Kelli Wise

Onward – to the Future!

Kelli Wise · May 23, 2017 ·

This blog post is a long time coming. If you look at the dates, you’ll see it’s been over 2 years since I last posted and a lot has happened and changed for me in those 2 1/2 years.

I’m no longer a massage therapist

A fall that injured a shoulder and a lot of other old injuries added up. I was massaging less and less. It was becoming more expensive to keep my office open than was profitable.

I am a full time web designer

I’ve been designing websites since about 1997, mostly for my former corporate job. I ended up doing more and more of them for massage therapists who needed websites for their practice. After a while, I was doing more web design than massage. Which totally suits me fine because I love web design. It appeals to the geek in me.

My web design business has grown and changed

I started off in the entry level web design market. $500 websites. In theory, they should be quick and easy (for me) to do and I could make enough revenue to pay my bills and live indoors. But the customer base for that market seems to expect fully custom websites for $500 and I just couldn’t make it work, financially. By the way, a semi-custom website price will start at $5,ooo and tops out at several hundred thousand.

I’ve also taught blogging for business with my friend Dawn Barclay. We hosted several blog challenges and got a lot of folks started in blogging. Those who have stuck with it have found that it has helped them get clients they want. A few have even started writing for industry magazines. Note: this has been a good thing and I plan to start up again.

I’ve also taught business owners how to write their own website copy. A Website That Works has helped a lot of small business owners get beyond the “Welcome to my website” boilerplate crap and build a website and content strategy that helps them attract the right clients/customers and make a living. Note: this has been a good thing and I plan to offer the course again very soon.

I speak at WordCamp almost every year.

Speaking at WordCamp is one of the highlights of my year. I get to share what I’ve learned with a room full of people who want to learn. I get to meet some incredibly smart and generous people and learn from them. I sat on a panel last year with 3 people that I admire. I felt like an imposter sitting up there with them, but they are lovely, gracious folks and I had a great discussion with them.

I’ve consolidated and simplified

At one point, I had 7 plates in the air

Massage
Web Design
Teaching live CEs
Teaching online CEs
Teaching at the massage school
Running blogging challenges
Running online courses

What I discovered is that you simply cannot promote and grow 3 very different businesses at the same time. At least not successfully. Even Gary V doesn’t have that much energy. So, I made some decisions. The first to go was teaching at the massage school. I was devoting about 3 hours outside of class for every hour in class and spending way too much time on someone else’s business with no value added to my business.

The next to go was teaching live CEs. Finding venues was a pain and after a venue double booked over one of my reservations, not the first time I had a snafu with a venue, I decided I had had enough. I wasn’t going to continue managing chaos while trying not to make my students angry over date and venue changes.

After that, I closed my massage practice and finally shut down my online ethics course this year. I haven’t run a blogging challenge or online course for over a year.

So, now I’m down to Web Design and I’ve spent the last 18 months concentrating on it. I’ve done a lot of the hard work of reviewing my strategy, client base, the market, the industry trends, and my expanding skill set and passions. I made some decisions.

1 – I can’t afford to do $500 websites

2 – I love teaching people

3 – I love doing more complex/challenging web projects and online marketing

4 – Bigger clients need help with #3

What the future looks like and what it means for you

This will be the last blog post on Massage Therapy World.

It’s been wicked fun and I’ve met some amazing people over the last 7 years. It seems fitting that I should shut it down on the anniversary of the blog. My first post went live in May of 2010. The last will be May of 2017.

I’ll leave this up for a couple of weeks while I sift through the archives. I’ll be taking some of my best business and website posts and rewriting them and republishing them at Pint Sized Sites. If there are any that are specific to massage therapy, I’ll see if I can find another place to guest post, like I have at Massage Business Blueprint.

My web design business is now pretty focused on helping nonprofits with their web presence and online marketing. I’m a proud bleeding heart liberal and helping organizations that help people makes me happy. Helping people is why I got into massage and teaching, so this is just the next step in that process. If you’ve got a decent sized nonprofit that whose website is ready for a level up, you’ll find me at kattero.

And Pint Sized Sites? Well, she’s getting a makeover. And, yes, I think of that website as a she. Kind of like a ship, ya know? Pint Sized Sites will still be focused on helping new and very small businesses with their websites, but with a change in method. Instead of doing it for you, I’ll be teaching you to do it yourself.

When I started Pint Sized and Massage Therapy World, your choice for DIY websites was using the crap site builder offered by your webhost or overpaying someone like Intuit for a crap website. Now, there are some really fabulous solutions out there that do a lot of the technical heavy lifting and will help you build a terrific website. With some knowledge of content creation, blogging, and simple SEO, you can create a website that works for your little business. So, Pint Sized Sites will be the place for how-to articles, in depth reviews of tools, and online courses to teach you to do it yourself.

