How to Borrow Trust and Book More Clients (Episode 27)
We’re living in a “trust recession.” Skepticism is at an all-time high—not just when it comes to buying shoes online or clicking on an Instagram ad, but also when choosing a therapist. And that deeply affects how potential clients approach finding support.
In this episode, I unpack why trust is so low across the board and what that means for your private practice. I’ll show you how to bridge the gap between being visible and actually being trusted, so you can attract the right-fit clients—even in a more cautious, discerning market.
We’ll talk about what’s not working anymore (like vague elevator pitches or hoping a listing on Psychology Today is enough), and explore how to strategically cultivate trust through something called "trust transfer." Spoiler: you're probably already doing this—you just need to do it with more intention.
Here’s what you’ll learn in this episode:
1️⃣ Why being visible isn’t enough anymore—and how to become the therapist who actually earns trust
2️⃣ How “trust transfer” works (and why it’s the most powerful tool you’re not fully using yet)
3️⃣ Concrete, doable steps to build your referral network without feeling salesy or awkward
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Hey there. Welcome back to Marketing Therapy. Today I want to talk about something. I've been noticing everywhere, and I see a lot of people talking about, particularly in the online space, but I think is truly expanding to just about every place we make decisions about our money. So not just online business, not just online therapy, but all of the in-person things we do too.
And it's called the trust recession. Here's what this term means. It means that as consumers. Every single one of us are more skeptical than we have ever been when it comes to making decisions about our money. Now, there are a couple reasons for this trust recession. Sometimes it's because we've actually been burned.
We bought a program that didn't live up to its promises. Are we paid for a service that didn't actually solve the problem? It said it would. We invested in something. And the goal we were hoping for just wasn't fulfilled for whatever reason, but other times it's not about one bad experience. And this is why this is truly a universal experience right now, because it's just the world we live in.
We are all skeptical about everything, right? We double check every review. We hesitate before we pull out our credit cards for that online purchase. We question if what we're seeing online is real or ai, and that level of skepticism doesn't just show up when we are shopping for shoes or being served an Instagram ad for this thing that they know you'll like or signing up for a course.
It really flows into how we make all of our money decisions, including whether or not to reach out to a therapist. So this trust recession, it matters very, very much to you, the private practice owner. Now, therapy is different than most purchases, right? That's safe to say because therapy doesn't work without trust.
So it makes sense then that in a trust recession, we need to be particularly mindful. Therapy isn't effective unless the relationship itself actually feels real. And your clients, they can't experience change unless they believe the process is going to help them. If they believe the person sitting across from them either on a couch or a screen, is worth actually opening up to.
And that's why I think this conversation matters so much for therapists in particular, because for a long time, the mindset around marketing for therapists was, if I just hang a shingle, I get the PLLC. I check the marketing box, the clients will come, and that may have worked in the past, but for lots of reasons, and we've tackled some of those here on marketing therapy.
But in this episode, particularly as it relates to the trust recession, that's not how it works anymore. Trust is at an all time low. Your client's trust is at an all time low, not just in therapy, but across the board just universally. That means that therapists are being forced to prioritize, cultivating trust in ways maybe they didn't have to before.
Now. The good news, of course, is that success is still very much possible. I see therapists filling their caseloads every single day. It's just that the path there looks different than it did even just a few years ago.
Here's the thing that's really important to understand here before we get into the trust recession and what you can do to fill it, I need you to understand that being visible.
Is not the same as being trusted. You may have heard before of the concept called the know, like, and trust factor. This is a universal term used across all industries, meaning that we don't make decisions about our money unless we first know someone, and then we like them and then we ultimately trust them.
It's only when we've checked all three boxes know, like, and trust that we decide to proceed. Now therapists are very, very good at trust building. You do that for a living, my friend. That's the work you do every single day in the therapy room. You sit with people, you build rapport, you create safety. You help people feel understood.
Now, on this podcast, we talk a lot about visibility, and the reason is because so often it's something that therapists forget. They forget that piece. Because you can't be trusted if you're not first known. And sometimes therapists forget that their ongoing marketing lifestyle and marketing routine has to include that visibility piece because of course, if nobody knows you exist, nobody can reach out to you.
But here's what's different in this trust recession today, it is not enough to just be known. Trust has to begin before the therapeutic relationship ever does. Your marketing itself has to begin the work of cultivating trust, and that's a really big shift because in the past it may have been enough to just check the marketing box, list yourself on site today, throw together a website, tell a few friends.
