EP120: I wish I knew this, starting out

Hey Sachin, and welcome to the Perfect Practice Podcast. It's my mission to use this podcast as a platform to help holistic, heart centered practitioners transform the world. I think we can all agree that the world needs more of what we have to offer now than ever before. And I want to take all the information and all the knowledge and experience that I've gained over the years and leverage the community and the contacts and the mentors that I've had over the years and share some of the most valuable nuggets that I've picked up over those years. I also want to bring special guests on so that they can share their valuable wisdom and knowledge with you as well. Each episode is going to be packed with valuable nuggets of information to help you grow both personally and professionally, all while moving you towards more impact and more freedom. I'm excited that you're here. I'm excited that you want to grow and learn. So let's jump right in. Hey friends. Welcome to Perfect Practice. Today with me, I have Aaron and we are going to be talking about starting your practice. And what are some of the things that I wish I knew? Aaron's going to be sharing some of the things that he wish he knew and we're going to be sharing some of the input and feedback that we get from our coaching clients because their questions are also things that they wish they had known before starting their practice. So that's our topic today. If you're new in practice, if you're looking to transform your practice, if you're still studying functional medicine, and even if you have an established practice, I feel like this conversation is going to be very impactful for you and it's going to help you get some insights that you can reflect back on and either relate to or maybe there's some things that you need to work on and this conversation can help you have that breakthrough. So with that being said, Aaron, thanks for joining me today. How are you doing?

I'm doing excellent. I have people installing gutters outside, but that's the show must go on real life.

Thankfully, we can't hear anything, but it's always good to know that we're doing some maintenance. And that's part of life and it's part of our practice too, is kind of keeping up, keeping things as time moves forward.

Exactly. I think that'll come up. There's things that we don't always want to do but have to be done to keep the. To keep the house in order. So just like a business, ain't that the Truth.

Right. So let's go back to. I'd love to like rewind the clock a little bit and maybe go back into my past and maybe into your past as well when you were first starting out. So take me back to when you first graduated. I'm sure you were bright eyed and bushy tailed to save the world, as I was. And then the rubber meets the road. So I'd love to hear about your journey starting out and then also perhaps your journey when you started your own practice and became your own boss.

Yeah. In the very beginning I knew, I knew I didn't want to enter a conventional clinic setting or a traditional clinic setting, but I knew I wanted to learn from certain people. So I remember like Dr. Masa who was a trainer for the Seattle Mariners or that. Oh, he's, he, he's a naturopathic doctor. He's a chiropractor, he's an acupuncturist. He was like a wizard.

Wow.

And so I was, I was able to be in his practice for a period of time. He's like, here, have a room, do what you want. See patients and then you can, you can shadow me and follow me around. And so that was a great start. So I think in the beginning I was looking for more for mentors and people I resonated with and I was like, how can I spend as much time around them as possible? You know, from there I had an opportunity to study visceral manipulation in more depth because that was what I was, why I love that I love using my hands. So then I started working with my visceral manipulation mentor in his practice and he's like, I charge cash. You're going to charge cash. I'm like, okay, how do I do that? So I'm grateful for him for introducing me to that world and. But I quickly realized that we were somewhat misaligned with where we want to go. He wanted to sell me his practice, but I didn't think it made sense. Like the value wasn't in the practice. He saw paper charts, no technology systems and people loved him. So like, am I going to pay six figures to buy this practice when I don't even know if people will actually show up? So that's when, you know, I, I met you and joined this mentorship and like, oh, I can do this on my own and started my own micro practice in a Regis setup shop there was seeing my own patients and clients and you know that. And that was a lot of fun, you know, so that was kind of the Beginning, journey. And then I'll leave out the part where we ended. This ended up here. But that's how it looked in the beginning for me.

Awesome. So what's something. As we kind of dive into this conversation, what's something, looking back now, that you wish you had known or somebody had told you?

