Interview with current 6 Figure Practice student Connor Moss, using the strategies we teach he has filled his practice to compacity. He shares his successes, his failure, and things he changed. It is a fulfilling and informative conversation. If you'd like to brainstorm a game plan together for your business you can schedule a quick free strategy call with us here: http://bit.ly/practicegameplan
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About the 6-Figure Practice Program:
The Six Figure Practice with Sasha Raskin, is an online program and community for helpers such as counselors and coaches, who are building their private practice. If you’re looking for a clear, step-by-step road map for creating and marketing your private practice, you're at the right place!
Free resources to grow and market your counseling private practice or coaching business:
Free 22 minutes crash course - "How to Create a Thriving Counseling / Coaching Private Practice": https://www.the6figurepractice.com/free-22-minute-crash-course
Free resources about marketing for therapists and marketing for coaches: https://www.the6figurepractice.com/blog
Free 30-minutes strategy session with Sasha Raskin: https://www.the6figurepractice.com/schedule-a-free-30-min-strategy-session/
Our accelerator program for creating a 6-figure business:
The 6 Figure Practice Program: https://www.the6figurepractice.com/the-6-figure-practice-program-accelerator/
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Chat with me on messenger: https://m.me/the6figurepractice
Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCITSmYvj-vpwuWrOuwqYr5w
About me:
My name is Sasha Raskin. I’m a Number 1 Best Selling Co-Author in 12 Countries, a Doctoral student in Counseling Education and Supervision, a coach, a psychotherapist and an adjunct faculty at a graduate counseling program at Naropa University.
One of the things I’m enjoying the most is helping other therapists and coaches build their successful private practice so that they could actually help the clients they were taught to help, and thrive themselves. I’m almost always fully booked, so my ability to work with individuals is limited. That is why I’ve created this program to deliver powerful results and create a community where you will feel supported by each other!
This program's primary goal is to help you build a thriving private practice, in a fun and authentic way. Counselors and coaches invest an incredible amount of time, money, and effort into building their helping skills. However, when their training ends, they usually find themselves lacking the business skills that are needed to start and run a successful private practice, feel isolated, discouraged and not knowing where to start.
I believe that to be truly helpful to others, therapists and coaches have to learn to thrive themselves and definitely know how to get clients whom they can help.
This is where this program comes in. If you're willing to learn and work hard, a 6-figure private practice is within your reach in a year - 2 years. This program will give you a clear outline, and detailed instructions on how to get there.
Transcription
connor case study
Sasha Raskin: Hi, Connor.
Connor: Hey, Sasha.
Sasha Raskin: Hi. So Connor, you are a participant in The 6 Figure Practice program and you're full, you did the impossible, right? Or what seems impossible for many counselors when they're starting out. And I think it would be a great and inspirational conversation to maybe fast forward for counselors to see and for coaches as well what is possible from you doing that actually, and pretty fast as well which on my end a lot of respect for that because you've been putting in the work.
So maybe to start with, can you share a little about who you are, what you do and who you help?
Connor: Sure. So I'm a therapist practicing online with California clients. I am just a couple years out of school, maybe three, and still gaining my hours towards licensure, so just a little plug that you can do this before you're licensed.
Sasha Raskin: Yeah, that's important.
Connor: Yeah, I figured why wait. And I work with ... I'm an integral therapist, so I studid at the California Institute of Integral Studies, I bring a lot of different approaches but my main focus is, my niches are with couples therapy, trauma healing and with drug and alcohol counseling. Those have been the clients that I've worked best with and I really enjoy working with.
Sasha Raskin: Wonderful. Can you share when you were just starting out, right at the beginning, what were some of the biggest challenges that you noticed?
Connor: I mean, many.
Sasha Raskin: You didn't lack any challenges, right?
Connor: Yeah, I mean, the whole thing was a challenge. It was, I mean, from imposter syndrome to just if I did feel confident enough that I was a good enough therapist to make this happen, I didn't know where to start, a lot of bad information, a lot of false starts, so generally just a lack of understanding of what the roadmap was and then not a lot of confidence in implementing it. And then like kind of I kept putting all my energy into ... I put a lot of energy into certain areas that I'm happy to talk about that didn't end up panning out, and so it was hard not to get really discouraged back then.
But yeah, just generally, I mean, I wasn't making very much money, I was trying to support my family and I was just out of school, student debt was starting to come into play and I just ... I kind of needed to get it started and I had no idea how. And I was kind of there for a couple years before I really started to get some traction.