Finally, you’ll still see me teaching at WordCamps across the US. I’ll be applying to speak at a few scattered across the country. If I come to your town, I’d love to see you at WordCamp and we can share a cup of coffee or a glass of iced tea.

And that’s my future. Helping folks with websites and teaching. In a couple of weeks, this site will automagically redirect to Pint Sized Sites. If that’s not your thing, then I want to take this opportunity to say:

Thank You for sharing this journey with me!

It has been my privilege and pleasure to write for you, meet so many of you online and in person.

If you come along to Pint Sized Sites to learn more about websites for your massage practice (or spa or clinic or CE business), then I look forward to working with you on your success.

Cheers!

Kelli Wise

The problem with DIY websites

Kelli Wise · Nov 20, 2014 ·

I know a lot of you are using the free websites available through AMTA and ABMP, or maybe you’re using Weebly, Wix, or WordPress. I’m really glad that you are taking advantage of internet marketing. After all, almost 80% of your potential client base is using the internet to find products and services.

There’s nothing wrong with being thrifty, either, although I’m still not a huge fan of the free AMTA and ABMP sites, but money doesn’t grow on trees and WordPress.com, Weebly or Wix with a custom domain is not a bad solution. Especially for those of you who get sweaty palms thinking about the technical, geeky stuff that comes with creating a website.

The DIY websites take care of the geeky stuff

like installation, setup, settings, and updates. That can help bypass a big source of stress for a lot of small business owners. We have enough stress in our lives, just trying to do bookkeeping, laundry, marketing, networking, newsletters, and all the other millions of tasks that come with running a massage practice.

Having something that takes one source of stress out of your day should be celebrated. If you don’t have a web designer that can help, then the DIY website providers are your best choice.

So you sign up for an account, pay the small extra fee for a custom domain (it’s worth the money, trust me), login in, pick a theme, click on “Add new page” to start work on creating your Home page.

And that’s when it hits you:

What exactly should you put on the Home page?

So you get up, make a cup of tea, grab a snack, and settle down in front of the computer. You still have no clue what to put on that home page, so you check out some of the massage therapists’ sites in town, and kind of copy what they do.

Now you just need to do the same for a few more pages and you’ll be done with that website.

You’re going to need a lot more tea.

I design a lot of website for massage therapists. I’ve even salvaged some sites after they got scammed by someone in the industry. I know what you’re up against. No one teaches this online marketing stuff in massage school. Ok, I do, and I know Allissa Haines over at Writing a Blue Streak does, but we’re definitely in the minority.

And this gets me back to the point of this blog post:

What is the problem with DIY websites?

When I talk to business owners who are trying to create their website content, I get the sense that they are just as lost as you are trying to figure out what to write on their website.

They have a blank sheet of paper, a lot of confusing articles and blog posts on what to put on their website, and an empty WordPress or Weebly site they have to fill up.

So, they delay a bit, walk around the office, make some tea, eat some snacks and finally resort to copy and pasting from other websites. And they hope that it works.

You just can’t get away with that anymore.

Website visitors have seen a lot of websites by now.

They can recognize a good website from a bad one and they really have little patience or interest in sticking around if it’s bad. And don’t even think about using autoplay on videos!

So the result is that the DIY websites don’t tell you what to put on that website or how to make that content great.

So you end up with a website that might look pretty, but it never really brings in any customers.

So the real problem with those free and DIY websites is: They don’t work!

All that time and effort wasted on a website that doesn’t work. That makes me very sad because I hate to see someone spend time and money on this terrific marketing tool and not have it bring them any business.

That’s why I created a course that will walk you through creating website content, step by step. Content that your website visitors will connect with and love. Content that will get them to do business with you.

I taught this course once before and the students who worked through all the material have seen it work. I use these same concepts when I’m creating a website. (Psst, some of this stuff works for flyers and newsletters, too).

This is my secret sauce.

I’ve spent years studying web design and content marketing. I’ve bought books, taken classes, and attended seminars. I’m putting everything I’ve learned and used into this course.

I’m not holding anything back.

If you are ready to get your website working and bringing in business, then you don’t want to miss this class.

10 weeks, 10 lessons, lots of support and real actionable work to give you:

A Website That Works

Registration is now open and we begin on December 1st. Why not start 2015 with a better, more effective website?

Your massage practice deserves a great website! If you are ready to make it great, click on the link and sign up or read more details.