Yeah. One thing that I. That I experience and a lot of people practitioners struggle with is like, finding a niche. But I think we get too boxed in with what a niche should be like. Is it a diagnosis? I thought it had to be, oh, IBS or a condition, but that didn't resonate with me as a naturopathic doctor, to put a label on something and to box everyone into a label. And I was supposed to have a solution for that one thing. There was an IBS treatment center here, around here, and like, oh, they've niched down. It's working for them. But it never resonated with me. But what I discovered along the way is there's a certain type of person I like working with, people who are coachable, who value health, someone who says, I want to optimize my health. I was told it was never possible to find those types of people. They're like unicorns. No one wants to optimize their health. But eventually I started finding people who were very proactive and. And value the coaching. So I wish someone had said that, told me that a niche is not a label or diagnosis.

So it's a type of person. Right?

It's a type of person.

It's an attitude. It's. It's what we refer to as an avatar. And it's very rare that somebody with any problem, any diagnosis, is only going to have that problem. Right. And only that diagnosis. So, yeah, I definitely. I definitely can resonate with that. You know, just really figuring out who is it that we want to help? Who do we connect with the most? Is it a personality or is it a problem? And it's obviously ideal when it can be both.

Right? Yeah. So did you ever. Did you struggle with this in the beginning?

Yeah.

You know what?

My. So for me, and perhaps for you and even anyone who's listening to this, like, things would just come really naturally to me and pretty easily to me. And, you know, once I went down a rabbit hole, I got really into it and so have kind of evolved in. In terms of who I serve. At one point, it was thyroid patients, and while I loved helping them, while we get great results, it just never really fulfilled me because I never had my own thyroid challenge. And so What I love helping people do is solving some of the problems that I've solved. And that was a big revelation for me is, you know, it took me a few years to figure that out. And they're golden handcuffs, right? Because it's working, right? Like, hey, what we're doing is working. Like there's a lot of people with this problem. We get great results, you know, and you can keep doing that, but if it, if it doesn't, you know, fill your soul bucket, so to speak, then it does. It only charges you up so much. So for me, I wanted to work with people who were just like me. And that's when I realized that I love problem solving, I love using technology, I love making a bigger impact. I love people helping people understand and find their self worth. And that's why I love coaching practitioners so much. But what I also realized in practice, I love working with people who are just like me, who are, for lack of better terms, those bio tuners versus biohackers, people who are into spirituality and people who are into plant medicines and functional medicine and thinking outside the box and focusing on celebrating their health and their body as opposed to viewing it as a punishment to get healthy. So really getting into the head of that person was really getting clear on who I was. So it's a powerful exercise to know who you are. And once you know who you are, then it's so much easier to help other people who are similar to you. And what that meant for me was very. The opportunity was quite inviting because learning how to help myself, I was also learning how to help my clients. Whereas if I'm learning all about thyroid disease and thyroid dysfunction as an example, and I don't have that challenge, the benefit to me is very limited. Once I was able to close that loop, I realized, wow, it makes sense because I can evolve personally at an exponential rate and I can help people evolve in this area and in this way in their life as well.

Becoming proof, literally.

Yeah, yeah, there you go.

That's where it comes from.

