Is DIY-ing Your Marketing [Accidentally] Holding Your Practice Back? (Episode 73)
In this episode, Anna explores the gap between insight and action—and why so many therapists stay stuck in their marketing even when they already know what isn’t working. Drawing parallels between therapy clients and private practice owners, she invites listeners to consider whether self-sufficiency has quietly become a barrier to growth.
Anna also walks through the many ways support can look in business, from free resources and templates to coaching programs and fully done-for-you services. If you’ve been wondering whether it’s time to stop white-knuckling your marketing and start getting support, this episode offers a grounded, compassionate perspective on what asking for help can actually make possible.
Here’s what you’ll learn in this episode:
1️⃣ Why insight alone often isn’t enough to create meaningful change in your marketing
2️⃣ The difference between learning a skill yourself and recognizing when it’s time to outsource
3️⃣ How self-trust—not just strategy—impacts your willingness to ask for help
4️⃣ What therapists can learn from their own clients about support, growth, and sustainable change
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Hey there. Welcome back to Marketing Therapy, episode seventy-three. . today's episode is inspired by many of the conversations I get to have with our Done for You clients. Now, when we work with someone on their website, particularly when writing their copy. We take a lot of time to get to know you and to get to know your client and to understand who we're really speaking to when we're putting this website together, because you are the right therapist for some clients and not right for others.
And it's really critical if we're going to create a website for you that does you justice, that we know who that person is. And so this episode was inspired by some themes that I often see in those client. So the clients of the therapists that we work with, that is likely a client. You also know, well, the one who already arrives to therapy knowing what's up.
They maybe have been to therapy before and if they haven't been to therapy before, they're probably one of those like podcast consumers, audio book listeners, researchers, whatever. They can name the pattern, right? They understand what's happening. They know why. Things are the way that they are, but they haven't been able to successfully change those things, and that's why they're coming to you. That gap right there between knowing and making changes. Is probably where some of your best clinical work happens. If you are, like many of the therapists that we work with, you love getting to work with people who are insightful, who are self-aware, but who need help making change.
That's where some of your best work happens. You help people move from just plain old insight into action. That's probably something that you feel you're good at clinically. And so the question that this episode is built around is, are you letting someone do that for you? In your own practice. So I wanna take that concept of insight, action, the gap, and invite you to consider that in your own business.
Because a lot of practice owners are sitting with a lot of insight about their marketing. I hear it from you regularly. You know what's not working. You can probably name it right now, but you're still doing the same things. You're still getting the same results, you're still not seeing changes. You're telling yourself that you just need more time or more information or just one more resource to actually get where you need to go.
And so this episode is about the wisdom, and I do think it is a form of wisdom of knowing when to stop trying to be your own clinician, and maybe when it's time to ask for some help and what that help can look like. So if you are like many of the therapists that we love to work with, you love working with clients who are motivated, who are capable, who are self-directed, I mean, the number of times I hear clinicians describe their ideal clients as high functioning, insightful, curious, motivated, self-aware.
Like it's the most common thing that I hear. They often come in having already maybe diagnosed themselves correctly or incorrectly, or at least like I talked about, be able to point to what's going on, to be able to name something about what's happening, explain their history, recognize that they have a role in it, looking for help, actually changing it.
And when I look at therapists that are in the same place, who know what's up in their marketing, who recognize something isn't quite right, who can spot the pattern or the issue, but struggle to ask for help, I see the reason for that in kind of three different categories. So one of them is a deep desire to learn, and I love this one.
I think this one is incredibly healthy, especially early on in your practice. I often talk to people about how I think one of the most magical parts of Confident copy is learning, quote unquote, how the sausage is made rather than just someone doing the website for you.
Confident copy is really cool because you learn why. You learn how to think, you learn an approach, it's a skill. You're actually growing your toolbox. And so sometimes people choose not to ask for help, raise their hand, outsource whatever, because they just want to learn. So they keep consuming the blog posts and the Instagram carousels and the podcast, whatever that might be, because you want to understand your own marketing.