You're taking clients. But today, your potential clients are weighing their options differently. In fact, in our state of the industry survey at the end of 2024, we heard for the second year in a row that many clinicians are noticing their clients doing more, quote unquote, shopping around engaging in more consults, taking longer to make decisions that reinforces this idea that they are weighing their options in ways they didn't used to.
Your clients are more cautious and more skeptical. They're not just asking, is there a therapist out there? I can see who has availability? They're asking, do I believe this person can actually help me?
You might be familiar. In Nashville, we have a lot of those injury lawyer ads. Commercials, billboards. They even sponsor like NASCAR cars and things like that. Imagine a therapist who's everywhere in their community, their face is on a billboard. Maybe they're on, you know, serving up Instagram ads.
Maybe they have a commercial. That'd be funny to think about. They go to every networking event they can find. They're very visible. But if all they say is, I'm a therapist, call me for a free consult. Like people might see them over and over again and still not feel any real connection. Now, that's kind of a goofy example, but that's what I mean by being visible is not the same as being trusted.
Or this might hit a little closer to home. Think about a therapist who's really great at building relationships, who enjoys that piece. They're showing up, they meet people, they put in the work, but when someone asks what they do, their answer is kind of vague. I work with individuals and couples on a variety of issues.
That's not enough for trust either because people don't trust, quote unquote therapist, they trust this is the person who helps new moms through postpartum depression, or this is the therapist who brings couples back from the brink of divorce. I know you can see the difference there, right? So visibility by itself is not going to cut it in this climate.
Because your clients are too skeptical to reach out simply because you exist. Imagine that visibility is the door, but trust is what's getting people to actually walk through it and engage with you. So in a trust recession, you really have to be thinking about both. Now, when we think about bridging that gap, if visibility isn't enough, what do we do here?
One of the most powerful ways is through something I call a trust transfer. Here's what that means. Person A, trusts person B. When person B recommends person C, some of that trust automatically carries over and suddenly person A feels more comfortable trusting person C, not because of anything person C did, yet.
But simply because of the relationship they already have with person B. Okay, so A trust B and B recommends C. And all of a sudden, even though A doesn't know C, A trusts C. Isn't that wild? That is trust transfer. Now, let me be really clear. This is not manipulative. This is not exploitative. It is incredibly natural.
It's how we have always made decisions as humans.
If you think about your own life, you probably rely on trust transfers all the time. You try a new restaurant because your friend swears by it, or you hire a contractor for your bathroom project because your neighbor says he was amazing. You're gonna love him. You watch a show because your sister said it was her favorite.
All of those are trust transfers and therapy is no different. Imagine this scenario. You are in the thick of postpartum. You are in that foggy first 12 weeks struggling with postpartum depression, and your best friend tells you you need to call Bethany. She was incredible and exactly what I needed at that time in my life.
Your level of trust in Bethany. Is going to be totally different than if you stumbled across her profile on site today because you already trust your friend and now that trust has been extended to Bethany. That's why trust transfer is so powerful in a skeptical marketplace like the one we're in right now.
When you're marketing to a cold audience, people who have never heard of you before. Your marketing has to do a ton of heavy lifting, and it's capable of that. There are absolutely going to be people that have never heard of you before that decide. You're the therapist they're looking for, no doubt. But in that scenario, your marketing has to warm them up.
It has to convince them that you're trustworthy. It has to move them all the way from, I have no idea who you are to. I'm ready to pay your full fee. And that's a long journey, especially right now. When you leverage trust transfer, you're not starting at zero. You're effectively already halfway there. So part of that heavy lifting has already been done by someone else simply through the nature of relationship.
Now, as I mentioned, not all of your marketing is gonna work this way. Of course, there are times people are gonna find you cold Google directories, your website, whatever. But when you have opportunities to borrow trust, it can accelerate the entire process. And in today's climate where clients are more skeptical than ever, anything you can do to build trust earlier and faster is going to serve you well in the long run.
That's the power of trust transfer. It helps you cut through the skepticism and really shorten the gap between stranger and my therapist. Really stepping into a relationship that already feels warmer and safer.
Now, once you start looking for trust transfers, you're gonna start to see them everywhere. The first is professional referrals, and this is probably the one therapists think of first. A pediatrician recommends you to a parent. A school counselor suggests your name to a family. A pastor says, I know someone who can help with that.
