This 10-Minute Exercise Will Change the Way You Market (Episode 13)
If you’ve been feeling stuck, spinning your wheels, or disconnected from the heart of your marketing, this episode is an invitation to pause. In a break from the usual training or step-by-step strategy, today I’m guiding you through a powerful visualization to help you reconnect with the real person behind your Psychology Today profile, your website, and every post you create.
So often, therapists focus on checklists, templates, and what they “should” say. But the most effective, aligned marketing begins with presence—with truly seeing and feeling connected to the person you are here to help. This visualization helps you sit with a past client who lit you up, the one who reminded you why you do this work.
You don’t need to overthink your marketing. You just need to remember that client and speak directly to them. This is a tool you can return to anytime you’re feeling unclear or disconnected in your marketing. It will help you write from a place of real connection, not performance.
Here’s what you’ll learn in this episode:
1️⃣ How to ground your marketing in real, meaningful client connections—not formulas or checklists.
2️⃣ A simple visualization you can revisit to tap into clarity and confidence when writing your copy.
3️⃣ The reframe that marketing isn’t separate from your clinical work—it’s an extension of it.
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Hey there. Welcome to episode 13 of Marketing Therapy. Today's episode is gonna be a little bit different. Today's episode isn't a training or a checklist, or a how to tutorial. This episode is an invitation to slow down to reconnect. And to sit for just a few minutes with the person that you're marketing is really for, because behind every Psychology Today profile, every website, every social post, every networking conversation, there's a real person you're trying to reach, someone who's struggling, someone who's searching.
Hoping they land on the right therapist page and no worksheet or webinar or fill in the blank template can connect you to that person the way presence can. So today we're gonna try something different. We're gonna visualize a client you've already worked with, so I want you to call to mind now, someone who you've worked with in the past who has absolutely lit you up.
The kind of person who, if you could, you'd clone them and you'd just have you caseload full of that type of person. Someone who reminded you why you do this work. Who helped you feel like the clinician you want to be. More often
in this episode, you don't necessarily need to do anything, although I do encourage you to likely come back and re-listen to it and maybe journal along with it. But at least for this first time, just listen. Let the words guide you back into the room with that person. Back into that relationship that lit you up and that likely led to some really incredible breakthroughs for that client across from you.
My hope is that this exercise can guide you back into the kind of clarity that you do have inside of you about who you're speaking to and how you're doing that.
Let's begin. For the purpose of this visualization, we will imagine you're going to see this client in person. Imagine your office, your desk, what's on the walls, the setup of the room. This is where you do your best work. Now you walk out to the waiting room, the air's quiet.
You hear the door unlatch and you see them there sitting on the couch waiting for you. Your client, the one who makes you excited to do this work, who makes you feel like you are doing exactly what you are meant to be doing with your life? You greet them with a smile. You invite them back to your office. Maybe there's a small exchange about the weather. It's familiar. It's comfortable.
Your client follows you down the hallway. You open the door and they settle into their usual spot. Maybe on the couch. Perhaps they pick up the throw pillow next to them and put it on their lap. You take your seat. You feel yourself settled down into that chair where you spend so many hours, the one that supports you just right.
You feel yourself. Come into the room. Take a moment right here. Notice the feel, the lighting, the temperature, the weight of this session beginning. This is your space. This is the person you do great work with. You know how to show up for them. They trust you and you. You trust yourself here.
Let that feeling settle into your body for a moment.
This is the version of you that does your best work. And this person across from you is who you're marketing is ultimately speaking to. Now, let's get curious. Let's start asking some questions.
Turn your attention fully toward this client who sitting across from you, notice their body language, how they hold themselves today. The expression on their face. And now ask yourself what brings them here right now?
Not just the surface level reason that led them to therapy, but what's underneath that?
What is this person struggling with? Even if they haven't quite found the words yet, what's keeping them up at night?
What do they think about while driving, while sitting on the couch, scrolling at the end of the day while lying in bed at 2:00 AM?
What's eating at them? In the quiet times,
what words do they use to describe that experience to you?
What are they maybe afraid to say out loud
now, I want you to shift gears into asking questions about. The incredible journey and outcome you can help your clients experience in this work
sitting across from this client of yours, what are they hoping therapy will make possible,
even if they're not sure it's realistic? Even if they don't know quite how to say it, what do they hope changes?
What do they want to feel as they leave today's session?
What do they want to feel next week?
What about six months from now or a year from now, as they reflect on this work, what do they want to feel? Then?
What do they hope to notice in themselves?
What do they hope to notice in their relationships, in their work? In the way they move about the world,
what do they wanna see? Change
Next, ask yourself, what does this client need from you in particular? What is it about your presence? Your way of working and joining with them, that helps them feel safe, seen, understood, capable, hopeful.
