WP 11 | Expert Insights on Hiring a Virtual Assistant
Summary
In this episode of the Wise Practice Podcast, Whitney Owens and David Sturgess discuss the process of hiring a virtual assistant (VA) for a mental health practice. Whitney provides guidance on the financial considerations and considerations for finding the right fit for your practice.
Hiring a Virtual Assistant
Whitney and David begin the discussion by addressing the common question of how much to spend on a VA as a percentage of gross revenue. Whitney estimates that for a typical practice bringing in $100,000 in gross revenue, it might be reasonable to budget $3,000 a year for a VA, or $250 a month. This breaks down to about $31.25 per eight-hour a month.
Whitney reminds him that it's important to track the results of the VA's work and make adjustments as needed. If the VA isn't producing results, it's okay to let them go and try someone else. Whitney also suggests an alternative to hiring a virtual assistant. If there are schools nearby, he could try hiring an intern with a marketing or business background to write blogs and improve the practice's SEO, rather than a clinical intern.
Scaling Financially
The conversation turns to the topic of scaling financially and when it might be appropriate to set aside funds for other projects, such as starting a nonprofit. Whitney advises having a rainy day fund in place first and then thinking about what you really want to do. She suggests considering if you have the time, emotional bandwidth, and willingness to work for free to make a non-profit happen. Alternatively, he could focus on growing your for-profit practice to a point where it doesn't depend on you seeing clients. This would free up time to work on the nonprofit.
Wise Practice Membership Community
Whitney mentions that the doors to the Wise Practice Membership Community will be reopening in February and invites listeners to learn more about the benefits of the community. David speaks highly of his experience in the community, praising the weekly contact, virtual group circles, discounts, and the opportunity to build friendships and professional connections with other mental health professionals. He also appreciates the freedom to openly discuss faith and pray for one another within the community.
Three Quotes Form the Episode
"If you hire someone and it's not producing results, you don't have to keep them."
"Everything in our practice is a trial and error."
"Watch your numbers, track things."
Conclusion
Overall, the discussion between Whitney and David highlights the importance of careful financial planning when considering hiring a VA, as well as the value of seeking guidance and support from a professional community. To learn more about David's practice, visit Foundry Counseling or call the toll-free number 888-710-3030.
Connect With Whitney
Instagram - @whitneyowensconsulting
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WP 11
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Whitney Owens: I know when you're scrolling on Instagram, you're wishing you had something fun to watch. Well, I wanna tell you that you need to head over to my Instagram account, Whitney Owens Consulting. Not only do I love to make silly reels for you, but I also give you helpful information to help you start and grow your faith-based practice.
So head on over to Whitney Owens Consulting. Would love to be hanging out with you on Instagram.
Whitney Owens: Welcome to the Wise Practice Podcast. This is episode number 11 and I'm here with a dear friend of mine, David Stuga. So let me tell you a little bit about David before we get into today's episode. He is a licensed professional counselor and Marietta, Georgia, and owns. Foundry Counseling on the Marietta Square.
He holds a C P C S, which is a supervisor credential in the state of Georgia, allowing him to provide supervision for newly licensed clinicians. Following their completion of their graduate work for a decade, he's worked as a therapist and two of Georgia's short and long-term psychiatric facilities. And during those two years of working in the hospital, he opened his own practice.
Part-time specializes in working with first responders. Thank you, David, for hanging out with us today. Yeah, so you are the first of a series we're gonna do here on indivi like consulting, but also working through some things in your practice. I'm looking forward to doing some live consulting calls. And then if you first wanna tell us a little bit more, whatever I left out in the bio, and then we'll jump into your hot question for today.
David Sturgess: So we we, there's two other therapists that are here all specialize in, in trauma work. We have a lot of experience with dialectical behavior therapy as well. I'm. Pursuing E M D R to add to that. And do a lot of work with first responders police, fire, paramedic, military and their families and children because that's a unique group aside from the responders.
And then we also do Christian counseling as needed or requested by our clients. It's not something. Is a part of every session for every client, but we do have that.
Whitney Owens: Yeah, I love it. And, and David and I have known each other for quite some time and I've loved seeing how he has pivoted his practice for the needs of the community around him finding his own passion.