The profession needs your help

Kelli Wise · Nov 7, 2014 ·

Hey you! Yes you, reading my little blog in between massage clients. Can we talk?

You and I have so much in common, see, so I feel like I know all about you. For instance, it’s likely you are

mid 40’s or older
probably a sole practitioner
giving about 15 hours of massage a week
charging about $65 for an hour of massage
rely mostly on repeat customers
and FEMALE

Wow, we are a lot alike! How do I know this? Well, survey data from the AMTA bears those numbers out. Even looking at the demographic data from the Massage Therapy World Facebook page, the demographic data is almost all women and the average age is in the 35-44 range.

If you’ve looked around at meetings, spas, or conventions, you’ve probably noticed this, too. And it’s a problem for all of us.

See, I come from the world of engineering. Electrical Engineering, to be exact. EE is almost the opposite of massage – the profession is dominated by men with about 11% of the profession being women. When I went to industry conferences and events, I was one of about 10%. It had it’s perk: I never waited in line to use the restroom during breaks since there were so few of us.

But it had its downsides. Subtle, if not overt, sexism. I made less money than my male peers. I advanced slower than my male peers. I actually had men tell me they didn’t want a woman (on their design team) (as a manager) (working in their lab). I was told, in those exact terms, all three of those by a man at least once.

It sucked. It was wrong. In some cases, it was illegal.

Here’s massage’s dirty little secret: the men in our profession are subject to the exact same sexism as I was in engineering.

This is what they hear: (I don’t want a male therapist) (He’s a male therapist, are you sure you’re comfortable with that) (I’m sorry, we aren’t looking to hire a male therapist, only female).

In only one of those examples was it a client. Almost always, the sexism comes from women in the industry.

Being a male massage therapist has it’s perk: there’s no line to the restrooms, but in every other respect, it mirrors women in engineering:

less pay
fewer job opportunities

Things can be tough for the odd man out, but not impossible. I had men in the corporate world who believed in me. They provided opportunities for me to demonstrate that a woman could do just as well as a man. I was promoted to Director of Engineering and the men who gave me the opportunity also worked as advocates to help convince the tougher nuts on my staff to ‘give the woman a chance’. Without that support, the opportunities would not have been as effective.

As a little shout out: Thank you Fred, Bill, Mike, Steve, Peter, Wes, and Jim.

This is where you come in.

See, the men in our profession need our help. They need the opportunities to demonstrate to the client base that a male massage therapist is just as good as a female therapist and they need us to advocate for them to the public.

We need to start educating the public that male therapists are just as safe and competent as female therapists.

As the majority in the profession, it’s up to us to help end the sexism. That needs to start inside the profession, but it also needs to include how we talk about male therapists to the public and our clients.

When clients call to book a massage:

Don’t go all “make sure the client knows there are male therapists available and that they are ok with that”
Do simply give them an option “You’d like an appointment at 6pm? We have Matt available or Beth available”. Let the client decide.

When someone you meet tells you they would never have a male massage therapist, ask them why and

Don’t confirm their bias
Do explain when you have had a male colleague massage you that was a great massage experience.

Example: when I refer people to my favorite massage therapist, who happens to be a male, my endorsement of him goes like this: “I want to refer you to Todd, because I’m sure he can help you. In fact, Todd is the therapist I go to for massage and I’m very picky.” It’s not about him being good despite or because of his gender, but simply that he’s good.

If you have a clinic with male therapists, start getting them some clients! Once your customer base starts to realize that a male therapist is awesome, they will rebook and tell their friends. Ending sexism begins by changing minds and you can change minds one client at a time.

And lastly, when a male MT applies for a job at your clinic or spa, unless there is a legitimate, legally defendable reason, do not turn him away because he’s male. That’s called discrimination and it’s illegal.

Why you should help

I know you’re probably wondering why you should help the men in this profession, since they tend to have advantages in society, so here are the reasons I think you should help end sexism in massage:

The men in this profession give great massages!
Diversity in any profession can increase the number of ideas to advance the profession and the people in it. With an industry that is predominantly female, white, and middle aged, we don’t have enough diversity in our ranks.
In female dominated professions, average pay is lower. So, if we get more men in the profession, we might see pay increase.
It’s the right thing to do. Discrimination sucks, regardless of who is being discriminated against.

How can we help the male therapists in our profession? Add your ideas and discussion in the comment section below.