What does this client need from you here?
Now, imagine this, this client sitting across from you is at home searching for a therapist, realizing they need some support. They don't know your name yet. They're simply scrolling through a list, reading websites, looking for someone who gets it.
What would you want them to hear in the first few seconds of reading your profile or your website? To know they found the right person
to know? This person understands the pain, the distress, or discomfort they're in. The truth of what they want out of this, the truth of what's possible,
what words come up,
even if they're messy or they don't feel professional yet those words. They are what matter. Those are what resonate with this person across from you.
Sit with that for a moment. What do you want this client to hear? To know they're in the right place.
All right. Open your eyes now. If maybe they drifted closed. Let yourself come back into the room, whatever it is that you're doing, as you're listening here today, back into this moment, take a breath. As you do that, notice what stayed with you. Maybe you saw that client's face very, very clearly. You knew exactly who you were sitting with.
Maybe a sentence they once said to you either about what they were struggling with or about their work with you echoed back in your mind. Maybe you just remembered what it felt like to be fully in it. That incredible sense of knowing you can help someone. Whatever came up for you in this visualization, I want you to hold onto that because this is the part many therapists skip right on past.
It's so easy when you start working on your marketing to go straight to the structure. What should I write? What do I include? What's the best way to do this, that, or the other thing? And those questions make sense. Absolutely. But they miss something foundational to this work that you do in particular.
And that is the relationship, the real human being on the other side of the screen, the connection that makes everything click into place. That's the beauty. Of marketing when done well that you begin to cultivate that connection and that relationship before you even have an opportunity to actually sit in the room with that person.
The most effective marketing, the kind that actually attracts the right clients, and the kind that feels really aligned and authentic and clear. It doesn't start with copywriting formulas or checklists
or magic bullets. It starts here with getting to know the person that you're actually trying to reach
with somehow or another sitting across from a client you care deeply about. And letting that experience remind you that you already know how to do this.
You already know how to form connection. You already know what your ideal client is deeply struggling with, and even more deeply desires.
I think this is one of the biggest reasons therapists struggle to write about their work and to market themselves, because they try to describe it from the outside in. They're really trying to pitch their niche or the work that they do from a bird's eye view instead of really just starting at ground level.
Instead of starting with one real person, one real moment, one real conversation.
So if you've really been wrestling with where to begin with your marketing or staring at a blank page wondering what to say, this. Visualization is not just an exercise. It can be a tool, something you can come back to as you decide who you're speaking to in your marketing
picture that client sitting across from you. Let what you write come from there. It's not always gonna feel polished right away. There's room and time for that. It's not gonna be perfect. But it will be real. It will be informed by genuine relationship, and that is what clients connect to. This isn't about cleverness or credentials or clinical jargon, but about connection.
So the next time you're sitting down to work on something related to your marketing, maybe you're writing your homepage or updating your Psychology Today profile, or thinking about how to connect with someone via email. Ask yourself, am I speaking to someone or am I speaking about something? Am I speaking to someone or am I speaking about something?
Because you're a marketing good. Effective marketing isn't about just checking boxes. It is about reaching the person that you are here to help. And the more grounded you are in that connection, the easier those words will come. Okay. You do not have to pull your marketing out of thin air. You don't have to perform or prove yourself.
You just have to reconnect. Reconnect with the clients who already trust you. Reconnect to the moments where you know your work clicks. Reconnect to what leads to those incredible client outcomes and light bulb moments in session. Reconnect to the part of you who already knows what to say because you've said it before in session when it mattered most.
There's a powerful reframe here that marketing isn't separate from the work that you do. It is simply an extension of it. The more rooted you can be in that, the more confidence will come and the more your words will resonate with the right people.
Like I said, this episode was a little bit different, but I hope for some of you that it was helpful that you're left with.
Some insights into that human that's actually on the other side of your marketing that is looking for someone just like you. I hope it gave you maybe a moment of clarity or just of calm of the opportunity to reconnect with those moments when you have shown up as the incredible, talented and capable clinician that you are.
And if you want to come back to this exercise again, do it. Save this, revisit it. Maybe like I said, come back and journal through this exercise and the questions that I posed.
Clarity will not come from just thinking harder about your marketing or following one more checklist or to-do list. It will come from action. It will come from connection, and you, my friend, already know how to do that. Thanks for being here. I'll see you in the next episode.
Resources & Links Mentioned:
The Walker Strategy Co website: walkerstrategyco.com
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About Marketing Therapy
Marketing Therapy is the podcast where therapists learn how to market their private practices without burnout, self-doubt, or sleazy tactics. Hosted by Anna Walker—marketing coach, strategist, and founder of Walker Strategy Co—each episode brings you clear, grounded advice to help you attract the right-fit, full-fee clients and grow a practice you feel proud of.
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