Sasha Raskin: Can you say more about how much of it was internal and how much of it was external? Basically what was I guess more difficult, more pronounced, the psychology and the mindset or the strategies?
Connor: Yeah, that's a really good question. I mean, I want to say a fair amount of it was internal because after working through your program ... like I've heard of SEO before, I've heard of Google Ads and there's a lot of technical knowledge about how to implement it, but I think one of the biggest things I got from your program and the thing that was most helpful for me to be successful was like the confidence that I knew what I was doing or if I didn't know you knew and I could just do what you did and it would turn out okay.
So nothing was really brand new to me, maybe that's why I was able to build really quickly, but I didn't know what order or how to do it and so it's very hard to be motivated. So like I knew I should have a blog but I was spending a month writing like this school essay that like no one wanted to read and didn't have any keywords in it and it was taking me forever. And so I was just like kind of spinning my wheels, and so it was hard to motivate to do a blog. But then kind of learning, well, what is this actually for? And what are the steps? It gave me that confidence. So I would say like maybe 70/30, like internal/external.
Sasha Raskin: Yeah, Tony Robbins says it's 80/20, I don't think there was a research ... or 90/10 ... research about that, but it's as if no one really needs that much more information. People need more application, right?
Connor: Absolutely.
Sasha Raskin: And it's on the spectrum, you can do actually too much as well, right? You're saying, "Well, I've been working way too hard on a blog post that I thought the main intention there is to create the best writing I could possibly create," right? Versus it's just, "Yeah, let's get it out there. Let's have it found," your website found, and it just needs to be good enough. And you're saying what the order was important, right? So it's the small details - how to make it as efficient as possible? And I guess I don't know if that was the case for you. For me personally at least I gave myself the permission to just go for it and finish things even though they're not perfect. There was a lot of freedom in that.
Connor: Yeah, that was, and continues to be really difficult, to put out writing that is not perfect. That's really hard. But just understanding like why I'm doing it in the first place really helped, like understanding what's going to happen if I blog regularly and who's actually going to click on it and why is it there. That gave me the motivation to actually write. And I've written like 30 blog posts since I started this program.
Sasha Raskin: No wait, are you kidding? I didn't know that.
Connor: Yeah, I've done ... well, maybe like 20, at least 25. So once I got that motivation I was like, "Oh, this is what's going to happen. This is why I'm doing it," it was very easy to get started. But to not understand like what's the point of it it's very hard to just kind of motivate out of nothing.
Sasha Raskin: Oh, you should totally post that in the Facebook group. For everyone who watches and listens we have our private Facebook group. And with the permission to brag about your hard work and achievements, that's like super important in a community, right? And counselors are kind of ... I don't know, I don't want to make generalizations but at least my colleagues kind of shy bragging about the results. I don't know what's that about, right? It's as if it's not polite or I don't want to make other people feel small or something like that. And as Nelson Mandela actually quoting someone else, he said, "No, it's okay to be big because you can inspire others to do the same."
Connor: Yeah, that's something I'm still working on.
Sasha Raskin: Yeah, that's a working progress, right? So you're saying the main thing is to actually have a roadmap and see kind of fast forward what will happen in the future once I get there and then reverse engineer it, right? "I know that if I get those blogs up, if I write constantly, if I do some basic SEO even on that - I will never need to pay for advertising again," which is a kind of a nice, nice thing to have.
Connor: Yeah. The hunter-farmer framework was really revolutionary for me, because I was ... I had Google Ads and I had this blog, like I said, I had like three like academic papers that no one wanted to read. And just understanding in what order things are going to go and how it's going to pay off, then it's very easy for me to say, "Okay, if I blog every week for two years, like predictably from the people who've done it like this is the outcome that's going to come." And I'm a very methodical person, so once I kind of have that structure it's like, "Okay, that's easy. I'll just blog every week for two years and maybe go even faster than that."
So understanding the why was extremely important. The how is like you can read it anywhere but the why is like that's what gives me the gas to actually do these things.
Sasha Raskin: So nicely said. By the way, just to clarify for people who don't know, the hunter-farmer framework is something we use in the program. And there's a book coming out I think two or three weeks from now, the three pillars of the over thriving practice, and you can buy it on Amazon or just literally send me a message on any of the ... you can find me on Facebook, Sasha Raskin, and I'll send you a free copy.