And I just wanted to say that here, cause I think so many therapists kind of stick to one thing and do it when it might not actually be the very thing that's best for them. And so I love that you have made this practice something that meets the needs of your community and also your own passion. Yeah.
Yeah. Well, great. Well, why don't you go ahead and ask your questions. I think it is a popular one for the
David Sturgess: audience. So it's when and how to add that VA or, or maybe not even a virtual assistant, but an in-person, you know, assistant to a, a practice to be able to scale and take things to the next level.
And, and also being mindful of. Not having a whole lot of, you know, cash reor resources just to immediately start paying out. Right. So how do you kind of bring somebody on in, in correlation to the resources that you have and, and being able to scale up? Yeah. If that question makes sense.
Whitney Owens: Makes perfect sense.
It's a good question. So there's several things I think we need to consider. You know, most people say if you've thought about adding an assistant, you've waited too long. , you know, I, I kind of agree with that. Kind of don't, but I think it's a funny thing to say .
David Sturgess: So I'm about two years old in into that.
Waiting too long. .
Whitney Owens: Yeah, that's right. Okay, so the first thing I wanna ask for you ask a question with a question is, what do you need an assistant to do? I think identifying your need first is most, I.
David Sturgess: Okay. It's, it's answering calls and getting them converted, you know, into a client. Getting them all set up into the, the ehr but then also being able to help out with that social media kind of marketing schedule as a self-pay practice. We're not relying on an insurance referral string. So having that social media presence, and then I work with simplified seo, Jessica Tepa with the SEO on the website and stuff like that.
It's, it's, it's those things initially and then there's those projects or those next level dreams that I also need. building that foundation, you know, so it's not your run of the mill. Let me just find that VA through your typical VA company, I guess. Mm-hmm. .
Whitney Owens: Yeah. Okay. And I wanna clarify, you just mentioned simplified seo.
Do you need an assistant to help you with something going on there?
David Sturgess: Possibly writing blogs, you know, type of thing. And, and for things that I don't have to be a part of directly, you know, in working with them. For instance, if the VA wrote a blog, them choosing pictures, them choosing keywords and working with simplified, I don't need to be a part of that, right?
Yes. In that context. Yes. Great.
Whitney Owens: Okay. So these are all great reasons to hire and I love that you narrow those down. And I would say in an ideal world, maybe we could have someone do all those things and they would be our little magical assistant. Yes. But doesn't always happen. So I would say find of all those things, what is the thing that's like, I, I kind of heard you say three jobs.
In essence, one was intake coordinator, the next one was social media manager, and the other one was a blogger, for lack of a better way to say it, or a copywriter of those three things. A good question is, which one of these is gonna bring me income or the most
David Sturgess: income?
Probably the marketing first. Okay. I, I mean, in the sense. I, I know that is what I hate doing. Creating a social media post and making sure that it's got the pictures and the keywords and like I need to outsource that. I know that about me. And because we're not relying on insurance referral stream, That is a huge piece.
And then second, I would do that intake just as calls start to come in. I also can't be on top of all those, but I would kind of put the marketing as a higher priority right now for those
Whitney Owens: reasons. Yes. Okay. So. How many calls would you say you currently get in a week at your practice?
David Sturgess: Well being that it's January 3rd I think, but think about the last two months looking back.
Yeah. Numbers wise, we're probably averaging three or four. And that's with. Some messed up seo, which is why I went to simplified because I was with another company that shall remain nameless. And so those calls are starting to come back. Okay. So it's not a problem right now in terms of me answering that phone, but it will be when the SEO in marketing is back where it was.
Whitney Owens: All right. Okay. That's good to know because if you're not getting a lot of calls, then having someone to take calls might not be what you need.
David Sturgess: Right, right. Okay. Which is where I'm kind of putting marketing as a higher priority at the moment. Mm-hmm. ,
Whitney Owens: so I think you've heard me say this before, but when people are on social media, are they looking for a therapist?
David Sturgess: Depends. I think where they are, they're not necessarily shopping, right. Ah, but they're, where are they shopping? What do you mean
Whitney Owens: if you, okay. I just had someone call me earlier today, a friend of mine, and she said, I need a therapist. What do I do? And I said, you go to psychology today.com. You search marriage counselor Savannah, Georgia.
