20 things to boost your practice
- Review and update your business plan for 2020.
- Get your website up and running if you haven’t already…If it is up start learning about Search Engine Optimization and how to get your website to be on the top of the first page of Google.
- Get your Google Business listed updated and post once or twice a week there. www.google.com/business.
- Work on boosting your website SEO by writing articles regularly. Google is in the business of showing the websites that best meet the searchers needs. They want websites that show that YOU are the expert in Your area. That is done by writing articles. Start with a goal for 20 for this year and keep going when you get to 20. Here is a list of ideas for topics.
- Learn how to rebook clients.
- Learn how to get referrals from current clients
- Learn how to get referrals from doctors or other medical professionals
- Learn more about setting boundaries and build your confidence in setting and enforcing them.
- Refine or create your Policies and Procedures.
- Set your boundaries around work hours, break times and days off.
- Find a local Facebook group to keep up to date with what is going on in your area. If you can’t find one, start one.
- Learn about supervision groups and how to start one in your area.
- Keep learning anatomy and physiology.
- Raise Your Rates
- Start a nonprofit organization in you area to provide massage therapy for low income people.
- Teach couples massage classes in your area or teach parents how to massage their children/family members.
- Learn how to use social media to get new clients in the door. Here is how to use Facebook.
- Run a groupon.
- Learn about billing insurance to boost your practice. In most states you can bill for car accidents and work related injuries. Many health insurance plans are covering massage in some states and more will be.
- Learn about how to get massage therapy covered by health insurance in your state and what others are doing.
20 Things YOU Can Do for the Profession
- Volunteer for your local chapter of AMTA.
- Start a new State Massage Organization if you already tried AMTA.
- Start or join a local network in your area and get together monthly for low cost CE classes, networking and support.
- Start a Political Action Committee in Your state.
- Become a massage school teacher.
- Open a massage school.
- Start a website that takes each research study we have and analyzes it and also gives suggestions on how to use that research. Provider resources, handouts or articles on each condition that massage therapy can help to give to clients and doctors.
- Work to get massage therapy covered by health insurance in your state. AMTA Fact Sheet
“Massage therapists and consumers favor integration of massage into health care.
Fifty-nine percent of consumers would like to see their insurance cover massage therapy.
The vast majority of massage therapists (95 percent) believe massage therapy should be considered part of the health care field.6“ - Start a hospital based massage program in your area.
- Learn about how to get massage therapy covered by health insurance in your state and what others are doing.
- Write articles for your local magazines and newspapers on how massage can help various health conditions.
- Write articles for your local magazines and newspapers on how illegal massage businesses need to be shut down and are not to be connected with legitimate massage businesses.
- Attend your state board of massage meetings.
- Apply to be on your state board of massage.
- Get involved with one of the other organizations and volunteer or apply for a job. NCBTMB, FSTMB, AFMTE, Massage Therapy Foundation.
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20 Things the Profession needs to do
- Figure out what we need to do to help attract new massage therapists into the profession. The number of people going to massage school has been decreasing significantly over the last 10 years, while the demand is constantly growing.
- Define Massage therapy and Therapeutic Massage and Wellness Massage therapy.
- Define Medical/Clinical Massage and make a statement about what it is.
- Figure out the CE Conundrum. Should the NCBTMB continue with approving providers or should it move to the Federation of Massage State Board since they are creating a CE database tracker.
- Create ONE National CE class that everyone has to take that provides the latest research and information so that everyone in the profession is on the same page as far as knowing how massage works and that things like toxins are myths and it is OK to massage a pregnant woman in any stage.
- Update the Entry Level Analysis Project (www.elapmassage.org) and work to get all massage schools across the US using this as a basic curriculum for their massage school.
- Create a true board certification in Medical/Clinical Massage or some sort of advanced board certification. (Really we need one for rehab work, hospital based work, sports massage, spa therapies and wellness massage therapy.)
- Step up and start working to explain illegal massage businesses and separate them from legitimate massage therapy.
- Create higher paying jobs and jobs where the therapist is paid fairly for each hour of work no matter if they have a client or not.
- Create a clear outline of independent contractors vs employees and have an attorney in each state that can be consulted so businesses can be set up correctly.
- Have advocates at the table for the massage profession in the world of health insurance in each state. If we are not at the table we are on the menu.
- Create a National Political Action Committee.
- Help get the massage profession to the table with insurance carriers in each state and nationally. If we are not at the table, we are on the menu.
- Teach people how to bill insurance and have a team of experts available to help. This would have to be done in each state and nationally.
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