So at the beginning you were kind of overwhelmed. Like, the progress was slow, you said a few years, right? Can you fast forward to the moments before joining the program? I remember our call and you were kind of hesitant, it's like, "I don't know if this thing ..." Could you say more about your hesitation? What almost stopped you from joining? And you can be as honest as you want.
Connor: I mean, I don't know. I clicked on this random Facebook ad that says thriving private practice or whatever it was. And I guess I'm a little jaded by just all the people trying to sell me something and all the targeted ads. And it was just, I mean, the copy was like exactly to me, it was like you clearly wrote your copy well. But I was still kind of like who is this guy and is he actually going to be able to help me.
I think because I had like been through ... I mean, I hadn't really done a program like this but I've done trainings and I've invested hours and money into working on this. So I think I've had many false starts in the past, and so I was just like ... honestly I thought it was a gamble because like there was no way to tell. Everyone says results guaranteed or that you'll succeed. And so I was just hesitant because I put so much effort into this, spinning my wheels, that I was afraid it was going to be another one of those things. I think that was my hesitation.
Sasha Raskin: I'm glad you joined; it's a pleasure to have you in the program and just to see the results. And like you doubled the amount of clients. And just the fact that you're helping so many people right now, right? And they're able to actually find you after all those years of training. That's a big one.
Can you say, well, two things, what was different about this program and what was different maybe about the way you showed up in this program, about how you did things?
Connor: I mean, I think they're related. You have a very structured active approach with your program, with your ... our short one-on-ones that we've had. And I just felt like it seems like he knows what he's talking about. And I clicked through your two businesses and seen how well they looked like they were doing. So I guess I just I trusted you and also just the structure and the organization. Everyone kind of talks ... I think especially for counselors we can get lost in the area like, "Oh, all these things, all these dreams, all these ideas. We should do that, we should do that." And you're just like, "No. Okay, do this and then do this and then do this." And that was very containing for me. I felt like it seems like he knows this plan and it's going to be very clear what I have to do.
And then how I showed up was I just kind of did the things. And so I did step one and step two and step three and I didn't try to think about it too much even if the steps were like, "I don't really want to do that," like calling five colleagues for a short coffee date, like I definitely didn't want to do that but I did it and I got a referral from it.
Sasha Raskin: Good for you for going into the fear.
Connor: Yeah, that was uncomfortable for sure, but it was helpful. So just kind of like almost in a way just not thinking too much and just following a program, like if you're like an Olympic weightlifter or something like you don't design your own program, you have someone else who says like do this, lift this much on this day, like eat this much at this time. And to outsource all that thinking of like what should I do next to someone who's put that thought into it was very easy, because then I could just log in and do the next step. So just a methodical approach was helpful.
Sasha Raskin: It's interesting when I was doing my research back in the day when starting my coaching business; I went into numi.com which is a directory for coaches. And it's like a gold mine - you see the inquiries of people, like it just listed. And I went for the language and was looking for when thinking about naming my business what's the most commonly used words. And it was the next step, right? Just what you mentioned, right? That's what people crave. And I think as a counselor from the attachment lens it is so containing when parents give clear boundaries to children ... not to say a parent and you're a child, right? But it's just so helpful to me right now working with my own coach, it's like just being told, "Hey, let go of that shiny new object, just focus on this one thing." And then I can kind of rest. "Oh, okay, I don't need to do everything. I have the freedom within the boundaries," right?
Connor: Yeah, and I'll tell you that it's affected my clinical work a lot too.
Sasha Raskin: Interesting.
Connor: Not every client needs that approach, but I've learned a lot more about just how to take a more active approach when clients need it. So that's been very helpful actually.
Sasha Raskin: I totally believe that every counselor should add coaching elements to their therapy, which like this is not even necessary to say to marriage and family therapists because pretty much every modality is very active. And I think we just need more conversation between individual therapists and marriage and family therapists. It's okay to have an agenda, right? How about you create good relationships with your loved ones? How about like you close the gap between the person you want to be and how you show up in the world? And with a compassionate way.
I'm heavily biased towards action. And I think like one of the biggest gifts, and I'm not sure, I'm actually curious if you feel that already, having a full private practice I can say no to potential clients and say, "And this person would be a great fit for you," right? And the intake questionnaire/sales script that we use in the program, like this is how you frame it - I might not be a good fit for you and now let you know politely. And there are so many wonderful compassionate therapists around and I'll be bored out of my mind if I'll just be doing compassionate nodding for 15 minutes, I was like, "Ugh, I cannot do this. Like, there are so many other." That's wonderful.