So I, I know one of the things that comes up a lot for practitioners, especially when they're starting out, is how to structure their programs. Right? And there's many ways to structure a program. There is one to one, which is the classic, you know, most traditional style of practicing, it never gets old, is always going to be valuable. And I feel like that's where a lot of people should start. Either even if you decide eventually you want to do group programs, there's always going to be a component and a percent of your practice that should be reserved for one on one. Because once in a while I like a challenge. Once in a while I like having a one on one intensive, deep conversation and transformational conversation with somebody. And I'm sure you do the same, Aaron, and we're all going to enjoy that, to deeply connect with people. So, you know, there should be a one on one component. But then as your business grows and your vision expands, then you might go into one on one to many programs, right, where you've, you're coaching people in a group setting and educating them in a group setting. And perhaps there is a component of one on one left there. And then the third component is kind of one to infinity, which is, you know, digital courses and trainings and things like that that are online and digital or even printed for that matter. So there's different ways to set up your practice. And I think in the beginning the key is not to be very rigid. So you might be gung ho on doing group programs because obviously you see the value in somebody's chapter 20 of their story. They're doing group programs. But chapter one, they were probably doing one on one. And the skills that they acquired doing things one on one allowed them to be more comfortable and better and fill those group programs as well. Right? So it's like you can't skip steps is I think, important for people to realize, but you want to remain flexible as well. So if there's enough of a demand to fill a group, then fill that group. But if there isn't, then start with one on one and also be flexible. So don't be so rigid in terms of how you deliver your services. So let me give you an example. If, let's say you've got a program and that program is $1,000 or $2,000 or $5,000, whatever it might be, and you're having that consultation with somebody, that initial discovery call, and you feel like they're a good fit, they feel like they're a good fit, but for whatever reason, the program's not in their budget. Right. That's just the reality for some people that it's yes, they can afford it, but it would stretch them financially. That the stress caused by the stretch would actually make the whole situation worse. And so for those individuals, instead of saying, well, I'm sorry, I can't help you, you would ask them what their budget is because they certainly weren't expecting your services to be free. They certainly weren't expecting that you were just going to hand them all the answers. At no cost to them. They came in willing to and wanting to pay something because they have a problem that needs to be solved. So by simply asking them, what is their budget? Right. Mrs. Jones, I'm sorry that we can't start here with you just yet, but I know that this is something you want to fix. That's why you're here. That's why you filled out this form. And I feel like we can truly help you what is within your budget so that we can keep the momentum going. I'd love to customize a solution for you that meets your budget but also doesn't cut any corners. So once you have that conversation with them, they might say, well, I can afford $200 a month. And now guess what? You've got somebody who's happy to pay you, somebody who's not stressed out and anxious about the payment because they've told you what they're comfortable with, and somebody who now appreciates you for really accommodating their needs. You've got essentially a fan for life instead of a no. And a no usually is a not now. But that not now could be for a year or two years, right? Until their problem gets significantly worse. And now they need your help again. But if you were to start them and meet them where there are, then all roads lead to yes. So, you know, I did that when I started out. I had that flexibility and really wanted to help each and every single person, so I accommodated based on those needs. Fortunately, it wasn't very often that I had to do that, but I never let anyone walk out the door without being of some level of value to them. And so when they say what their budget is, that budget could be supplements that you offer them, could be a supplement protocol that you offer them within that budget. It could be a product that they might need to invest in that could be helpful for them. You could also offer a test that could be helpful for them. Hey, Susan, why don't we start with this lab test, and based on the results, we can make a more inspired and educated decision. So, again, you're moving them forward in the direction of healing themselves and working with you in a capacity to heal themselves. Anything you'd want to add to that?

Yeah, I was going to say, I wish I'd known that in the beginning, but eventually I realized that that was an option. It's like, oh, I can I. If someone doesn't want to do a full program, hey, let's do an initial consult and, like, a review of findings. Like, yes, let's See what value I can provide there. And I think it's the same with pricing. There's a misconception that you have to have your prices, that they're set in stone forever. But in the beginning, it's probably more important just to get that conviction, that experience, feel the validation of, oh, someone does value my service enough to exchange money for that. That engagement. So whether it's 100 bucks in the beginning, it almost kind of doesn't matter because you can always adjust your rates to what's fair as you. As we grow and as our time becomes more, you know, more, that's not scarce, but, you know, as we get busier, we have to adjust our pricing accordingly as well.

