12 Practice Building Tips

The Essential Keys to Building a Full Practice as a

Coach, Counselor or Healer
Brian Whetten, Ph.D., M.A.

Here are 12 simple, powerful tips for how to build your practice as a coach, counselor, healer, or
other type of heart-centered service professional. These are some of the essential keys to success
I wish every purpose driven service professional knew, so that hopefully your path to a full,
abundant practice can be a lot faster and easier than mine was.

1. If you feel scared, it means you’re probably going the

right way.
We tend to assume that if we’re “meant” to be doing the work we’re called
to, we shouldn’t feel scared or have doubts about the value we offer. This
isn’t true. Being a purpose driven practice builder automatically brings
forward our fears, insecurities, doubts and self-judgments. It’s supposed
to.
The best way to know when you’re on course is when the voice of intuition
says “Yes,” the voice of reason agrees, and the voice of fear says “Hell
No!” When you experience this type of Yes Yes Hell No – keep going!
You’re on your path of growth and authentic leadership.
The question isn’t whether or not you feel afraid, upset, conflicted, or discouraged. The question
is how you deal with it.
(For more on this, please feel free to explore the book Yes Yes Hell No! The Little Book for
Making Big Decisions at www.yesyeshellno.com)

2. It’s easier to be successful, at least at first, with individual clients rather

than with groups.
We tend to assume that it’s easier to make money selling lower priced services, than higher
priced ones. So practice builders often try to skip past the stage of serving regular, repeat,
individual clients, and jump right to trying to make money with classes, seminars and
information products.
However, it’s much more difficult to be successful, at least at first, selling lower priced services.
We call this the fundamental pricing mistake and it shows up with almost every practice builder
we’ve worked with.

© 2015 Brian Whetten, Ph.D., M.A. www.sellingbygiving.com

3. How much you make per client is much more important than how much
you make per hour.
We tend to assume that the most important thing to focus on is how much we charge per hour. It
isn’t, because if you work 20 hours for every 1 hour of paid work, then even if you’re charging
$100 an hour (your nominal hourly rate) you’re really only making $5 an hour (your real hourly
rate).
It tends to take about as much time to enroll someone for a single hour session (or a group class,
or a weekend seminar) as it does to enroll them for a series of regular sessions. Put another way,
it typically takes 5-10 hours of work to bring in each new client. Would you rather invest that 5-
10 hours signing up someone for $100 in services, or $3000 in services? The latter is actually a
much easier way to make money and provide exceptional value, once you learn how.

4. Find a recipe for success you can adopt, adapt, and then make your
own.
While we often invest years of time into our training, along with tens of thousands of dollars,
when it comes to learning how to build our business, we tend to choose to learn by a painful
process of trial and error instead. Or we’ll reach out and ask our friends what they think we
should do, even though they may be struggling too.
If you want to be successful, find a proven recipe for success. Find someone who is doing the
type of work you want to be doing, and is being financially successful doing so. Then learn what
they did (adopt their recipe) customize it to your particular situation (adapt it) and make it your
own.

5. Commitment creates value.

We tend to feel that our services are
something we give to our clients, and our Exceptional Value
fees are something we take from them. Expertise Presence Client Commitment
Similarly, we tend to assume that our
10%
value comes from our expertise – from
what we do – when in reality this is only
10% of what creates exceptional value. 30%
60%
30% of exceptional value comes from
your presence – from who you are, and
from the level to which you’ve done your
own inner work. And 60% of exceptional value doesn’t come from you at all. It comes from
your client’s level of commitment. This is why we say that commitment creates value.
And in our culture, few things commit us like money. Are your clients really willing to invest in
the things they say they most want? And how can you support them in this process? This is the
essence of heart-centered enrollment (what we call Value Based Enrollment).
6. Enrollment is about creating stair steps of trust and commitment.
We tend to think that selling is about trying to convince
people of our value. This is natural, because so much
of the way sales in normally done (i.e. selling by
taking) is based on interruption and manipulation. But
when you’re committed to providing exceptional value
to each client you’re working with, then enrollment is
really about determining fit. And the easiest way to do
this is through a series of stair steps of trust and
commitment.
Enrollment is a lot like dating. Now, for most people, enrollment is either like proposing on the
first date (I’ve got to convince them to buy something!) or else going on first dates over and over
again, and never asking for commitment at all (let me give and give and give and give some
more…) Instead, give a taste of value, see if it resonates, and then invite your potential clients to
step up to the next level of commitment. Do this a few times, and you’ll either have a great, new
paying client, or you’ll have agreed that it isn’t a fit.