Could you say maybe in three or four sentences the biggest actual measurable outcomes of the work you did in this program?
Connor: Like, numbers-wise what's happened in my practice?
Sasha Raskin: Yeah, anything that's measurable that you seen ... so you shared what was before, right? Fast forward two ... I think two and a half already, right?
Connor: Something like that, yeah.
Sasha Raskin: What is different?
Connor: Well, I've gone from about, what was it? 10 to 12 clients to 19, maybe 20 depending. And I have like three consults set up this week. So a little less than doubled. I like that you were talking about the consult script, I have a consult script that I don't always use but I have it as a backup in case I get lost and that's been huge. I would say my conversions have gone up from like one in four to three in four. So that's an area where the more active approach I found to be extremely helpful, especially in a first contact people want to know that you kind of know what you're doing and have an idea of what it's going to look like. So I'd say the consult script has been huge.
And then I would go back to the I've written 30 blogs or close to. That's huge. And I've tracked my SEO rankings and I've seen myself rank. I'm ranking for like longer tail keywords right now. The shorter ones are I'm still in the 50s or 60s, but I'm in the top 10 for a couple smaller keywords and so that's been a direct result of blogging.
Sasha Raskin: That's incredible. Just the momentum that you created with blogging. And also like anyone who watches or is listening to the podcast, notice that he has, Connor has the lingo, right? Long tail keywords, right? That's so nice to hear.
Connor: Stuff is important, yeah. You can get lost in it but it's important to just know what that is and know what SEO and these little details that I think are really helpful.
Sasha Raskin: What do you think about SEO, search engine optimization? Many counselors and coaches who heard about it, right? And the theory is like the only way I can do this thing is if I hire a company, what do you think about that?
Connor: I would say that's a waste of time. I mean, a waste of money. Well, both. Because ... I mean, I think SEO it's like this keyword catch phrase that has all these associations, but when you really get down to what it is it is the way to build a practice. And I really like that you brought it back earlier to like how I'm serving more people, and I think it's really helpful ... I think a lot of therapists get turned off by like marketing and SEO and money because it feels so greedy, but I really like bringing it back to SEO is helping people find you who you can really help. So if you can help people, you've been through school, even if you don't feel like it you have skills that the average person doesn't have and SEO will help those people find you and help the right people find you. So I really think it's everything.
And hiring a company is completely backwards because you're trying to ... what you want to do with SEO is put your authentic voice out there so that actual people can find you. And I think the only real way to do SEO successfully, at least the way I've found, is to create content. And you can't really have someone else do that for you. You can have people manage it and fine-tune and add the meta data and all those things, maybe a company would be helpful for that, but as far as the long-term strategy of content creation like that's central.
Sasha Raskin: Could you share a little tip for counselors or coaches who are scared of writing? They hear 30 blog posts, and I don't know if rewind half a year ago someone would tell you, "Yeah, in a few months I wrote 30 blog posts," and you might have been ... I don't know if you would be a little intimidated by that or just wouldn't take it seriously. "I don't know what you're talking about," right? What would be maybe a tip or advice for people who want to start blogging or maybe are stuck at the one or two blog posts? And just from your experience.
Connor: Well, you've got to let go of your perfectionism which is harder to do than it is to say. And for me that was about bringing it back, again, to the why. It's like why am I actually doing this? Sure, I'm doing it to rank higher on Google, but the real reason I'm writing these things is because I want to help people. So if someone clicks on my website and then I have the sidebar with the relevant blogs on the specialty pages I genuinely want to help them. So even if they don't book with me, if I can help them just a little bit with something that feels good and it has the side effect of helping SEO and bringing me more clients.
But I think, yeah, so to bring it back to like you're trying to help people. You have knowledge that will help people and writing it down even if you're not completely satisfied with it is going to really help people. So for me it was just about getting started. It was like I write them out, I think about an idea, I write a short outline and then I just start writing like I'm talking to a friend in a coffee shop. And those conversations that you have with your therapist friends, like someone somewhere wants to know that information that's going to really help them. So sorry, if I'm a little scattered, but the question is like tips and tricks.
Sasha Raskin: I think you covered in a great way the mindset and the psychology that silences that perfectionist voice. I'm curious, any strategies, how did you wrote ... how did you write 30 blog posts with having a family in such a short time? What's your system?