Yeah, absolutely. And that's the other thing, too, is I think it's important that you meet people where they are, right? So that you're of value to that person, because when you help that person, it's going to open up the door to more referrals. It's going to open up the door to them upgrading their level of service with you. It's going to open up to them bringing perhaps their family members in. So there's lots of upside once you get that energy moving through your business. And as I was mentioning to you earlier, the time will pass. So a week from now, it'll be a week from now. A week from now, that person could be healthier because of you, or that person could be moving in the wrong direction not because of you, but you certainly had an opportunity to deflect them in the right direction so that they're able to make better decisions moving forward for themselves. Sick people make sick decisions. Sick people who are tired and exhausted can't even see themselves going up that mountain. Right. It's not even in their reality. So what if you could start them with a simple protocol that gets them feeling better so now they have more clarity in their thinking and actually have the energy to take that plunge and be like, oh, my God, I can do this. I already feel motivated and inspired to do this. So to me, I think that we do ourselves and we do our clients a huge disservice by only giving them the most narrowest and fewest options possible. It's our obligation and our responsibility to really be flexible to their needs, especially in the early stages of our practice. And none of us own a franchise. So it's not like the franchising company is going to come down on you and reprimand you. This is your business. You could be creative, you can have fun, and you could decide that you want to help every person that walks in the door, no matter how big or how small that investment is on their part.

And when you're creative, some of the, like in the moment, you might have created a new product in the process, and then that creates a new opportunity to create something systematic that you can offer. It's like, oh, that worked. Oftentimes that's kind of what happens. Like, I'm going to try it. Yeah, I'm going to price it at this. Like, oh, they said yes. Oh, 10 people, like, didn't even blink an eye. Like, oh, this is, this is. This is something. And I think that's a lot.

We've.

We missed that validation step. Almost like treating it like a. An experiment in the beginning and being open to the possibility instead of being, like you said, rigid to how it should be.

Yeah. And see, like, sometimes people, when they say no, right? Or not now, they might be saying no to your program, they might not be saying no to you, they might not be saying no to how you approach the problem, but they might just be saying, well, I don't need all those things and I'm not going to use those things. So unless they're bonuses, how do we remove them from the price? For example, if somebody has an OURA ring and they're joining our program, we could be rigid and say, no, you have to keep that ring and you can gift it to somebody. Or we could say, hey, we can give you a credit for the amount that it would cost us to, you know, to have that OURA ring sent out to you. And you could be flexible and you can be accommodating. Right. It's. And how you approach that is totally up to you. Now, you might not be giving out an OURA ring, but maybe if you want to cut expenses or fixed costs on your program, instead of mailing all the materials that you would normally send a client, perhaps instead you only mail them the digital files and then you give them a list of things that they can purchase on their own. Right. That they could invest on their own whenever they're ready to. Like, we give out a scale, we give out an eye mask, we give out lavender oil, we give out mouth tape. Right. So if we make our program digital and only send the digital files to them and then cut out the physical goods that we ship to them, then they could buy those on their own. Right. We can send them a list and they can purchase them whenever they're ready to. So you can get creative and lower your cost. But then also substantially lower the investment for your clients. So that again, you just get that. Yes, you keep moving them forward and as long as you can be of value to them. Right. So I think it's very clear if you know, myself and Aaron and our practice, like we're never saying to say yes to somebody you can't help. Right. If you can help that person, then you have a responsibility to them because I mean, chances are like they don't know anyone else who can help them. That's why they're there. Right. If they had met someone who could have helped them, they probably wouldn't be in your practice right now. So we do have that responsibility to help them.

Yeah. And especially once you start putting yourself out there, you're going to get calls from people who have, like from, from everywhere who may not know that you have a program, but they're just like, oh, this person can, might be able to help me. Like their perspective is different.

And yeah, I, I totally agree.

You get DMS and phone calls from all over the place. They're like, how did you find me?

