From the Ground Up: Building a Business in the Mental Health Field – Pitfalls and Suggestions to Think About – Differentiation, Why You?
What are you good at? How does that help people? What makes you different? Why should someone use you over someone else? These are just a few of the questions that you should be able to answer if you really want to differentiate yourself from your competitors. There are two main factors to consider in this, price and value.
Price –
This one is simple, if all other things are equal, then a person who does their research will always choose the lower price. Fortunately, all other things are not always equal.
Value –
This is where differentiation comes in. Value can come in many shapes and sizes. It could be your skill set, it could be your rapport with clients, it can be your looks in some cases. The list of ways that you can build value with a potential customer is endless. I honestly believe that every single person in this field can bring value to people’s lives, it is only a matter of how much and to whom. There are a few questions that I believe really get to the core of value to customers, and all marketing is aimed at answering these questions to customers.
- Why should your potential clients trust you? – This is the first question, because it is the most important. If you do not build some form of trust with a customer, then no matter how much value you could bring to them, they may not believe it. We are conditioned to buy from those we trust, which is why so many of us buy the same brand of something over and over again, and it takes a lot to get us to change. It goes the other way as well, if someone trusts you, then they already will believe the value you are bringing them.
- What will your potential clients get out of it? – For this you need to know what you are good at, and how you can use that to benefit your clients. By the time you are starting a business in this field, I am guessing that you have been through a few years of school, gotten certified in something, and in general actually believe that you are good at something at that you can use it to help people, otherwise what is the point. Now you need to tell people the what and how of it.
- What is different about you? – Are you more experienced? Do you know different techniques? Do you have particular experiences that have shaped you? Answering this question is one of the keys to building value with your customers, because every single one of us has something that we are particularly good at. We have five clinicians on staff at my work, and each has a different population that they work incredibly well with, based on their own experiences and their personalities.
- What are you not good at? – This question can be one of the keys to building trust. If you tell people exactly what you are not good at, then they are more likely to believe what you are good at. I don’t care if you are the best psychologist on the planet, or the smartest researcher in the world, you don’t know everything, and you can’t help everyone. Be honest with yourself about your weaknesses, so you can either build them up, or explain them to possible clients.
- How much do you believe in yourself? – This is the key to all of it. No one will trust you if you don’t trust yourself. No one will have any confidence in your work if you don’t. If you don’t believe you have something to offer, then why would a potential client. This doesn’t mean you have to be the best at everything, or that there could be no one better with this client, what it means is that you truly believe that you have something to give to the client that is worth their time and money.
There is a reason that content marketing has grown so much in the last decade, and a reason why it works so well in this field, even though most people aren’t doing it. That reason is simple, when you are creating useful content for your potential customers, without expecting anything in return, you are answering all five of these questions before they even walk in the door. You can build trust by honestly assessing your own strengths and weaknesses, and by giving before getting. You can show your knowledge and experience by sharing your gifts with the world. You can even give yourself more confidence by creating things that you see helping others.
By making yourself visible, useful, accessible, and honest you will create that differentiation and trust in the minds of your potential customers before they even walk in the door. You will differentiate yourself just by your actions. You will create new ways to help you customers, and you will better yourself right along with them.
Thanks for reading, and I hope you got something out of it. Please like, share, subscribe or comment. If you have any questions please comment below or email me at jeremyl@coherenceassociates.com.
- Jeremy Larsen
Business Development and Practice Manager
Coherence Associates Inc.