And like I said, I think that's a really, really healthy, that is not an inherently bad thing, what we're talking about. Today is not an inherently bad thing. It's just worth looking at. Now, another reason that I see people decide not to ask for help and to continue to sometimes stay in that stuck place is because they believe they could figure it out and they're probably right, right?
Capability isn't usually the question here, although there are people who are like, yeah, no, I don't do technology, or I hate writing, or whatever that might be, but usually you absolutely could do this if you were given enough time or enough space or enough whatever. I think the question when this is the issue is whether continuing to try is actually serving you, or if there comes a point where it begins to cost you.
But when I look at clinicians who are genuinely resistant to asking for help, who really feel the pain of not being where they wanna be in their practice, but still haven't invested time, money, or energy in receiving help, outsourcing, whatever that might be.
It's not usually because they haven't found the right thing to invest in. It's not usually because they haven't done enough research. You know what I think the issue is? I think it's that they don't trust themselves enough. And the only reason I can say this is because I've experienced this myself.
Resistance to asking for help is rarely about not trusting who you're gonna hire. Now, it can be masked as that. You can think, oh, well, I haven't found the right coach, or I haven't found the right program, or I haven't found the right provider, or guide or teacher or whatever. But I think more than that, underneath it, it's that you don't trust yourself to make a good decision to show up and engage.
And more importantly, to get something out of it. Even if the ROI doesn't look exactly the way that you imagined it would. This is where I see so many clinicians, and quite frankly just so many business owners get stuck is, well, what if it doesn't turn into clients by X number of months? Or, what if I do it and it doesn't work?
What if you go into it believing that no matter what happens, you are going to learn something valuable? Get something out of it, make the most of it. Like I said, the only reason I can make this observation is because I've experienced it myself. I have worked with the same coach and consultant for nearly four years.
She knows the ins and outs of my business. She has been on the ups and the downs and the all arounds with me. And every year she raises her rates as she well should. And every year I'm confronted with, do I sign on the dotted line again and I feel that fear come up. I do because it's a significant, we're talking, very significant investment, but what I come back to is not, do I trust her?
It's do I trust myself to make the most of this investment? Do I trust myself to make use of what I'm paying for, to find value in it, to engage? And if so, then I can trust that I'm making a good decision. Am I necessarily going to be able to tie the exact dollar amount that I've invested in with her to sales in my business or something quantifiable?
Maybe, yes, maybe no. Often, yes. 'cause she's excellent, but even if I didn't, I can trust myself to have made a good decision, to have gotten the most out of it, and to have capitalized as best I could on the time and money that I put toward it.
So I'm wondering if you can identify with any of that. I think a lot of times therapists know this professionally because you help your clients do it. So often clients can understand everything or what feels like everything about why they are where they are and still not be able to move.
It's why therapy is so powerful because the barrier is not knowledge, it's not insight, it's not knowing. It's the willingness to, quite frankly, surrender some control to the process to recognize I can't do this by myself. To bring someone on and to ask for help in order to actually create change. They haven't been able to create themselves.
I could figure this out if I had more time is an insight. But it is not itself a plan, and there's a difference there. Like I said, the question is rarely whether or not you're capable. It's whether white knuckling it is actually in service of your practice, or if maybe it's just protecting a story of self-sufficiency that you didn't realize you were playing out.
I mean, what would you say to your client who's been sitting with the same insight for months or years? Could that insight potentially translate over into how you view your business? And I wanna be really clear that asking for help doesn't always mean because things are fundamentally broken in your practice.
Actually. I think that some of the best investments we make in our businesses are when we are in a more stable or healthy place. Although there's certainly a time and a place to invest when you are in a state of need. So this isn't about realizing, wow, things are really, really broken.
I better bring someone on board, but more so what's the cost of continuing to try and figure it out, or continuing to stay where I am versus recognizing maybe someone could do this a little bit better. That's exactly what happened for me at Walker Strategy Co. So I began Walker Strategy Co. Just me in 2019 and for many years it was just me, but about four years ago.