You know, so like, another thing that comes up often with regards to, you know, when you're just starting out and engaging with people is the discovery call. So the discovery call for us, we refer to that as like, as almost like a test drive, if you will. Right. So it's not a health consultation. We're not treat, developing a plan or diagnosing somebody. We're determining through that discovery process and call if they're a good fit. Right. And that's super important for all of us to acknowledge is like, who actually can we hit a home run with? We have an obligation to them that we can hit a home run. Obligation to our practice because we want more referrals that we can hit a home run and an obligation to ourselves because frankly, I like building up my own self reputation and self worth by getting great results. So I can help everybody. And we have to be selective with who we do choose to work with. But if we do choose to work with somebody, then the question is, okay, are we offering a free versus a paid discovery call? And I'd love to hear your experience with this, Aaron. And I'll tell you that we've kind of oscillated back and forth in the beginning. I did a ton of free stuff and then at one point you reach kind of like this tipping point where now people are scheduling calls and they're not showing up. So they're devaluing themselves really, because they're not Keeping their word, that's one of the four agreements is be impeccable with your word. So they're violating that agreement. But it's coming at the expense of your time and energy and you're setting aside that time and eventually your time becomes valuable that it's hard for you to just give it away. So then you start charging for it. And then that creates. It certainly doesn't lubricate the slide for people. It creates a bit of friction. And you can justify the friction because you don't want to waste your time or you only want people who are really serious and committed to join the program. But one of the things that we recently discovered, just actually the other day on a webinar, is we completely greased the slide for people. So we said we're going to do a complimentary discovery call to see if you're the right fit. It's half an hour. Depot's doing this and we're also going to review something called your root cause assessment. So this is looking at kind of root causative factors. Again, not diagnosing or coming up with a plan, but just seeing do you have the right hallmarks of the conditions that we can help you with and ways we can support you with your health. And then what we also didn't do is we didn't say the price. What we said is we have a solution for everybody, regardless of your budget. So in saying that now, nobody leaves that call thinking like, oh my God, there is nothing for me. Everyone leaves that call feeling hopeful. And as a result of that, we had the highest conversion rate ever for calls, for book calls. We had 30 booked calls from one webinar. And so I'm really proud of Deepa for doing that and accomplishing that. And I think that those two things really grease the slide for people. Now we'll see what the conversion rate is and what the show up rate is. But we now know that when we say these two things in conjunction with each other, one, that the consultation is complementary. Just like a test drive, when you drive a car is complementary, secondary, that we have something that fits everyone needs. I think that really lit a spark in people. And then our job is to figure out, okay, what's within their budget and what delivers the most amount of value when they get on that phone call. And oftentimes we recommend the program because that is where we pack and the biggest amount of value into the smallest price that we can.

And so it becomes a, like a, a test bed when you, when you're thinking about Discovery calls. You do them free. How long do you do them free? Do you charge for them? I. I believe that once you do, you test something, like, you created this. You grease the slide, so to speak, and you book 30 calls. Then the intention behind the business is like, we want to help every. You know, we want to help people as much as we can. Let's say after these 30 calls, Deepa's like, oh, 15 people didn't show up or 20 people didn't show up. Like, we greased the slides too much. And that's where we can be intentional about where we introduce intentional friction. Maybe it's like a. An application or a questionnaire. If someone's. Are they willing to fill out a questionnaire before they get on the call?

Right.

I had a friend text me over the weekend, and he's like, hey, you know, dude, I got. I have trouble. I want to prevent diabetes. Like, what's going on? Is it a general question or this is a specific question? And he sent me screenshots of his Dexcom continuous glucose model. Like, okay, we're getting into, like, diagnostic mode. It's like, hey, like, this is best taken care of with a consult.

Yeah.

And so me being clear in my mind the intention of the discovery call and having an option that helps me, like, having a game plan, like, is this a discovery call free situation where I can connect some dots, but I'm not going to be coming up with a treatment plan or interpreting someone's labs. Like, in my mind, that requires, like a consult, a professional working agreement.

Right.

And so in my. In the beginning, I would just get in calls with people and I'd get tricked into, like, not trick, but I would just kind of go down that rabbit hole. I want to help you go through their labs, you know, start coming up with a treatment plan. But it doesn't. I realize it doesn't do them any good if they. We haven't agreed to work together as a. To create a partnership.

Right.

And so we. I started to know where my boundaries were. I'm, like, generous with my time. Very often. I'm happy to do it, but I also want to make sure someone's swimming towards me before I invest my energy.

Right.

And that becomes. I think it comes through experience. You might feel burned a couple times. I never want to come out of an interaction feeling resentful. That's kind of my bar. If I did this well, I feel resentful. If I spent five hours interpreting someone's labs for free, would I be. Feel like, oh, man, I didn't get anything in return for that. I don't want that feeling ever either.