First, Do No Harm

Kelli Wise · Aug 7, 2014 ·

Today on my Facebook feed is a news story about young girls soaking tampons in Vodka and using them to get drunk AND this little beauty:

I can't believe people believe this: Essential-Oils-to-Combat-Ebola-virus — I can’t believe people believe this

You read that right, this brand of essential oils is being touted as fighting Ebola and that is being propagated by licensed massage therapists. I have only one thing to say about both of these stories:

Are you fucking kidding me?

At first, I thought the EO/Ebola thing was a silly joke, but some of my less informed colleagues are out there spreading this information like it was handed down to them by God herself. If you are one of them, STOP. Right now. Just stop.

First – ebola is not an easy disease to catch. You have to come into contact with the body fluids of someone with the virus. It’s not spread through the air, like the flu.

Second – there are only 2 people in the US with the disease. Out of over 300 Million people in the US. And these 2 aid workers caught the disease in Africa while treating infected patients in Liberia. They came home to the US for treatment and to die near family. They are in isolation units after having been transported to the US in specially equipped planes. No one has caught ebola in the US and it does not exist on this continent.

Third – there is no known cure for Ebola. You either have the constitution to survive it or you don’t.

So why am I so angry about this one little graphic? Let me count the reasons:

1 – THIS IS FEAR MONGERING FOR PROFIT

Yes, I said it. Given that Ebola infects 0.000000667% of the US population and does not exist in any animal populations on this continent, no one you know is going to catch this disease. So firing up your copy of Photoshop and creating some new advertising materials to cash in on the Ebola news is fear mongering for profit. Did you know that there are 6,500 cases of Leprosy in the US (1)? And that armadillos carry the disease? How about bubonic plague – you know the disease that killed over a third of the population of Europe? There are 7 new cases reported in the US each year (2). I don’t see anyone advertising about preventing either of those with essential oils. They are not as sexy or in the news as much, so there’s less quick profit potential.

Where are your damn EO posters for treatment of leprosy (Hansen’s Disease) or Plague? Well? Where are they? If you don’t have them, you are simply fear mongering for profit.

2 – YOU ARE OPERATING OUTSIDE YOUR SCOPE OF PRACTICE

Oh, you can put all the disclaimers about “this is just my personal opinion” on all of your posts, but I’m sick of you manipulating the power differential (3) like that and then hiding behind some weasel words. Your clients think you know more about medical care and health matters than they do and your opinions have power. Real power. Your weasel words and disclaimers do nothing about that and you know it. So quit. You are misusing your license to manipulate people into changing their health care treatment in ways you have no training to asses.

3 – THIS IS UNETHICAL

See points 1 and 2. You are whipping up a panic and selling an unproven remedy and marketing it with your advanced massage training and licensing. Yes, I know you have ‘anecdotal evidence’ showing that your favorite EO works for everything, but I have anecdotal evidence that the sun circles the earth. It comes up in the east, travels across the sky and sets in the west. That doesn’t make it true. And your anecdotal evidence about EOs doesn’t make their claims true, either.

4 – SOMEBODY IS GOING TO GET HURT AND SOMEBODY IS GOING TO GET SUED

When you convince someone to rely solely on your EO to prevent and cure disease, someone is going to get sick and die of one of those diseases. And that makes you liable, despite your cut and paste disclaimers. It happens to bigger companies with better disclaimers, it will happen to you. And when that happens, I plan to cheer on the plaintiff because you, dear, are responsible. You whipped up their fear, told them to trust you because you have a license, offered them a miracle cure, and they died. That’s all on you.

I’m not even going to offer the platitudes of “I know you mean well” and “You do it from a place of love” because that would imply that I condone this kind of behavior. And that would make me complicit in any harm that behavior does. I don’t and I won’t.

It’s good to keep your clients informed about the latest in health news

When that ‘informing’ turns into fear mongering for profit? Nope. That’s not good. That’s unethical, irresponsible, dangerous, and disgusting.

First – Do No Harm

That should be the first thing you think about whenever you treat a client, educate a client, or market to a client. Will what I am doing/advocating harm someone? Will my encouraging someone to defer medical attention cause them harm?

If you are more interested in jumping on the media frenzy “we’ve got 24 hours of airtime to fill so let’s make it all sound like a crisis” bandwagon than actual facts, than I say shame on you.

If you find this post to be too inflammatory or offensive, then as my grandmother used to say “Don’t let the door hit ya where the good Lord split ya.” I don’t want to be complicit in the harm you are doing.

To the families and friends of the two aid workers, one of whom has died while I was writing this: My very sincerest condolences. I am so sorry for your loss and have the greatest respect for those brave people who go into aid work knowing the risks and facing the dangers. Blessings on you and your loved ones.

