It’s about 4 pm on a Tues in early summer. 80 degrees. Sunny. Slight breeze.
I’m driving to pick up a fifteen-hundred dollar check from my client, Thom.
Seems like I should be enjoying the ride, right?
It’s a beautiful day. Money coming in. But I’m in a panic.
I have good reason to be: The electric company is about to shut my power off unless I pay them right now.
As I turn into Thom’s driveway I notice that his Lexus is not there, and my stomach turns.
Unfortunately, my stomach is dead on because when I knock on the door no one answers.
I text Thom.
He forgot about meeting me.
In fact, he’s away on a work trip and won’t be back for two days.
Looking back over my massage career, this scenario of waiting for money to pay a bill wasn’t that unusual.
At the time I had viewed this problem as a cash flow problem.
A client who pays for 10 sessions at a time owes me and I didn’t collect soon enough.
Or a client who pays me $300+ a week for massage and personal training is a way for a month.
But it wasn’t until later on in my massage career that I realized that cash flow wasn’t the problem.
Client flow was.
As in, I didn’t have enough clients walking through my door which meant that I had to worry about money if a big-ticket client was away for a month or two.
Yes, I survived when cash cow clients got out of their boxes.
I juggled bills and sometimes borrowed money until they came back, but I don’t think that I need to tell you that this is a crappy way to live.
I don’t live like that any longer. And if you’re living like this, you don’t have to either.
Bills can be paid, retirement can be funded–if you understand that big-ticket clients will NOT be enough to get the job done.
Here’s what happens when you’re dependent on big-ticket clients.
1. You get comfortable.
When you get comfortable you don’t go after new business.
Why?
Because Rachel, her family and friends get massage and give you just enough referrals so that you don’t quit massage.
This is precisely where being in your comfort zone bites you in the butt because no one person or group of people is going to give you enough referrals to make your practice crank for years and years to come.
You have to go get that business.
As you’re waiting for more referrals from your cash-cow clients….
2. Your “getting new clients” skills rust (or never get fully developed).
I had a bad case of rusting and arrested development when I was chasing checks down from big-ticket clients like Thom.
In fact, the thought of “hustling” to bring in new clients felt a little beneath my level of experience.
But eventually reality slapped me silly.
And I learned that it didn’t matter if I had been doing massage 1 year or 30 years, if I’m not competent at getting clients to walk through my door, my massage practice will fold or die a slooooow, loooooong and painful death.
Cash-cow clients also come at one, potential, huge expense:
3. Dual relationships and more.
Hey, you want to make sure that your big-ticket client isn’t insulted? Then you better make damn sure that you go to that New Year’s Day party that she invited you to.
It’s so easy to fall into that trap, right?
After all, she’s paying your bills.
Then it’s: I know you don’t like to carry a table, but do you mind coming to the house and working on Jamar? He just wants to go to bed after his massage.
No problem.
Or: I know 4:30 is a tough time for you, but I really like when I get a massage right after tennis…
I can make that work.
Can you say, love/hate relationship?
There’s only way to create steady and reliable massage income without fearing that the big-ticket clients will leave, move or die.
And that is to have a steady flow of clients ALWAYS coming in.
AKA, clients coming out your butt.
To do that you need to be working on bringing clients during the time when you’re not rubbing clients.
So, you mean all the time, Mark?
Well, in the beginning, a lot of the time.
After 6 months, once you get your systems in place, you won’t need to spend as much time on bringing in clients.
Getting Systems in Place
Start by working on a referral system.
Getting clients, businesses and other health professionals to refer to you is not rocket science. In fact, you have the tools to set up a damn good referral system already: Your hands and your mouth.
Use this is free course to get started: Jumpstart.
At this point, you probably thinking that Mark has some major anger issues with his big-ticket clients.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
In fact, I love the relationship I have with my big-ticket clients now. Because when a big-ticket client gets sick and can’t keep an appointment, I know a new client or a new, repeat client will want to jump in that slot.
That’s freedom.
That’s security.
That’s worth sustaining.
But I need to be honest, there is a downside to having a cranking business.
It’s a first world massage problem.
Too many clients.
Deal with it. Lol. 🙂
