Client Stories: Targeting Upscale Clients
A Single Mother's Challenges
A few years ago, a well-respected mental health counselor gave up her full-time job with the county to start her own mental health practice. This was a true leap of faith for an immigrant single mother of 3 school age children. Armed with over 15 years of counseling experience as a Licensed Clinical Social Worker, her new practice focused on helping immigrant and minority children, adults and families overcome their mental health issues. Her dream was to build a successful bilingual mental health practice to help disadvantaged groups in her community and provide financial freedom and security for her 3 children.
The Problem
Her professional experience and reputation allowed her to quickly acquire several contracts to provide bilingual counselors for local, state, and federal agencies. To accommodate the increase in counseling clients, she added more licensed bilingual licensed mental health counselors. Initially the hourly contract rates were adequate to pay her counselors, cover practice expenses and make a very modest profit. All was going well until the agencies experienced budget cuts following the pandemic. And one-by-one agency representatives asked her to cut her hourly counseling rate. In some cases, they asked for up to 25% reduction in her hourly counseling rate. If she did lower her rates to that level, it would have a devastating impact on her ability to operate her practice and provide quality counseling. If she was forced to accept a 25% rate reduction, she would lose all her top-quality bilingual counselors and that would lower the quality of the counseling provided. She was faced with the enormous decision... should she cut her rate or take her mental health practice in another direction? She struggled to find the right answer.
The Guide
To solve this problem, she turns to an associate at Rutger University’s Entrepreneurship Pioneers Initiative (EPI) program for advice. This program is a comprehensive program designed to support first-generation entrepreneurs successfully navigate the competitive world of business ownership. Her Rutger’s associate referred her to me because I teach a Sales Training workshop for business owners enrolled in Rutger’s EPI program.
The Plan
The first step in our plan to solve her problem was to conduct a SWOT (Strength, Weakness, Opportunity, Threat) analysis of her mental health counseling business and determine the best growth strategies going forward. We agreed to meet one-on-one once a week to discuss new challenges, plan additional strategies and evaluate her progress. My commitment to her was to provide training, coaching and guidance to help her achieve her goals... to build a bilingual mental health practice to help disadvantaged groups in her community and provide financial freedom and security for her 3 children.
An Update
After several months of planning, problem solving and soul-searching, she is now focusing on a unique niche: upscale executives who are eager to enhance their leadership capabilities. She is currently developing her sales tools and process to approach this new client. and is well on her way to achieving her personal and business goals.
Client Stories: Living the Dream
Pop-Up Plants
My connection with "The Plant Lady" started with a 4-week free coaching session. She had a full-time job but sold plants on the side to supplement her income. Her dream was to one day turn her plant business into a profitable retail business. But the cost of retail space in her market and her lack of working capital made that dream a nightmare!
Although she had a small temporary retail store, her most lucrative sales occurred during “Pop-Up” plant sales at weekend events, festivals, and residential housing complexes. Much to her surprise, she realized the potential of the “Pop Up” plant sales, but she was somewhat reluctant to pursue it full time.
During our weekly coaching sessions, I helped her define her business and financial goals, create an implementation plan, build a customer sales funnel, develop an operating budget, make a “Pop Up" Inventory list, and then develop a strategy for marketing her “Pop Up” plant business.
At the end of our business coaching sessions, she had a thriving “Pop-Up" Plant Business with numerous profitable events scheduled each week. She is well on her way to her dream of one day owning a profitable retail plant business.