I don't say get on Instagram and do the hashtag right Christian counselor and find it. Right. So I'm saying and John Clark said this to me and I say it over and over cause I thought it was so insightful. People are on social media just to scroll and be entertained. You know, people are on Google a lot more to find something they need.
right. So we were kind of just talking about these two different things and as we're kind of talking through this, what if you hired, it sounds like doing the website stuff might be the most important and really focusing on that and then, and then the marketing or the social media after that.
David Sturgess: And I feel very confident with the SEO under Simplified seo.
Mm-hmm. , they're phenomenal, they're easy to work with, afford. . And in the two months that they've taken things over, numbers are already going up, analytic numbers are already going up. Right. So it's that social media component I guess. Mm-hmm. .
Whitney Owens: Yeah. So what if we could combine these two in the sense of what if you hired someone to write blogs for you?
Cuz I know that's important. What if you could get four blogs a month? Cuz I know weekly blogg. You know, if you post your blogs at the same time every week, that's helpful for your seo. That's what simplified would tell you. So if you were to hire someone to write four blogs a month, that would probably take, I don't know, an hour, two hours per blogs.
So maybe max eight hours a month. Does that sound reasonable? Sure. Okay. And then what if we took those blogs and converted them into social media posts? So maybe your blog is. You know, five tips to get through the holidays, just cuz I'm still thinking about the holidays. And then you made some social media blogs, a social media posts, or if this person could get on Camba and do it for you and then you post every day, tip one, tip two, tip three, then you're not having to do so much content creation.
David Sturgess: And that post especially being made in can. Can just be duplicated on Facebook, Instagram, Google My business, LinkedIn Psychology today.
Whitney Owens: You got it. And then the content, you're just gonna copy and paste the blog. Gotta say, I've done this before and it worked . In fact, you can do the same thing if you have an email list for your.
David Sturgess: So email lists, what's the, I guess all sorts of companies, you know, that your your MailChimp, AWeber you know, those types of things. Do we have to consider the HIPAA aspect? Cuz like outside of referral streams, like, Some of my police fire department contacts or ministers, you know, that are just referral, they're not clients.
Mm-hmm. , right. I'm not so much concerned about their email addresses. Right. But if it's a client that is subscribing in our intake paperwork, we do get permission to text and email. That's the way they get their appointment reminders through the ehr. Is that. Adding a sentence in the informed consent of you'll also, you're also consenting to receive the monthly newsletter type of thing.
And then that, because like MailChimp doesn't sign a hipaa. Mm-hmm. or a BA. .
Whitney Owens: Mm-hmm. . Yeah. And that's not the best situation. I agree. You could put it in your informed consent. I would not automatically add people to your email list, but you can let clients know. Hey, if you're interested in, I think the one on my website is five tips to manage Anxiety, head to my website, download the pdf.
It will put you on our email list if you wanna be on it, but let the client do it on their own initiative. They choose to subscribe to it instead of us adding them to the list. I think that's how you prevent some messy stuff from happening. Okay. That makes sense. Yeah. So let's go back to this assistant part.
Okay. So we've kind of talked about the idea of maybe adding someone for about eight hours a month max. Maybe they can do 'em even faster in, that would be the ideal situation. So you need some money to do that. Mm-hmm. . So lots of different ways to think about. If we want to run percentages, cuz I love percentages.
You can think about what percentage do people typically spend on an assistant of their gross revenue? I, I should have looked at the charts right before we got on here, but I think it's somewhere between three and 5%. So if you're practice or VAs mm-hmm. an assistant for your practice. Yeah. So let's just say and I'm not gonna make you say your number's online unless you, like, on a podcast, unless you like, really wanna talk about it.
David Sturgess: I don't have, unless don't have 'em right in front of me, so I'll use that. Excuse .
Whitney Owens: All right. Let's say the typical business, let's say a typical group practice about your size. Let's say it's bringing in a hundred thousand and we're talking about gross revenue, total revenue, right? And if we multiply that number by 0.03, you've got about $3,000 that you could pay some.
A year. Did you, did you follow me with that? A year. A year. A year? Mm-hmm. . So divide that number by 12. $250 a month. You divided that by eight. You've got $31 and 25 cents. Now the goal is that you're gonna grow, right? But what if you could hire somebody for $25 an hour? To work eight hours a month just to write these blogs and get your SEO up.