So 2022, I'm three years into the business operationally, just as far as everything that I alone was doing at that point, it had grown. Past what I could hold well while still being a mom at that point, to a toddler to having a limited work schedule. I've never had full-time childcare.
I was managing multiple inboxes. I was both writing and designing our done for you projects and also maintaining those relationships and making sure that my clients were well cared for. I was coaching in confident copy, and also making sure that that curriculum was staying up to date.
Creating the curriculum. Hosting the curriculum, like I was doing it all. And there came a point where I was like, huh, is this the best use of my time? Is this the best way to serve my clients? And there came a point where I had to ask, is this the best?
Way to steward my limited time. Is this the best way to serve my clients? Right? So could I do all of it? I absolutely could, and I was, but was it the best use of my time? It, it wasn't. Was I doing every single thing as well as it possibly could be done? I had to recognize that, no, I probably wasn't.
And so I came to the realization that some of what I was doing could be done better by someone. Whose full attention it had. So the very first hire I made was an operations assistant, someone who could help me in the inboxes, who could help me deliver templates, who could help me get updates made to confident, copy, things like that.
And then shortly after that, hire, Monica came on board. If you've been around confident, copy live. You know, Monica, she has also written at this point we should count, I don't know, 50 plus. Done for you projects. So I brought on Monica just over three years ago to support me in the done for you copywriting and confident copy coaching. And since then, the business and the team has continued to grow. But you know what happened? The copy, it got better. When I brought on our incredible first designer, Erica, the design got better.
The coaching got better because Monica and I were able to do it in tandem delivery, got faster. Clients were served better. I hired people who were better than me at things that I had been doing myself, so I could have done it myself, absolutely could have kept doing it. Things were going really well.
But it's pretty humbling to realize that, huh, maybe if I bring on other people it could go even better. And to this day continues to be one of the best things that I've done in my business. Now, I could have and probably should have done that sooner, but the whole idea of I've got it, I can do it, look at me, go.
It kept me from making that leap. And it's the same thing that your clients say. It's the same thing that you might say. Now asking for help can look a lot of different ways. It doesn't always mean signing on the dotted line for thousands and thousands of dollars, right? Sometimes it's free resources, although I think those can get a little bit sticky.
Obviously I put out this podcast. I hope that you enjoy it, engage with it, and I love hearing from people that leverage our free resources or other free resources and are able to make the changes that they need. That's fantastic. That's the reason we do what we do sometimes. Continuing to only consume, consume, consume free resources can keep you stuck.
I think there's something to be said for having some money on the line, but still reaching out, getting support, seeking support, finding tools that you can put into action. That's one way to ask for help. Right. Then there are the sort of templates, formulas, DIY style things where you're doing the work, but you're not starting from scratch.
You're given a starting point kind of that launching pad, which is what we hear so many template. Customers say that, I just needed a starting point. This is what helped me kind of. Start moving, right? Mm-hmm. Then we get into programs similar to Confident Copy. That's where I was talking about learning how the sausage is made.
This is for the person who needs support, who knows that, but who also wants to build their own skillset, who wants to build a toolbox of things that they can leverage moving forward in their practice. You get the behind the scenes. You start to kind of.
Build a new muscle, as I say, but you own it completely while having that expert support. And then there are the truly done for you style services that could be done for you, ads that could be done for you. Websites like what we offer, copy design, things like that. You're handing it off someone else's, executing your job there is to trust yourself enough to engage with the outcome, right?
So your job when investing in someone to do something for you is to be thorough, right? To show up to that process as fully and as completely as you possibly can, and then to take what you are given to take the insights, the data, the website, whatever the outcome is, and to create movement with.
Okay, so there's always that element of self-trust here. Whether it's a free resource, I trust myself to take this information and do something all the way up to a done for you website or done for you social media, or done for you virtual assistance. I'm gonna take what I'm given here and do something with it.
