Member-only story
She Called Me Fudge Ripple!
And why this is a good thing…
As some of you know I was once a counseling psychologist in private practice. That’s before I “traded my couch for a mouse.”
In the 90’s the medical practice where I worked fell apart quite suddenly and I needed a place to land. So I landed at a counseling center run by a friend of mine, sponsored by a local church.
The pay structure was based on percentages and number of clients. So the more clients you saw, the more money you made.
The next paragraph is important for content creators.
Because I had a weekly relationship column in the local newspaper, I was able to negotiate a unique contract. In my contract after a certain amount of monthly clients and money brought in to the center, I got 100%.
This had never been done before.
Some months later the issue of contracts came up at a board meeting. The board took issue with my 100% contract. Thankfully, the family of one of the board members were clients of mine.
I found out from my client the board wanted to take the 100% clause out of the contract. My client fought for me and won with these words:
“There’s dozens of “vanilla” counselors in our city. I’ll pay more for “fudge ripple” every day!”
Through my laughter I thanked her. And her family got their next session on me!
Take aways for Content Creators
- The Power of Content: as content creators we can sometimes take what we do for granted. Doors open for content creators that would not open for anyone else. When I was a counseling psychologist I was practicing in a city over run with counselors. Virtually “teeming with mental health” hahaha. I knew early on I had to work hard at becoming the “go to” person in town. One of the ways I did this was writing a weekly relationship column in the local newspaper. Because of that column, when new clients called me they’d ask: “How soon can I get it?” vs. “How much do you charge?”
- The Power of One: creating your “niche of one” or your “category of one” is a powerful and profitable move. I became “the guy in the newspaper.” The column was in the paper on Mondays. On Wednesday’s I’d…
