Growing your Practice
Many times I am asked at seminars or on the phone, “I’ve taken the classes to stretch people using AIS”, now what. When giving advice to others I work on four different components for success.
Lance Mattes
Vice President of Aaron L. Mattes Therapy and StretchingUSA.com
Be professional.
Identify yourself as a professional who is trained and qualified to work with others, helping them to stretch properly using AIS.
- You must have a good basic knowledge of how to do the self-stretching if you are going to teach this work to your clients or teach a small stretching class to your clients.
- You must have the training and know the protocols to assist clients who are suffering from different types of ailments. Many times you will have people who want to feel the relief achieved from the full range of motion of their joints and muscles. Others want you to assist in their stretching because they lack the range of motion which causes aches and pains and life becomes easier to endure when the body moves without restriction. There will be clients that come to you with specific problems such as low back pain, neck pain, fatigue or other neurologic type problems. When working with those individuals you will have to have knowledge of the protocols of the stretches to do to solve these types of issues.
- Students/therapists may come to only 1 class and they feel that they are now an expert. I always tell people that you must keep improving your skills and pay close attention to the technique you use each and every time you assist the person you are stretching. Watch your form, body mechanics, hand placement and fluidity of your movements. You will want to also maintain the proper amount of pressure applied during the stretch as well. Stretching should NEVER be painful and when finished you should have an enjoyable experience so that the client will want to come back for more.
Quality is not an act, it is a habit.
Your quality of work will be a sounding board for others to come to you. A great form of advertisement is a success. When you work on a client and you help them to achieve their goals of feeling good or relieving them of pain or stress, they will tell others. I love when I receive a phone call and someone tells me that a former client has referred them to me. Then you know that you are doing good work and others appreciate you for the quality you perform. You just have to remember that you are only as good as your last treatment. If you start to get sloppy or you do not do a good job, people will notice and your referrals from others will stop. Quality of work breeds success.
Be of service.
A great way of introducing yourself and your stretching skills is to volunteer your services in your community. Many times in the community you will see where there are events taking places such as road runs or community events. Take the time to go out and donate a little time, introduce your skills so others know what you do. Set up a little space, give people a sample of how the stretching will help their tightness or soreness. Share what this work can do for various problems. Speak intelligently and present yourself in a clean looking manner. Offer people your business cards for future reference. As your practice grows, a satisfied customer is worth its weight in gold. One satisfied customer will tell their friends.
Promote your practice.
Another great place for getting business is from referrals from other AIS Practitioners. For years we have encouraged AIS therapists and practitioners to refer people to their peers. Many times you will work with a patient and they will say, “A family member or friend lives in another state, do you know of anyone there?” On our site, we have an area where you can place your information on our site so that people can refer clients to you. It also will show up when people are searching online for AIS Practitioners. This will give you credibility as it will show your location, your web site, give them further information like your education, where you got your training, etc. This will help promote your practice. Our site is visited by people from all over the world who are looking to improve their health and knowledge of AIS. A person simply types in their address and a list of AIS Practitioners in their geographic area will come up for them. When people ask us who we would refer them to in a certain area, we tell them to check the referral list and assure them, that therapist had attended a seminar with us.
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