And it doesn't even have to be other professionals in the mental health space or what have you. It could be a yoga instructor who says, if you're working through trauma, you should call Liz or a chiropractor who notices anxiety showing up and saying, there's a therapist. I really trust with this. All of these are incredibly powerful because the client already has trust in that professional.
And when their name gets attached to yours, trust transfers over. Here's another category. I call it borrowed authority, and sometimes this one can get overlooked.
Borrowed authority is when you're featured in a space where the audience already has trust.
For example, if you are invited onto a podcast. The listeners already trust the host. So by trusting the host, they automatically extend some of that trust to you. Or if you're quoted in a local article or invited to speak on a panel listed as a resource, maybe for a nonprofit that's borrowed authority because you are stepping into someone else's circle of credibility and carrying some of that trust with you.
None of this requires you to be famous. You don't need national media, although that is an option. You don't need 10,000 Instagram followers if you don't want them or need them. Sometimes it literally is as simple as one trusted professional saying your name.
A final area of trust transfer is colleague endorsements. Now, of course, therapists are not going to be using client testimonials the way that other service providers are able to, but you can share endorsements from other professionals. You know, that could look like a colleague writing a short testimonial on your website, really specific to a niche or area of specialty you have.
It could just be someone from your consultation group who says she's the therapist. I always think of when I have tough couples cases, maybe a recommendation on LinkedIn. All forms of trust transfer because if another therapist says, I vouch for her, that carries a whole lot of weight, right?
Here are a couple real life examples of these things. A school counselor tells a parent, if your daughter is struggling with body image, call Dr. Smith. That parent trusts the counselor, so now they trust Dr. Smith or a family lawyer shares your blog post on LinkedIn with the caption. This is who I send my clients to.
Suddenly everyone in her network that saw that post sees you as credible. Or a local news segment features you talking about back to school stress and parents watching think, well, if the news station trusts her, I probably can too. See how that works. Trust transfer doesn't happen in a single one way. It doesn't take a single form.
It happens across relationships and communities and platforms. And when you start to recognize all the different places it can show up. Hopefully you realize that you already have more opportunities available to you than you think. Now I wanna pause here and talk about something really important because trust transfer is powerful.
It can also backfire. Here's what I mean. Imagine a friend says to you, you've gotta call this therapist. She's amazing. She helps me so much. You're interested, you're curious, you're starting to feel a little hopeful that maybe this could be a good fit. So what do you do next? You look her up. That's what we all do.
You check out a website and what you find there doesn't match what you were told at all. It's generic or maybe outdated, not specialized, unprofessional, whatever. That is a rupture of trust, and in some ways it's even worse. Than if she had found you and never heard your name before, because the stakes are higher with trust transfer.
When someone refers a client to you, they are handing you a gift. They're saying, this person trusts me and I'm extending that trust to you. If your marketing does not rise to the occasion, if it doesn't back up what was said about you, that trust evaporates and that's more than a missed opportunity.
It can be a massive letdown the client was leaning toward yes already, and then the gap between what they expected and what they saw was simply too big. This is why your client conversion engine that we talk about all the time matters so much. Yes, networking and referrals are critical. Yes, trust transfer accelerates the process, but if you don't have something strong on the backend.
A clear and specific and compelling way to capture that trust and carry it forward. You're wasting the energy it took to get referred in the first place. What does that look like in practice? It looks like being specific, not just, I help individuals and couples, but I help high achieving professionals recover from burnout, whatever it is.
We've talked a lot about specificity in recent episodes. It looks like positioning yourself as a specialist. Not the generalist who can work with anyone but the go-to therapist for this kind of problem. It looks like empathy, using language that helps someone feel seen and heard even before they've met you.
Because at the end of the day, trust transfer is really just the beginning. It's your job to confirm it, to build on it. To show in your marketing that you are exactly the therapist this client was hoping you would be. When you do that, you're not only honoring the referral, but you're honoring the client, and that is when trust moves from something borrowed to something real that they have in you.
Now, what can you actually do to strengthen your own trust transfer pipeline? The first thing I'm gonna say is stop making excuses for not networking. I know that's blunt, but I mean it. Besides your website, in this market, networking is the only true non-negotiable in marketing your practice today.