Okay. How does that, how does that feel to you when I say it like that?
David Sturgess: Less overwhelming and intimidating. Because to go to your Enneagram I'm a six and so I can get really wound up in. What ifs. And to have a dollar amount and to have that in the budget. And it might also be me accepting I'm not gonna get the person that I want necessarily, but $25 is what I have.
And I think that's one thing that I've learned in my Enneagram work and in my own counseling of.
Do some reframing, I guess, you know, with Yeah, with that money and paying out, so I'm less stressed and anxious about
Whitney Owens: it. Yeah, and you know what the good thing is? If you hire someone and it's not producing results, you don't have to keep them. Everything in our practice is a trial and error. And you know, I'm always telling you to watch your numbers, track things.
So track every intake call because you wanna see are more people calling cuz they're going to your website. I mean, you definitely want your analytics to go up, but it doesn't matter if your analytics are up, if no one's converting, right? Right. And so that converting means calling and then calling becomes a client, right?
And so I would watch those numbers and then once your calls start going up, the next step would be to have somebody answer those calls. So though, when we're talking about money, interns are always a great addition. And I know you've had interns in the past, so have you considered bringing on an intern and they could write these blogs for you?
David Sturgess: I don't want a clinical intern right now if it was an intern in a business type school. Mm-hmm. , or a marketing type of degree. I, I wouldn't have a problem doing that. I just don't have that bandwidth right now for a clinical intern. If, if that makes sense. It does make sense, but those marketing business interns need, need a place too.
Whitney Owens: Yeah. So maybe if you have some local schools that you could reach out to,
David Sturgess: you know, that were zones throw away from a couple. Yeah.
Whitney Owens: So, and see if there's any way that you could just post a, Hey, we have a job in, I mean, an internship. Yeah. I know it's something to put together, but it could end up being worth saving $3,000 a year.
Sure. Mm-hmm. . Yeah. Great. And so, I know that we kind of just addressed that question. Do you wanna I know we have a few more minutes here. Do you have another question that you wanted to kind of add today? I know we were discussing that before we jumped on
David Sturgess: having the numbers for this marketing. I is super helpful in the sense of knowing where to start and. In terms of scaling into other projects it, it's scaling into things like creating a whole nother like non-profit. I mean, we're a for-profit company, but creating a non-profit in terms of my responders and thing in, in those groups that can't always do.
The full self-pay rate. Right. But they still need the care. And so I guess, do you have any
information or I guess, you know, pointers of when is it enough to kind of park that money over to the side to start developing that stuff and bring on somebody? A little bit more full-time to help with some of these bigger projects that I need, you know, an assistant for. Is it a matter of, okay, I've got my three to six months rainy day fund, and then I create that budget for you know, somebody that's doing more?
Social media, you know, blogging,
Whitney Owens: but you're talking about someone specifically to help you with the nonprofit. Is that, am I hearing that
David Sturgess: correctly? Yes and no. I, I think it's, it's having an assistant that can help me grow these different things while also still managing some of what's going on. In the for-profit, but to not get kind of lost in the locality of those, because I know paying out of which pot and all that other stuff is a different conversation.
But I guess when is it safe to
start scaling financially? D does that question make sense? Mm. We've, we've got the marketing, we've got the intake rolling, right?
Whitney Owens: Sure. I mean, I think part of this is do you have the money that you need for your family and for you, first of all and then next would be what you said. Having that rainy day fund. I think that's really important, especially after we all just went through Covid a few years ago. Like you gotta have. And then I would really think through what do you actually want, right?
If money was not an issue, would you want to start the nonprofit? How excited are you about it? And then thinking through, are you willing to work for free to make this thing happen? Because that might be what you have to do. Do you have the time commitment, the bandwidth emotionally to do something like that?
If you feel like you don't, you still wanna do. Then yes, I would stay. I would say start saving for that and save for it on the side if you feel like you can't do it yourself. Your other option would be if you wanted to continue to grow your group practice, you get the group practice at a place where you're making enough off of the group practice that it's not dependent on you seeing the clients, and that frees up your time to do the
David Sturgess: nonprofit.