Capitalize on it, use it in my business. Now, like I said, this is a spectrum here, but what all of these have in common is that they require humility. About recognizing where your expertise ends and someone else's begins, like when I brought on team members to Walker Strategy Co. Who actually write better, who design better than I could have, and then you've gotta have that self-trust that however you ask for help, whether it's a free resource or a template, or a program like Confident Copy or a done for you service.
However you ask for help, you will get something out of it no matter what. You are the only one that can decide that. But isn't that sort of liberating that you're not dependent on choosing the exact right program or the exact right, whatever, but instead knowing, huh, I am a capable enough business owner who trust myself enough that no matter what I do, even if it ends up not being the best investment, 'cause that can happen, that I will still get something out of it.
It's a powerful place to be, but it does require a pretty powerful mindset shift first. Now, a lot of the clinicians that we work with in our done for you services in particular, so that is where we write and or design your website for you. Are the ones who have really moved beyond the, I could do it myself phase, and who are starting to ask, is this the best use of where I am right now?
Like I said, I think there's a time and a place, especially early on in practice to be a little bit scrappy to go and learn the skills, and sometimes that's all you need. But I find that a lot of the clinicians that we work with who decide they want to hand off this powerful element of their marketing.
Is because they're starting to evaluate the cost benefit analysis of staying with their current site or continuing to toil away and try and create themselves or sacrifice a mediocre website for not right fit clients and who are really realizing maybe their expertise has ended and it's time for someone else's to begin there.
That's really where I see a lot of our done for you clients decide to sign on with us. Sometimes this is burnout prevention, I think like active stewardship of your limited bandwidth so that you can, if you're a group, practice, lead a team or you can serve your clients really, really well, right? And not give away your wellbeing to a task that someone else can own.
We recently worked with a group practice owner who has DIYed, much of her marketing and experienced absolutely tremendous success. She should be so proud of it, and she is, but she decided to sign on with us for done for You because she realized this isn't something I want to own anymore. This is one piece I want to give up in order to be better and be more well myself, to be able to serve my team better.
When I decided to bring on people who could do things even better than I could, right? She needed her energy to go toward her team and her clients and herself not to managing her marketing, and that's often where we see our done for you clients decide to make that decision.
Now I've mentioned previously, but it is important to note as we get into the summer that our done for you services, so copy design, and then a brand new service, I can't wait to tell you about soon will be changing very, very soon. So beginning July one, our packages and pricing.
Will be changing. However, any projects booked before July one will lock in our current pricing. So I'm just now returning to maternity leave. As you are listening to this episode, my calendar is opening back up for discovery sessions, which are just opportunities for us to meet and determine if a done for you service is a good fit for you.
But this is definitely the time to be considering that if it's. If it's something that you're wondering about, and if you are finding yourself at this point of, is this the best use of my time? Does this match the caliber of clinician that I am today? Is this doing me the justice that it needs to?
Right? So if you have been thinking about asking for help with your marketing, again, not necessarily because things are fundamentally broken and you haven't, I hope this episode gave you something to think about. Maybe some reflections as you think about your own favorite clients and how you might see yourself in them. Because again, it's not 'cause you can't do it, you probably can, but should you, is that the best use of your limited time, energy, money, whatever it might be. Your clients are often coming to you because insight alone wasn't enough. They needed someone to help them actually move.
And I just wanna remind you that you're allowed to be that person too. Asking for help is a wonderful gift to yourself, to your business, especially when you're doing it with someone that you are excited about. And at the core, when you trust yourself enough to make use of whatever investment you're making, so what might it mean for your practice and for you if you stopped being the only one responsible for all of it? If you got the support you needed, if you started to fill that gap. I think there's a lot of room for opportunity and excitement there. I hope this one got your gears turning. Thanks for being here.
I'll see you in our next episode.
Resources & Links Mentioned:
Confident Copy: https://walkerstrategyco.com/cc
Done-for-you services: https://walkerstrategyco.com/services
The Walker Strategy Co website: https://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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