7. The more conscious you are, and the more committed you are to being
of service, the more you will naturally tend to procrastinate when it
comes to selling your services.
This is the core challenge of purpose
driven practice building. It’s the white
elephant in the room. It’s what stops
most people without them ever realizing
why. The more conscious you are, and
the more committed you are to being of
service, the greater the gap there will be
between how you feel when you’re
providing your services, and how you
feel when you think about selling them.
The easiest way to deal with this conflict is to put it off – to procrastinate, and plan to do it the
next day, and then the next, and then the next…
The other alternative is to learn a new, different, more loving way of doing business. One that’s
based on growth, giving connection – the three aspects of mature love. Traditional business
tactics don’t work well for practice builders – both practically, and energetically. Instead, the
three keys of conscious business provide the foundation for how to do business from a place of
love, so that selling your services can feel just as good as providing them.

© 2015 Brian Whetten, Ph.D., M.A. www.sellingbygiving.com

8. The problem usually isn’t what you think it is.
One of the biggest challenges of being a purpose driven practice builder is that what often seems
like common sense – isn’t. For example, the most common response to not having enough
clients is to look for how you need to improve your offerings. We assume that if people aren’t
beating a path to our door, then the problem must be that we need another degree, certification,
training, etc.
When in reality, this is usually the last thing we need to focus on, because the problem usually
isn’t in the services we’re offering. It’s in how we’re selling those services. But facing that truth
is scary, so we tend to focus on working harder at the things we’re comfortable doing – instead
of finding the few things we’re uncomfortable doing, which would make all the difference, and
learning how to master those and bring them into our comfort zone.

9. Neither is the solution.

In the last tip, we pointed out that the problem usually isn’t what you think it is. And neither is
the solution.
Traditional marketing is based on selling commoditized products to mass markets. It’s what big
companies use to get lots of people buying the same thing (which makes it really important to
compete on price – something that doesn’t work well, and usually isn’t necessary for us.) Given
that this is what we’re exposed to, day after day, from the moment we’re born, it’s natural to
assume that this is what we “should” do to build our practices.
But we don’t sell bananas. We sell heart surgery. Imagine. You receive a glossy postcard in the
mail, from your local cardiac surgeon, promising “Buy One Heart Value Replacement Surgery,
Get The Second One Free FREE FREE!” Yikes!
What you offer is a treasured service that’s based on intimacy, not commoditization. And that
makes it much, much easier to fill your practice, once you know how.

10. It’s not about you.

The idea of “providing exceptional value” often brings up our fears and insecurities. It causes us
to wonder, “Who am I to offer exceptional value?” and “What if I’m not good enough to do this
work?”
This can sound humble. It’s not. It’s our ego, trying to make everything about itself again.
Whether or not you provide exceptional value has very little to do with you. Yes, it’s important
to invest in developing your level of experience and skill. AND, when it comes to enrolling
people into your practice, the question of exceptional value is almost entirely a question of the
relationship between you. It’s a question of fit, not worth. True service is about getting outside
of ourselves, and focusing on others.
Put another way, exceptional value is in the eye of the receiver. And the only way to really know
if it’s being provided is to ask.

11. Yes lives in the land of no.

It’s interesting how many of these tips deal with reframing some widely shared – and wildly
inaccurate – assumptions. Here’s another. We naturally tend to assume that yes is good and no
is bad. Yes means pleasing people, and it means we’re liked and worthy. No means rejection,
pain, and unworthiness.
Or so our fears would like us to believe.
In reality, no is just as loving as yes, because while one half of love is about acceptance, the
other half is about loving boundaries – which are all about saying and hearing the word no.
For much of my life, I felt that every date I went on was a referendum on my self-worth. I
assumed that no meant rejection (of me or of the woman I was dating – both of which felt awful)
and yes meant worthiness and love. Thankfully, somewhere along the way I stated getting how
dating is really about fit. And it’s about moving through the “no’s” as quickly as possible so I
can find the “yes” – who’s now my wife – that I really wanted to be with.
The same is true with getting new clients. We can sit back and wait for them to call. Or we can
get into the circle of conversation, make connections, explore whether or not there’s a fit, and
embrace the no’s as being just as valuable as the yes’s.