Right. I want to. We definitely have to set boundaries right. For ourselves. And I think with experience, we get a sense of who's, you know, who's. I shouldn't say worth our time, but where our time is best spent. I think there's different ways that we can help different people. And, you know, sometimes it might just be, hey, go watch this video and come back and let me know what you think, or listen to this podcast. So it could be a quick way of helping that person. But, yeah, once you're getting into CGMs and screenshots, I'm like, no data analysis, then, yeah, that's. You know, that's. Yeah. And just because you could do it over the phone, it doesn't make it any less valuable. Right.

I had one college professor. He was. He taught. Was it qualitative analysis?

Some.

Some economics class. And then he asked for people to, like, help with the project. And I was like, you know, a couple of us raised our hands. It's like, okay, I. I want to teach you a lesson. I'm going to pay you $300 for, like, an hour or two of work. And in college, it's like, this is huge.

Yeah.

He's like. And he treated us to dinner. He's like, the lesson here is, never undersell your labor.

Oh.

And that stuck with me. And he was so generous with it. He was one of the toughest professors I ever had. People didn't like him because he was, like, straight talker, but I came to appreciate his intention behind it. And that lesson, like, never undersell your labor stuck with me. And I think that's a mistake that happens in the beginning. We feel we don't have the value or we feel imposter syndrome. So it leads us to do, like, the overly accommodating in the beginning.

Yeah. You know, one. I love that story. And you know, one reframe that I think could be helpful for people is, you know, using the plumber as an analogy. Right. So, you know, people pay a couple hundred bucks to have a plumber come to their house. And, you know, imagine if the plumber could fix your toilet virtually without having to come to your house, without having for you to block off half a day at work to wait for him to come or her to come, or without you being, like, having to even think about, oh, the plumber is coming on this day, and we have to wait until that day for it to be fixed. Imagine that it could be fixed instantly and virtually. You probably pay a premium for something like that. Why is it that when it comes to our services, which we can help resolve people's issues permanently, in many cases, instantly and virtually, they don't even have to leave their office. To me, that's actually more valuable, not less valuable.

I remember the first time I did a virtual consult I had in my office, but a patient needed to travel like an hour, an hour and a half. I said, hey, why don't we just do this virtually on Zoom or before Zoom was a thing. It's like, oh, this actually helps me a lot. It saves me an hour. Like coming here and going back. I'm like, oh, this can work. And it's actually valuable to my patient. You forget all the work that comes with working with the practitioner, going to an office and that whole finding daycare or whatever for their kids.

Yeah, you're so right. Right. And we forget how. How many hoops people have to jump through to get to our office. We're just sitting there waiting for them to come. They're having to plan dinner around this appointment or figure out alternate dinner plans. They're having to figure out alternate plans to picking up their kids. They're having to figure out how to adjust the rest of their schedule to accommodate this appointment. If it's a half hour appointment, it could take up an hour and a half or two hours of their day for that half an hour with you. So, yeah, I think that there's a ton of value that we can add for people and we want to recognize that. Right. Not diminish the value of that. Because I feel like that can happen sometimes when we go online because it's easy, we devalue it. But people pay for easy. People pay for convenience. They're happy to pay for that. They don't like paying for inconveniences. Right. So, like another thing that another way to kind of spin the discovery call, if you are going to charge for it, is you could charge for it and then apply it to the program. So that's one way to create a little bit of friction. But then you're only getting clients and customers who are serious about working with you because they're willing to make that investment. So if you want to create some friction, that's one way to do it. Apply it to their program. You want to create even more friction, you don't apply it to their program. Right. There's all kinds of ways that we could make that process easier for people, lubricate it for people. Or we could add layers, and some of us may need to do that. Depending on the level of demand on your time, you may have to have people jump through several hoops before they ever get on a call with you. But until then, let's make it easy for people to connect with us.