Okay. Yeah, those are helpful. It's would not be me leaving Foundry Counseling to go do the nonprofit, you know, it'd be something running parallel. Right. And that is down the road. You know, when I think things are.
Where I want them to be with that Ring Day Fund. And we've got some of that marketing conversion process streamlined and happening. So to hear kind of what you're talking about in terms of the money and the, and when do we hit the go? The go button on these other projects. , making sure I get a raise, which I haven't gotten a little while, and I think my wife would like that.
Having that rainy day fund where it needed to be and like Green Oaks accounting and some other folks do recommend that three to six months of expenses. Mm-hmm. , right. For that rainy day fund. Mm-hmm. ,
Whitney Owens: Well, wonderful. It sounds like, has this been helpful for you?
David Sturgess: Very helpful. It, it helps kind of shape some of the priorities and goals for 2023. Good.
Whitney Owens: Good. And so David, as we kind of talk about this coming year I'm looking to open the doors again to Wise practice the membership community at the very beginning of February.
So I'm really thrilled about that and would love to just have a few people share you included on what is Wise practice kind of, and maybe share a little bit about how you have found it beneficial to
David Sturgess: you. It's the best. I can spend right now. Not only is it anybody can listen to a podcast, write some things down, right, but to have access to you, to have access to a community.
I, I spent 10 ish years working in psychiatric facilities and one thing that I miss the most, well, I mean, it's been six years in private practice at this point. One of the things I missed the most coming into private practice was community. You know, not having, I had my clinical consultation group, but I was doing small business entrepreneur and we're trained to be therapists.
We're not trained to be business owners and leaders. And so not only to have community with people that are. In the early stages of developing a business and growing it into something that they can depend on. But then just making friendships and bonds that I have been able to make through wise practice and consulting group masterminds, things like that.
I have a friend that I met through a mastermind with you. This was pre pandemic. Almost three years ago. 3, 3, 4 years ago. Yeah. And he lives in Oregon. I live here in Atlanta, Marietta area, and we have never physically met, but we talk almost every two weeks and have for three years. And we're. Both planning to be in Savannah with you next fall and we'll see each other for the first time.
Oh my gosh.
Whitney Owens: I'll have to be there to see, see the event occur. Yeah.
David Sturgess: But I mean, he and I, we know each other's families. We know each other's business, you know, and we've got a great friendship, but it has been over Zoom and phones. And you don't get that just by yourself trying to figure out how to.
Run this business, where are the resources, what are the ideas? And with wise practice, you get very specific things like this, this consultation today. But on all the different topics of not just growing a small business, but a mental health practice, which I think mm-hmm. is unique all and of its own.
And to have the, the weekly contact to have. Virtual group on circle and be able to message each other and good discounts that you toss out there every once in a while. I it for the amount of money, it's, it, it's one thing that I would not stop paying for if things got financially hard. Because it's just that
Whitney Owens: I.
Hmm. Well, thank you and I appreciate your support and the involvement that you've been in that community. And you know, one thing I just love, and you, you kind of, you hit on this, but I love the fact that we can get together and not have to worry about talking about our faith. Right. I just feel like in a lot of communities you feel like you can't be free about it.
You can't talk about prayer the same way or how faith impacts your clients the same way. And so to have a community that you don't have to fear, that is such a beautiful thing.
David Sturgess: Yeah. Especially in the therapy world. Mm-hmm. , you know, there, there's I think a lot of quote unquote spirituality and, you know, things like that that is different than what Christian faith is, you know, and to be able to say and praying for you, or to be able to throw out encouraging scripture or to recommend a book that comes with, you know, the issue that we're dealing with as a Christian counselor or, you know, small business leader, um mm-hmm.
that happens in Wise practice all the time. Yeah.
Whitney Owens: Well, thank you David. Well, I appreciate you and if somebody's listening and they wanna get in touch with you, hear more about your practice or your work with first responders, how can they get in touch with you?
David Sturgess: Foundry counseling dot. Or give us a call.
I've got a toll free number for our practice. 8 8 8 710 30.
Whitney Owens: Awesome. Well, thank you again for taking the time to be on the show today and actually look forward to seeing you tomorrow and our wise practice meeting.
David Sturgess: Yes. Looking forward to it.
Show noted prepared by James Marland