Connor: I mean, I have a Google Doc where I write down ideas, and so I have it split into my three specialties of couple's therapy, drug and alcohol counseling and trauma therapy. And very often in session someone will ask me a question and I may or may not answer it depending on how the session's going but it'll ping something that's like, "Oh, people have asked me this before. They want to know it." So it's like when to moderate versus when abstinence is needed with alcohol or how do you forgive yourself or how do I communicate better with my partner. It's like these ideas that just kind of come in. And so I write those down on my Google Sheet.
And then for me when I only had 12 clients I had a lot of free time, so I would just block off ... like it would usually take me an hour or two to write a blog post, so I would block off two hours when I had free. Instead of stressing about the clients I'm not having in that moment I put that energy into something productive and I'd just pick one of the things from my list, write four bullet points about it and then write one paragraph per bullet point. Really stream of consciousness. That was helpful for me to like imagine a friend that's talking to me about this in a coffee shop, like how may I talk about it? Just like, "Oh, yeah, you should probably do this and probably think about this." And when you're communicating these types of things are things to look out for. So to kind of just get in that flow.
And so one idea, four bullet points, one paragraph per bullet point. That's 800 words. And then edit it very briefly, like 15 minutes to edit. Don't do it too much. And then just post it. So to not get caught in the perfectionism spiral.
Sasha Raskin: Connor, I see a workshop coming in the future.
Connor: Sure, yeah.
Sasha Raskin: And I see a book in the future, right? We probably should talk about that in the Facebook group when you post about the ... but those 30 blog posts literally compiled as links, sent to an editor and you have your first book, done.
Connor: Yeah, maybe.
Sasha Raskin: We'll talk about that.
Connor: And I really just want to underline before we move on that the key for me was like to understand that this is helping people, because every time I felt like I'm trying to get clients, I'm trying to like extract money from people, it's like it just feels icky. It's like, "No, I'm helping people. I'm putting content out there that's going to help people, whether they become my client or not." And that type of energy I think is what really builds the practice.
Sasha Raskin: For sure. Always lead with value, right? You lead with money, that's being felt by others and that I think it's off-putting. But you lead with value, right? How many clients do I help - actually tracking I think, like asking them, "Well, is it helpful?" Where do you want to be? What are your goals? And seeing are we there. And I guess like one of the reasons that I called the program the 6 figure practice even though some counselors have strong feelings about that, is it's just one way to measure your positive impact on the world, right?
And I think it's important to make sure you have a goal and build towards that, right? It means that you're serving the clients that you will taught to serve, you're not under charging and you're actually able to give sliding scale or pro bono if you want to and that wouldn't cause harm to yourself.
Connor: Yeah, where I'm living you probably need to make six figures to be really inspired about your work. So you can bring it back to if I want to help people I probably have to make that much if I'm not going to get burnt out, to bring it back to the value you're offering.
Sasha Raskin: Exactly right. Sorry, go ahead. I cut you off.
Connor: Yeah, just I've had the experience of making 30 and 40 grand a year and working my butt off, and I don't think I do as good work. It's just not rewarding, I don't feel inspired, I don't have as much energy, I'm stressed about my family. So it's another way to kind of take the stigma out of the money. It's like the money is just the energy that you are using to serve your clients really well.
Sasha Raskin: Very nicely said. There is no separation between the income you're earning and your clinical work. There's actually a strong connection. Nothing romantic about frustrated counselors or coaches who are being kind of overwhelmed by their finances or living paycheck to paycheck and need to work eight hours a day to make a living. Nothing good about that. You're not doing anyone any favors, your clients especially.
Connor: Yeah.
Sasha Raskin: So Connor, you gave a nice overview. By the way, how much time do we have left?
Connor: I should go at 5:30 so we have about 20 minutes.
Sasha Raskin: Great. So you gave a short overview of measurable outcomes of the work you've been doing during the last few months. Let's zoom in a little bit, if you remember our first call we talked about the three pillars of a private practice, right? I drew this triangle that we use in the program which is operations, basically being professional in setting up your business; marketing which is being found; and getting hired which is the sales part - a very scary word sometimes for counselors and coaches.
Could you say more about what changed in operations, in your business foundation and the way you run things? Everything that's not clinical work and ... or advertising or sales?