That's a great point. In the beginning, you want to grease the slide and get the numbers up. That's what I didn't realize in the beginning. In the beginning, you need that volume, that initial. You need to take a lot of swings, right. You're not going to hit a home run, your first at bat, necessarily. So how many, like, I think of baseball all the time. The difference between a great baseball player and one who's out of the league in a couple years is like.025, 0.05%.

Right?

Someone who's batting.300 versus someone who's batting.250. Like, they're being paid millions of dollars more for being Bang. 300.

Yeah.

And so you got to take swings.

You can't just get on base, right?

Get on base, take a walk, take some pitches.

Yeah. I mean, you know, that's the thing. Like, you don't have to hit a grand slam every time you bat, right? And, you know, you hit the Glenn grand slam when it's the right person, the right opportunity, and you know, you can knock it out of the park. But other than that, you're. You got to get on base, right. Get singles, get doubles, get triples. That, you know, adds tremendous amounts of value and over time, right. If you hit enough singles, you get the run. Right. So you might. It might take you four at bats to get what's equivalent in terms of the score to hitting a home run, But I'll take that all day, right? Because in the long run, that person wins.

Right. You mentioned earlier we have to be numb to the numbers in a certain sense. And that came up with our council meeting with all our council members. And this is a theme that comes up. Oh, someone did one webinar and they had like, five people show up or no one signed up. Oh, it didn't work. And one of the council members asked this mentee, like, oh, okay, so are you. When's your next webinar? Oh, next quarter. I'm like, and how about next week? So we forget that in the beginning. We have to do a lot more in order to create the opportunity. I didn't understand that in the beginning either. I'm like, oh, it's a volume. It's the reps that go into it, that create more learning momentum opportunities. So maybe I'd love to hear you your take on being numb to the numbers.

Yeah. So we don't do it for the numbers. Right. We do it for the number of lives or the number of lives that are transformed. Right. So it's not about the numbers. It's. It's the transformations that take place. And those could be micro transformations or major transformations. And, you know, when. When no matter how many people are on a call, if there's five people on a call or a hundred people on the call, the goal is to always leave these people better than you found them. Right. How do we leave them better than they found them? Smarter, healthier, happier, more hopeful than when they started this call? Just because they don't sign up with me, it doesn't mean that I didn't accomplish that objective, right. To leave them better. So I always focused on that is, did I leave everyone better? And then the focus became, did I have fun? So did I have fun in this process? Did I enjoy this process? Because if I didn't enjoy it, how can I modify it so that I do enjoy it? How do I change the tone? How do I change the message? How do I change the topic? How do I change who I'm inviting to this call or who this call is for so that it's fun for me? I really love in person public speaking. So for me, one of the best ways that we grew our practice was in person workshops. Did a workshop every week for many years unless I was traveling or had a conflict. But that was a consistent way for us to get in front of people and build our practice. And I would still say that's, you know, proximity is probably the best way to build relationships with people. So I was, for example, at an event recently, and, you know, I met some amazing people that I probably wouldn't have met if I was, you know, only online for the event. And I got to build connections with them. I got to hug them, I got to hold them, I got to sit next to them and have conversation and dialogue with them. So there's a ton of value of connecting with people in person. So if you're not doing that, that might be something to consider. If you don't like webinars or if giving a webinar makes you just nervous and anxious for the entire week, well, find something that gets your message out there that leads to discovery calls. That doesn't do that. You don't have to put a discovery call on the back of A webinar. You're exposing just the tip of the sphere of the people that know about you and what you do to your discovery call. So maybe you put that discovery call further up, not too far up, but somewhere else in your pipeline that can be helpful for people. One thing that comes up for me is how can you do, or how can somebody do a service that they're giving a second opinion? Right? Like that's it. Like, your whole marketing strategy is, hey, I'd love to offer you a holistic and second opinion to whatever health challenge you're having. And I'm going to offer that to you at no cost. Right? Like, who wouldn't take you up on that?

There's an idea right there.