1 – http://www.hrsa.gov/hansensdisease/

2- http://www.cdc.gov/plague/maps/

3 – A power differential exists when one person has more knowledge in an area than the other. Examples include: car mechanic and car owner, doctor and patient, lawyer and client. The person with less knowledge will defer to the expert’s advice or opinion.

Why I won’t sell skinny massage

Kelli Wise · Jul 29, 2014 ·

There’s nothing like a good, meaty ethical topic to sink your teeth into, is there? I love ethics and I’m fortunate that a lot of you send me emails or Facebook messages about interesting ethical topics. Every now and then, I am very lucky that one of you gets so passionate about an ethical issue that you offer to write a guest post. Today is my lucky day. Today, I’m fortunate that Tracy Bradley has written a guest post on a very interesting subject – add ons.

Tracy Bradley has been practicing massage therapy in Paris, Arkansas since 2003. She works with headaches, shoulder/neck pain, and overall stress management at The Comfort Zone Massage. Tracy loves purple, peace signs, Coke Cherry, ethics discussions, sarcasm, internet cats, family life, naps, and all types of massage therapy discussions.

It’s not every day that I get to feature a writer from Paris!

Why I won’t sell skinny massage

Things you won’t find on my retail shelf or service menu:

Skinny massage
Anti-cellulite products
Skinny wraps
Weight loss supplements
Nutrition shakes/pills/juices

Disclaimer: This post isn’t about my personal opinion about these products. This isn’t about whether or not I think they work. My professional ethics and integrity regarding clients, body image, trust, and money is what this is about.

When someone brings up a “great new product” which makes them “tons” of money from clients I cringe. It’s either an “exclusive” essential oil brand or some kind of fat-hiding/burning product. Why? Why, as licensed/certified massage therapists would we want to sell products which highlight and shame perceived imperfections?

The fat-hiding products bother me on a professional level. Could offering fat-hiding products potentially cause a client to feel shame about his/her body? As professional massage therapists we bring people to a place of trust and understanding. Clients are asked to remove some or all of their clothing allegedly without fear of judgment or scrutiny. We touch people’s skin, massaging indiscriminately over cellulite, moles, scars, freckles, and other unique markings. Did you see those words? “We touch people.” Why would we want to line our walls with products which draw attention to bodily imperfections?

I work with clients of many different body shapes, sizes, and weights. Each person possesses a body image. Many people view different body parts as abnormal, imperfect, fat, or ugly. Often these beliefs are distorted. A person may see past his/her healthy muscle and only be able to see a layer of cellulite. Cellulite naturally occurs on every human body. It isn’t shameful to have it’s natural and probably necessary.

Body image is a fragile thing.

How we speak to clients stays with them. How we handle their little fat jokes about themselves is how they decide how much to trust us. I have a few clients who worked up courage for a year or more to book an appointment. They were afraid of what I might think of their body. If potential clients are that worried about what we think of what we see why would we want to display products that throw their insecurities in their faces? I believe displaying and selling these products can contribute to low self-esteem and poor body image. We could be losing massage clients by selling these products. Who wants to be semi-nude in front of someone who could be scrutinizing him/her? Even if we aren’t scrutinizing bodies the products do.

Scope of Practice

Promoting inch-reducing products also confuses the client/therapist relationship. If we sell skinny wraps the client could see us as weight loss experts. Even though the company provides information about use and lifestyle the client will want more from US. If a client has questions beyond the product literature where will I get the answers? I am not a medical doctor, dietician, or personal trainer. I am not qualified to give advice or develop a weight-loss plan. Clients view us as experts and authority figures. If we sell these products they will think we are weight-loss experts. Is potentially harming a client with possibly incorrect information worth a little money? We are licensed to administer massage therapy not to counsel weight-loss. Restating information from marketing materials is not the same as becoming certified to become a weight-loss counselor.

Is selling weight-loss products, vitamins, and wraps practicing within our scope? This probably varies state to state. In my state our Practice Act (Law) states: (4)(A) “Massage therapy” means the treatment of soft tissues, which may include skin, fascia, and muscles and their dysfunctions for therapeutic purposes of establishing and maintaining good physical condition, comfort, and relief of pain.” Selling wraps that clients take home to apply weekly doesn’t seem to fall into this category. Applying a skinny massage technique would be within this scope. Who knows about selling vitamins and supplements? My opinion? It crosses into the territory of prescribing things, which we are not supposed to do. It appears to be a gray area and I’m sure there will be a great discussion. Discussions are good. I can see things from other perspectives.

What do you think? I’m curious to hear what add on services or products you sell and which ones you won’t and why.

Let’s discuss add ons in the comments below.