12. Invest in support.

In the face of challenges, our natural reaction is either to give up, or to “bunker down” and try
even harder to push through things on our own. This is particularly true when it comes to
practice building.
I had the opportunity to give a short speech to some students at my old high school, as part of my
20th year reunion. I started things off by asking the adults to raise their hands if – back in high
school – they resonated with the following statements. First, “I’m not good enough.” This
created nervous laughter, and almost everyone raised their hand. Second, “Everyone else is so
much [smarter, better looking, popular, etc.] than I am.” Again, nervous laughter, and most
people raised their hands. Third – and this was the kicker – “I’m the only one who feels this
way.” Nervous laughter, and lots of raised hands.
The problem in practice building isn’t that we have challenges. We’re supposed to – as far as I
can tell, it’s a core part of the spiritual dynamics of life, particularly for any calling where we’re
helping others grow and develop. The problem is that we’ve somehow come up with the idea
that we shouldn’t be having these challenges, or that if we have them, we have to figure them all
out on our own.

© 2015 Brian Whetten, Ph.D., M.A. www.sellingbygiving.com

Every single practice builder I’ve worked with – every one – has had the same types of
challenges and fears. They’re natural. They’re shared. And the best way to work with them –
by far – is to reach out for support. In a typical month, I’ll often go see between 6-8 coaches,
counselors and healers, in order to get support with my learning edges. It took me years to be
able to do so, and to realize that asking for help is a sign of strength, not weakness.
Does this resonate? If so, we’d love to explore whether or not the Practice Building
Breakthrough two day retreat could help support you, the same way you’re committed to
supporting others.
(For more on this, please visit www.practicebuildingbreakthrough.com)

Love and light,

P.S. And here’s a bonus tip – lucky number 13.

13. Stop telling people what you do.

When someone asks you, “so what do you do?” they’re not really asking that question. They’re
either seeking to get to know you and make polite conversation, or else they’re really asking a
different question. “How can I know who to refer to you?”
And the truth is, people don’t care about what you do, they care about the needs you can help
serve. Instead of saying “I’m a neo-Jungian analyst with training in EFT, EMDR, and XYZ,” tell
them “I specialize in serving young women who have eating disorders, and I help them develop
authentic self-confidence so they can take back control of their lives.”
The more you narrow your focus, the more value you’re able to provide people – and the more
clearly you’re able to communicate it, so you remain top of mind for people. In contrast, I had
someone the other day try to sell me on a set of CDs he’d created that were the answer to
everything – money issues, spiritual issues, relationship issues, sexual issues, career issues,
confidence issues – you name it, and this was the answer. The problem with this is that by doing
so, he’d positioned himself as competing with every single teacher and tool I’ve spent the last 10
years studying. That’s a hard sell. Where if he’d offered me a specific tool for use with a
specific need, I’d have been much more inclined to refer someone in that space to his products.
Co-creative positioning is the art and science of finding your niche in a way that resonates both
with your calling and with your clients. It starts by asking four core questions.
Why do you serve?
What need do you serve?
Who do you serve?
How do you provide exceptional value?
 About the Author

By the age of 30, Brian had earned a Berkeley Ph.D. in computer science, raised $20 million for
two Silicon Valley startups, become an internationally known academic and speaker, been part
of a $400 million IPO, repeatedly made and lost millions – and burned out twice. After an
emotional crisis, he left his career for six years of full time personal growth work, including a
M.A. in Spiritual Psychology from the University of Santa Monica.

Today, Brian serves as an executive coach, leadership consultant, and keynote speaker. He helps
leaders turn soft skills into hard results, and supports them in developing companies that both
make money and make a difference. He is the President of Core Coaching, the founder of
Selling By Giving, and the author of Yes Yes Hell No! The Little Book for Making Big Decisions.
He is considered one of the foremost experts in the fields of conscious business and authentic
leadership.

That said, what really excites Brian is his family. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife Nicole,
where they spend much of their time wondering how their two daughters can be so cute.

For More Information

Please feel free to visit www.sellingbygiving.com or www.practicebuildingbreakthrough.com to
learn more about how to build your practice in a new, different, more loving way.

© 2015 Brian Whetten, Ph.D., M.A. www.sellingbygiving.com