Yeah, there's an idea right there. I mean, you know, so that's easy to put into motion. And the people that take you up on that offer already have a diagnosis. They have a diagnosis. And the fact that they want a second opinion means that they're confused about that problem. And the fact that they're reaching then out to you means that they don't want to solve the problem the way it's been proposed to them. Because if they were happy with the way that problem was going to be solved, they wouldn't be looking for a second opinion. We only look for a second opinion when we don't get the answer we want to hear. And that answer might be, well, you got to take these medications for the rest of your life. Well, okay, well, I want a second opinion about that. There's got to be more options than that where somebody says, oh, you got to have surgery to remove this thing. Well, maybe you do, maybe you don't. Maybe there's another way to approach this problem. So again, I think getting people on a phone call has never been easier. If you have a consistent message that you're putting out there and people value what you have to say when it comes to health. And the only way they're going to know that is by you putting yourself out there on a consistent and regular basis. Not just in webinars, but also day to day. It could be through email, conversations, in person, online, social media. You've got to find a way to.

Stay connected with people, join communities, find interest groups. People have their churches, for example. People, the people around you who are. You're already spending time there. It's just a matter of being people, being aware of what you do.

So, you know, so those are things to consider, you know, And I think for a lot of people starting out just make it fun. Right? Have. Enjoy the process. Don't be so stiff. Don't be so rigid. Don't be so hard on yourself. Have fun and realize that it's your business. Right? You didn't buy a franchise. If you were selling my programs, then that would be different. Right? There's a fixed price, there's a fixed way of doing things, and sometimes we can get creative. But if you're selling your own program, then guess what? You've got all the flexibility in the world to customize a solution for your clients. So that again, all roads lead to. Yes. All right. Well, Aaron, was there anything else you wanted to add? I think we packed a lot of value into that conversation, and I'm hoping people really resonated with that. We'd love to hear, you know, what your comments are in the comments section. If there's something that you wish you had known, please share that with us so that we can, you know, all the other people who are reading this or seeing this can also see some of your tips and strategies that have helped you come this far in building your practice.

All right. I'll say the thing that resonated with some of the mentees that I had in our group last week was we have permission to make it messy to, like, create an ugly first draft. Learning and studying writers like Stephen King, no one wrote a masterpiece on their first try. It's just an expectation in the writing process that's going to be ugly. It's going to be disorganized, and the beauty comes when you edit. But you have to give. You have to wear that hat of I'm going to be making messy in the beginning.

Right.

I think that can free up a lot of the expectation of how perfect it should look. So I don't think perfectionism should be a crutch we can lean on. We have permission to have an ugly first draft. That's often what's happening in the beginning. It's like, create the first draft or you can't edit nothing.

I have this big smile on my face because I remember when I got my first website ever made for us, and this was back in 2010. And I look at it now, and you couldn't pay me to have that website, but when it first came out, I was like, oh, my God, this is so cool. And it was mine. You know, it was. It was my website. And just know that you're going to evolve over time. Right. You're never done. Building your business is never done. You know, growth is never done. So you know, be prepared for that. And I love that. You know, let your, you know, let your mess help you with your messaging, right? And, you know, don't be so caught up in making it perfect because it's never perfect, right? If nothing is perfect, even like the iPhone, when you get it, like every few weeks you've got to update it because it's not perfect right now cars, like, you know, if you buy a Tesla, they update them because they don't ship them perfect. They're always refining them, improving them. And I think that we have to realize that our business is like that as well. It's kind of like we're in the software business, right? We're able to, you know, create solutions for people and customize solutions for people based on their needs. Just like software is, hardware is very rigid. It's hard to move the keys on a keyboard. It's impossible to do that. But software is flexible, it's malleable. And if we view our business through that lens of malleability, just like that tree when it's very young, it's flexible. That allows us to form and take shape in a way that serves us. I thought this was a great conversation, Aaron, thanks for sharing your journey and your insights and your story together. Get to get you to where you are today.

My pleasure. Thank you, Sachin. It's always fun.

Awesome. Have a wonderful day everyone and we will chat with you soon. Bye for now. Sam.