Connor: I mean, it was very helpful to kind of outline what my procedures are when a new client reaches out to me. So in the past I was kind of anxious and I'd call them and if they didn't get back to me maybe email them or I'd text them, and I'd feel like I was being too intrusive. And now I just have a really clear system. It was helpful, your format of a call and an email - here's three times that are available. And so I just feel a lot more ... I don't have to think about it so much. I have just a form email in my Gmail so I just click on that and enter some times. So that's made my life easier I think on the operations perspective. I don't know if that's a little bit sales too.
Sasha Raskin: Well, it's all connected, right? It's kind of just to organize it, a separation to organize. And system is not a dirty word, it's okay to have system probably. I very much advice, right? It's predictable, you can assess if it works or not, it needs to change, and it just makes ... it's so easy.
Connor: I guess on the systems level another huge thing has been the consult script.
Sasha Raskin: That's on the sales, getting hired part, right?
Connor: Okay.
Sasha Raskin: Oh, no, continue. I think you covered the operations. That's great.
Connor: Yeah, so in the just, again, knowing what I'm saying ahead of time. And again, it's not an exact script, I don't read it word for word, but I'll call it a road map or a strategy. I was having a lot of trouble converting clients who I thought I could really help because I didn't really know what I was saying, I kind of treated it like a short therapy session, and I think I wasn't providing enough structure. And now, yeah, if they're a good fit I can pretty consistently convert three out of four because I just have this ... I just know what I'm saying. I'm not stumbling over my words.
Sasha Raskin: That's the confidence piece.
Connor: Yeah, that's been huge, because like you say you can get 100 leads but if you're only converting one out of four ... that's one of the fastest ways I think to increase your caseload, it's like work on your conversions. So that's been huge. And just going into consults now and just knowing what I'm going to say feels really good.
Sasha Raskin: And I love consultation calls. For me it feels like I should probably do the version two of the script, what I'm adding right now at the beginning is that even if we don't end up working together I want to make sure that those 20 minutes have value for you, and that you at least get some insight or clarity or figuring out the next step for you. And I think that's what I love about the script. That's been developed not just by me but from my coaches and from everyone that's been mentoring me. That like the easiest way to sell is not to sell, just provide value, right? And, "Oh, okay, this person really helped me to figure out my problems." And like to see them clear, right? It's like, "He probably knows that. He would know how to guide me through longer term work."
Could you say a little more about the marketing part, the third pillar of a thriving practice? By the way, for anyone who's listening we have live trainings now. Three pillar of a thriving practice, you can just go to the6figurepractice.com and sign up. Speaking of marketing, right? Here was my little pitch.
Connor: That's great. I mean, I think I've talked about it a bit but just the biggest thing ... I was running Google Ads and they were very expensive and not converting very well. And I've I fine-tuned them a bit but I've kind of just abandoned them because my farming strategy is paying off already even just a little bit. And so that's the biggest thing for me is like just knowing what my plan is even if I'm not going to get like huge growth immediately, although I kind of did, to know that in two years, in five years I'm just going to have this really solid system set up and to know the work that I need to do. So the biggest thing for marketing has just been understanding the how and the why of SEO and coming up with a system that works for me to create content that hopefully really helps people. That's been huge. And it's fun, I actually like enjoy writing blogs, believe it or not.
Sasha Raskin: No way, you enjoy writing and doing marketing now?
Connor: Yeah, it's fun. It's like if I have a lighter week, instead of stressing out about those empty spots in my caseload I'm like, "I know what I'll do with those two hours - I'm going to write a blog." And I've gotten much faster at just getting my ideas on paper and not stressing out about so much about them. So that's been huge.
Sasha Raskin: During those two and a half, three months in the program, how much time did you put weekly into building your practice? Because I'm sure there are counselors who work at agencies or coaches who work a second job while they're building and they might be thinking, "Oh, my God, I need to quit my job and do full-time or whatnot," right? And I think if you would share that it's not.
Connor: Yeah, I mean, five, maybe more, probably not, five to ten at the absolute most. No, probably five if I'm being honest. Like, I did have some systems, like I had a decent website already, but like you say you have a 17-minute website, I'm sure I could have built it really quickly if I hadn't had one already. So I would say five hours max.
Sasha Raskin: That's incredible.
Connor: Including all those blog posts.
Sasha Raskin: And part of it was watching the videos in the program I assume.
Connor: Yeah. I mainly watch the fast lanes. I admit that I didn't always watch every single video because I'm a very like once I know what to do I just want to do it.
Sasha Raskin: Could you say more about the fast lane videos in the program for anyone who is curious?
