emotion which can cause you to think  illogically. This episode will give you some specific insight on business skills and whether you have what it takes to run a private practice or not.  If you already own a private practice, then you will learn some specific techniques on how to think about business and some tips on how to run your private practice well.

I think you will find this information as inspiring as I did.  Please leave a comment about how rich people think differently and how you try to implement that way of thinking.

Here is what is covered in this episode:

• The business skills you need to run a private practice
• Take the test to determine if your private practice idea is a good one
• How to determine if your private practice idea will work without taking a risk
• Who should you ask to see if your private practice is a good idea
• Should you get a business degree
• The Entrepreneur mind- how it works and how yours should work
• What type of business model you should consider
• Maslow's hierarchy and your private practice
• What numbers you should track and when you should  track them
• Is there such a thing as a bad customer
• Other ways rich people think
• Is money the number one motivator

Yvette McCoy is a Speech Therapist in private practice in Maryland. She has a brick and mortar clinic called Speak Well Solutions that provides Speech, Occupational and Physical therapy. Yvette has a great attitude toward her private practice and delivers a fun and insightful interview.

Here is what we cover:

• How she "accidentally" got into private practice
• Why she partnered with an OT and how she set that Partnership up
• What her biggest marketing tool is
• How she shamelessly markets her practice to local doctors - Learn her one tip that will be huge for your practice marketing
• How she pays the therapists she hires
• What tools she uses for billing

James Lomuscio

I "met" James on Twitter using the #bizpt hashtag. I checked out his website and was intrigued by his tools for private practice therapists there. I thought you might be interested too so I invited James to visit with me about what his service offers.

Hability.net is a patient relationship management solution for therapists designed to help you
strengthen your relationship with patients. In this episode, James shares with us how this tool can help your private practice reduce no shows using text messages and emails which are automated and configurable.

Hability gives you the power to create one or more communication plans for your patients, and Hability automatically follows-up with each patient during and after their course of care. Each message is completely configurable, ensuring scheduled messages reflect your voice and your clinic's brand.

Hability is not just for PT's.  Any private practice therapist would benefit from this service.

I love different sauces, don't you? In my fridge there is Tiger Sauce, many different salad dressings, chili sauce, Tapatio, and one of my favorites, Show-Me Bar-B-Q Sauce.  You can really create the best meal with that special, secret sauce.

There's a secret sauce to managing a private practice too.  This secret is called productivity, and it's is all about learning to harness and control your time.  To run a successful private practice, you absolutely must learn to be productive.

If you leave a productivity tip in the comments below you will have a chance to win a FREE copy of my E-book to be given away May 24, 2014.

I have been very excited about this episode because it is one of the best ways I can help you make a positive change in your private practice and in your life. In this podcast, I will share some philosophical thoughts on productivity and some very practical tips and tools that you can use to improve your productivity. You will definitely want to check out the links at the end of this post.

Here are some of the insights you will learn:

• How productivity helps you reach your ultimate goal with your practice
• The secret to scheduling success
• What tasks you should delegate to others
• Evernote is the secret ingredient in the secret sauce
• How I use Evernote
• How I use Siri
• How I use email
• Life habits that make you productive and successful
• Screen capture for productivity
• Bluetooth your learning capacity
• How service to others fulfills you as a person
• Why productivity is important to make you a better servant
• The servant of the servants of God
• Duty is not a four letter word

Rachel Wynn is a private practice Speech Therapist with an award-winning blog at GrayMatterTherapy.com. Rachel worked in a nursing home setting and became disillusioned with what she saw there. Her entrepreneurial husband encouraged her to step out into private practice so she finally took the leap. After discovering her niche, she soon figured out that even though she loved what she was doing she was not able to make money doing it. She had to pivot and go in a different direction. She actually went in a few different directions. You will want to hear how an entrepreneur therapist isn't reactive but proactive in taking her private practice in new and exciting directions.

Here are some topics we cover:

• How to fail and succeed at networking
• Evidence based practice tools
• Your website may have a problem
• Importance of presentations and community events
• The "Why" of your practice and how it makes a difference
• The Area Agency on Aging tool
• Private Practice is not just one on one treatment

Aaron LeBauer joins me to discuss cash based therapy. He and his wife own and operate a cash only PT practice.

Aaron started a massage therapy business in 1999.  He decided he needed more knowledge and expertise on the body and how it worked so he went to PT school.  As a student, he figured out quickly that he did not want to work in the corporate world of PT because he wanted to give more individualized care to his patients.

Besides running his own cash based practice, Aaron now helps other therapists learn how to start a cash only practice too.

I love Aaron's attitude of simplicity both in life and in private practice.  It's definitely an attitude that builds success.

Be sure to check out the links at the end of this post which are mentioned in our conversation.

Here are some of the subjects we cover:

• How to begin and nurture relationships that will bring you referrals
• What to do if you are just starting a private practice
• Specific information to have on your website to bring in customers
• How to optimize your practice website so people can find you
• A great marketing tip on how to follow up with clients you discharge
• Different types of marketing and which types you should use
• What Aaron uses for therapy notes
• What tools Aaron uses for billing a client
• Useful scheduling tools and apps
• ...More

In this episode I had the opportunity to talk with Cyndee Bowen, a speech therapist who owns a private practice in Florida.   She knew she wanted to pursue a private practice right out of graduate school.  She became an independent practitioner in 2009, and in 2012 decided to take it to the next level and open a brick and mortar clinic.  Her private practice has been a success, and she is here to share some of her wisdom with you. 

 Here are some topics we cover:

• billing insurance
• marketing
• practice management software
• using debt to start a practice
• having a niche
• importance of a website
• ASHA Private Practice Institute

I have received many questions from therapists that I want to present in this Podcast episode. I bring my wife Jennifer on to help out. Be sure and listen all the way to the end because I tell you what I do when doctors call me wanting information quickly about a client we serve. You will definitely want to scroll to the end of this post at www.startatherapypractice.com/11 for some great links that I mention in the podcast and a picture of the marketing poster I mentioned.

Here are the topics we cover:

• Marketing poster and the QR code used on it
• What to do when the doc calls needing fast information on a client
• Shark Tank and the Entrepreneur Therapist
• How to let a client know you are tired of sitting in poop in their house
• Automatically be informed when Medicaid or Insurance is accepting new providers
• What type of screenings my clinic does and what I recommend
• What to do if a client switches providers and brings their previous evaluation report to you for treatment
• What insurance providers are doing now with Prior Authorizations
• Do you rent your therapy gym for events such as birthday parties?
• What to do when a client doesn't pay for your services
• Sissy Dog and Miss Kitty

Kim Lewis is a Speech Therapist who does solo private practice. She treats pediatric clients in thier homes, daycares and schools. Kim also has a very helpful website at ActivityTaylor.com. You will learn how Kim got started and how she markets her private practice. Allow Kim to peek your interest in developing a product that relates to the type of therapy you do.

Kim is a very innovative therapist that has allowed her talents to bring other forms of revenue to her private practice.