They’re (sadly) a rite of passage.

The more successful you become, the greater the likelihood you’ll start getting them.

It only takes one person who’s having a bad day (or month, or year, or lifetime).

You don’t even have to do anything “wrong.” You can conduct yourself perfectly in every possible way…but someone is going to decide for reasons of their own to go online and defame you.

Since negative reviews are basically inevitable if you’re at all committed to growing a successful practice, the real question is: what can you do about them?

One of life’s greatest dangers is:

Not walking your talk.

Talking is easy.

Walking your talk can be quite hard.

Particularly when we’re talking about ever-present practices like how to relate to one’s own thoughts and feelings, or how to communicate with other human beings, or how to navigate fears and inadequacies.

If you have any aspirations whatsoever of growing a successful private practice, learning to walk your talk and actually apply the things you preach to your clients is one of the most powerful things you can possibly do.

You finally got your practice website done.

It’s live.

It’s out there ready for prospective clients to find it.

But now comes the reckoning:

You’re not sure whether or not your website is actually working to bring you new clients.

A growing sense of website-related dread is starting to gnaw at you.

Is your practice website a disaster?

The first time I saw a therapist do this, I couldn’t believe it.

This one little habit is costing you clients.

Even worse, it’s leaving people in search of a therapist out in the cold.

Let’s dive into this surprisingly controversial way you can easily grow your therapy practice.

What if I told you that if you actually have your practice growth process in place – a process that is dialed into your particular needs, in your particular location, centered around your particular modalities – that you can have plenty of self-pay referrals? 

An average individual practitioner typically wants 20-30 weekly sessions at their proper rate – that’s often 0.0001% of the population in the area around their office (and even less than that if leveraging remote help, telemental, and so forth). 

Do you really think it’s impossible to get 20-30 weekly clients, in a target area that contains tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, possibly even millions of people, that will self-pay? 

You’ve paid your dues.

You’ve completed your degree.

You know it’s now or never – either you commit and make it happen, or you may have just spent thousands of dollars and hours on a degree and licensing and supervision only to end up with fewer options than you had before you started.

You need to build your practice NOW.

Well, I’m here to give you some reassurance.

If you can honestly look around at your current efforts (and mental landscape) and see most of the following 11 signs, you’re well on your way to private practice success.

Are you struggling to get clients through your Psychology Today profile?

Before you cancel your PT subscription, make sure you first implement these five tips for writing a killer Psychology Today profile that brings you great-fit clients like clockwork.

I’ve personally edited over a thousand Psychology Today profiles. Here are my top five tips for what really works on PT.

People out there need your help.

You know they’re out there (or, at least, you’re fighting hard to believe).

And you want them to reach out to you so you can make an impact with your expertise.

(And yes, it is also nice to pay the bills and have a little money at the end of the month.)

Well, what does an enterprising practice owner do to achieve that practice growth?

Ideally, you’d be full today.

(Tomorrow at the very latest.)

Those bills are piling up – your office rent, your utilities, your cell phone bill, the monthly webhosting charge to keep your website live.

So what do you do to grow your practice as quickly as possible – i.e. RIGHT NOW?

The techniques used to properly fill a caseload with good-fit clients vary dramatically, depending on:

1. The modalities in use
2. The demographics one works best with
3. The market – Urban? Suburban? Rural?
4. Brick and mortar practice? Any remote / telemental sessions?
5. Individual practice? Small Group? Large Group? Agency?