Marketing for Therapists: The Third Ethics Mistakes Therapists Make Marketing in Private Practice (Part 2 of the Series)
Ethics, Marketing and Private Practice
When you learned about ethics in grad school was it in the context of marketing for therapists? Probably not! When we went to school therapists were still advertising in the yellow pages y’all!
We talked in our last article about how you don’t have to even own a private practice to be making some of these ethics mistakes. If you missed the first blog in this series, check it out here.
Let’s be clear, today is NOT about scaring you. It’s about helping you AVOID or FIX some of these common mistakes so you can be the ethical, amazing therapist you are meant to be!
Side note: We are providing a FREE live training soon (or you can watch the replay if you miss it): Client-Centered Marketing Messages: How to Write an Ethical Marketing Message to Fill Your Practice.
Ok, so let’s start at the beginning: When is the last time you read your ethical code and really gave it a deep exploration? Has it been years? Was it before you were in private practice, or employed by a big tech company? A LOT has changed in the last few years. It’s great to go back and give it a read and really ponder what the ethical code means in light of the world today.
In this article, we are going to be focusing on the ethical code of our State organization, the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists, for the purposes of an example. When looking at ethical codes, we highly recommend looking at not just national organizations, but also state organizations. State ethical codes are often more closely aligned with the laws and regulations in your state that you’d be held accountable to if there was an ethical or legal complaint made against you.
Remember, we are going to start with Ethics Mistake #3 today, if you want to see the first 2, check them out here.
Ethics Mistake #3: They don't track their clinical outcomes
If you are surprised to hear business coaches talking about the importance of tracking clinical outcomes, you shouldn’t be. We are therapists first, always. AND… guess what- great outcomes and customer service just happen to be the basis of all great businesses! If you aren’t doing great work, do you really feel great about marketing? So, let’s dive into the code of ethics:
“ADVERTISING: Marriage and family therapists do not use any means of ... media, if it includes a statement or claim that is false, fraudulent, misleading, or deceptive... contains a material misrepresentation of fact, omits any fact necessary to make the statement, not misleading, or is intended to or is likely to create an unjustified expectation.”
Now, most therapists, when reading this particular ethical code feel pretty solid. No wild claims are made on their website or business card. Maybe the website just has a list of symptoms that they can treat. Or, maybe it has a list of modalities that they have been trained in.
So- hard question: Does a list of symptoms or modalities give people expectations at all? Remember, our ethical code is helping us avoid clients having unjustified expectations. If people have no expectations at all, because they can’t actually tell what you do or what your specialty is- is that aligning with the reason that the code of ethics is there?
The code of ethics around advertising is to make sure people get access to quality care. That people can find people who can deeply help them and that people are giving them realistic expectations.
So- let’s go back to the third ethics mistake: How can you give people realistic expectations if you aren’t tracking your clinical outcomes? And no, we aren’t just talking about filling out spreadsheets, sending out surveys, or doing the SRS or ORS (although we think all of these things can be good). We mean really deeply connecting with our clients to understand the impact of therapy with us on their unique lives. (Check out our free training with optional CE on the Outcome-Driven Practice: How One Conversation Can Increase Your Referrals, Income, and Joy in Private Practice)
Clinical outcomes conversations allow us to figure out things like:
What were our client’s expectations of therapy?
What actually happened for them?
What were the pivotal moments for them, in their own words?
How many sessions does it take for a client to FEEL like they are making real progress?
How many sessions before a client is ready to graduate?
How does your client describe what being in the room with you is like in lay person terms?
Are there times we are messing up and don’t know it?
Who are we NOT getting great outcomes with?
This information allows us to track our work over time, use it to improve our outcomes with clients, AND it allows us to create marketing messages that are aligned with giving people REALISTIC expectations.
Informed Consent - Helping the Client Decide
This brings us to our next ethical code that is related to this same ethical mistake: “INFORMED DECISION-MAKING: Marriage and family therapists respect the rights of clients/patients to choose whether to enter into, to remain in, or to leave the therapeutic relationship. When significant decisions need to be made, marriage and family therapists provide adequate information to clients/patients in clear and understandable language so that clients/patients can make meaningful decisions about their therapy.”
How can we give clients informed consent if we don’t know our own clinical outcomes and/or we can’t convey to a client what is needed to get them. When therapists go through our Business School for Therapists they are usually STUNNED at how much their clinical outcomes improve through the process of upleveling their business. Underpaid, overworked therapists who don’t know why they are amazing and can’t communicate are at such risk for burnout. So, let’s look at a few examples of this impacts your marketing:
Do you use a particular modality and share the research related to that modality? Are you also honest about the frequency and duration of treatment needed to get those outcomes?
What about your availability? Are you constantly saying yes to new clients out of fear of not having a full schedule and unable to provide the frequency your current clients need to get the outcomes they desire?
Do you even know what frequency you need to see someone to get them great clinical outcomes?
Do you know who you get terrible clinical outcomes with and are you confident enough to refer that person out? Are you able to be honest, AKA give informed consent when you don’t have the clinical training, interest, or history of getting great outcomes?
And we hope you’ll join us for the FREE live training (or you can watch the replay if you miss it): Client-Centered Marketing Messages: How to Write an Ethical Marketing Message to Fill Your Practice. We are going to be diving into not just the ethical mistakes but an ethical framework you can use. We’ll include your very own workbook and template to use to ethically create a marketing message that can attract people you can deeply help- and that is what it is all about!
References:
California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists. (2019). Code of Ethics. Retrieved from https://www.camft.org/Membership/About-Us/Code-of-Ethics##responsibility-to-clients
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