Absolutely. Everything else is optional, and yet it is the strategy I hear the most pushback on from clinicians. I hear I'm an introvert or it makes me uncomfortable, or the therapists I know are also trying to build their practices. They're not gonna send me clients or I tried and it didn't work. If you've been in my world for a while, you've heard me say this, I have yet to meet a fully booked private pay clinician who is not well connected.
' cause here's the thing, not every client is the right fit for every therapist. Maybe your colleague works with kids, but gets inquiries from parents who really need help themselves. Maybe your peer loves working with couples but doesn't wanna see individuals. Maybe they specialize in trauma, they don't wanna take on high conflict divorce cases.
You are not in competition with every therapist around you. In fact, many of them can be some of your strongest referral sources if you build those relationships. If you're looking for a very first step, here it is. Start with people you already know and trust. Building a trust transfer pipeline does not mean having to cold call doctor's offices or drop in on strangers you've never met before.
Okay? It can be as simple as reaching out to colleagues from grad school, reconnecting with someone from a consultation group, letting your own providers know. Your kid's pediatrician, your ob, your chiropractor, your massage therapist that you're taking clients and who you work best with. Those conversations are low pressure and they're natural because you already have trust with those people.
If you want an even gentler entry point, we'll say, here's my suggestion. Start connecting with adjacent niche therapist. The examples I was just giving earlier your colleague who works with kids but gets inquiries from parents or your peer who loves working with couples but doesn't do individual work.
Those are adjacent niche therapists. They're therapists who work with the same client population or run into the same client population, but in a different way. So if you work with men, an adjacent niche would be a couple's therapist. Or if you work with moms, an adjacent niche therapist would be a child or teen specialist.
If you work with trauma, an adjacent niche would be someone focused specifically on substance use or eating disorders. When you connect with adjacent niches, it really reduces that potential sense of competition. That can sometimes arise when you feel like you're just talking to people who do similar work to you.
You're not stepping on each other's toes. And instead, you can create a really natural reciprocal two-way relationship where referrals can flow both directions. Here are a few concrete steps I encourage you to take this week to start putting this concept into action. Make a list of five people in your world who already trust you.
Reach out to just one of them, not as a pitch, but just as a reconnection. They came to mind and you wanna know how they're doing. A quick update on what it is that you're up to. Then consider joining one group or community around you, either geographically or related to your niche or area of specialty where trust already exists.
Again, we're not going into this to get referrals. We're simply going in to connect. This could be an alumni group. This could be a PTA, A professional association, a local Facebook parenting group, whatever it might be, and just start looking for opportunities to develop and cultivate relationship. Because trust obviously isn't gonna happen if relationship isn't established first. Keep your eyes open for relationship. Start talking about the work that you do more and your eyes will be opened to all of these opportunities for trust transfer that you have probably been missing. You do not have to build trust completely from scratch.
This episode was about showing you how you can step into places where trust already lives, and let some of that transfer to you in an incredibly natural, ethical and authentic way.
And you know, I talk about the fact that our clients are more skeptical than they've ever been. And I wanna remind you that skepticism isn't bad. It's healthy. We want clients to be thoughtful about who they trust with their time and money, and deepest struggles.
It doesn't mean that there aren't clients out there who are gonna trust you. It just means you need to help them get there. This is an opportunity, not a limitation. Because in today's market, you know what the cool thing is? You don't have to be the first therapist someone finds, because we know that they're gonna be doing some looking.
It's about being the therapist who stands out as the most trustworthy, the most compelling, the most specific, the most connected. That's how you win right now, and that is an opportunity.
So here's what I want you to remember as we close this episode out. You are already a professional trust builder. You are incredibly gifted at that. It's what therapy is. It's what you do every single day in the room. This is simply an invitation to take that same skill and extend it into your marketing.
To look at every part of your marketing, your conversations, your networking, your website, your presence as an opportunity to cultivate trust before you've even spoken to someone. Because in a trust recession, you're clients are cautious and careful, and they're comparing and they're skeptical, and that is not a bad thing.
Your clients are weighing their options carefully. And they're ultimately looking for someone who feels real. And that's right where you can come in. If you can be the therapist who shows up with clarity and empathy and specificity, if you can be the therapist who makes people feel safe enough to say, I, this therapist might get me, then you will stand out.
It used to be about being the first therapist someone came across. And now it's just about being the therapist who inspires the most trust, and that is something you are already equipped to do. Thanks for being here today. 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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