Connor: So basically you have all the content which there's a lot of, and I might go back and watch it while I still have access to the course, but then if you just want to get on with it, if you're someone like me who just needs to know what to do and then just to do it there's a shorter version of basically all the information you need to know condensed into like 30 or 45 minutes, maybe an hour sometimes. So mainly I would just watch those and then go to the to-do list, and if there's something I didn't know how to do I maybe go back and watch more videos, but mainly I could do everything from the fast lane which really goes to show how much it's not about the information and it's about the motivation, it's about the check-ins on the Facebook group and having the community and just having a plan. That structure I think was the most valuable part for me.
Sasha Raskin: How did the community help you? I think I hear a lot from counselors who think about going into private practice that fear of being isolated and lonely and then they're kind of thinking about, "Well, my only path is agencies."
Connor: Yeah, I mean, it makes me think a lot about my work with addiction clients, like that's a strange analogy but ...
Sasha Raskin: Oh, it's totally it.
Connor: Yeah, it's like it's a behavioral shift that you're trying to do. And I know from my clients that if my clients go to meetings they are way more successful, just having someone else to talk to or even if they don't go to meetings but they text their sponsor or someone. And I think for behavioral shifts like building a practice or like getting motivated or quitting drinking - having other people who are going through that similar experience is so valuable. And I feel a little corny or a little vulnerable saying like, "Hey, I wrote a blog post this week," or like sharing my wins, but it really does help because you feel good about it and then other people say, "Way to go." And you feel more motivated.
And if there's ever like a chance that I might slip off and like give up, I have this support network around me that's going to keep inspiring me. So I think talking with other people who are going through a similar experience can really help with these types of changes.
Sasha Raskin: For sure. Connor, what's your biggest tip? Well, the one that ... the first one that comes up. If someone who's listening and just trying to figure out if they should go into private practice or not, if they should open their coaching business or not because there are like other possibilities - they can go into agencies, why should one go and start their own business?
Connor: I mean, I think being an entrepreneur is very satisfying and very tied to like self-confidence and self-worth, self-growth. Just the process of like being my own boss and seeing what I want and building towards it. I've always been someone who kind of like knows what I want and doesn't always like taking direction. And so just that freedom to just I'm the only one and I'm going to build what I need in my life and I'm going to help people in the process, that's been so rewarding for me and it continues to be.
And then just on a logistical note, I mean, I think it's very hard. I live in Colorado now and I'm based in California, I'm going to move back there eventually, and I think it's very hard to make a living not in a private practice setting. And for me it's just about like I want to provide for my family, again, like value, like I want to provide, I want to help people and I don't want to be like worried about money my entire life. So if I want to ... it is possible to build a six figure or 200,000 or 300,000 or seven-figure practice if you really want to, you just have to put the work into it. And I figure why not put the work in now and reap the benefits later instead of sticking with what's safe but never really being fulfilled financially.
Sasha Raskin: Very nicely said. Such a great accelerator of personal growth, at least it was for me. I'm not going to even try to pronounce it with all my accents. And not to brag, but also to show that this is possible, this year just from my private practice, probably maybe I put less than five hours into advertising it because the systems are built already. With the pandemic, right? All this year there was a crisis, right? They hit so many businesses and I crossed the 200K mark without like doing any marketing at all and working less than 20 hours, right? So which allows me to do my PhD, invest in all like any training that I'm thinking about doing I can go and invest which makes me a better counselor and a better coach, right? And it's just so rewarding. And I wish I could fast forward to any counselor or coach what can be achieved if they put in the work just like you did, right? Like, yeah, five hours is not a lot but it does require commitment and effort.
Connor: Yeah, and the motivation is the key. I'm excited to fast forward my own story. I already have big plans beyond filling my practice.
Sasha Raskin: That's wonderful. We're actually building the 10th model now for people who reached 100K, like some really exciting things like how to build your product and online programs and agencies and group practices so good stuff is coming.
Connor: Cool. Yeah, I want to build a group practice and continue to just grow.
Sasha Raskin: Connor, it's such a pleasure to have you in the program and thank you for sharing and being vulnerable too about your challenges. I think it's important for people to hear the before and after.
Connor: Yeah, thank you. It's a pleasure to talk about this stuff. And thank you so much for all your support in creating this program and really being integral in helping me progress in this way.
Sasha Raskin: You're more than welcome. Thank you so much, Connor.
