As I’ve started my own business in seven cities and three countries, let me share some insights with you.
You’ve built up your practice. Business is going well. Your clients and the physicians in your area are happy with you and keep a steady stream of referrals coming in. The local media call you for TV, radio and newspaper interviews. Spokesperson work is sporadic but regular. Life is good.
Then you have to move, for whatever reason, and you have to start over. You know what success feels like and look forward to continuing this feeling in your new city. You expect your name and reputation has traveled so well that minimal marketing is necessary. Unfortunately this doesn’t happen when you have your own business. A move means going from “celebrity” to “nobody” in a few hours. However, do not fear, help is near, and a reality check.
Your First Year
Before leaving your area, contact dietitians in your new city. Go to www.eatright.org to find your state and regional dietetic associations and local members of your dietetic practice groups (DPG’s). Members of the Nutrition Entrepreneur’s (NE) DPG will understand you the best. Call or email them about locations, media or spokesperson opportunities and fees. The NE listserv is a wonderful way to get good advice, although you cannot discuss fees due to legal issues. Update your location on your website, which you really need to have.
Private practice: If you do not have savings or someone supporting you, start part-time as you’ll need a steady stream of income. Colleagues can help you find a day job. Start counseling in the evenings and Saturdays.
Consulting, speaking and spokesperson work: Send change of addresses to former clients. Find new clients on the Internet. With new clients, success is obtained through continuous contact and persistence. When you hear that it takes seven tries to make a contact; that is certainly close.
Media work: Find the TV and radio stations, newspaper and magazine offices in your area. Send the health producers or editors your articles and demo-reels, or refer them to your website which should contain your articles.
Location
Private practice: Fix up a home office or find a health club that won’t charge you rent. You will need to pay a percentage of your fees to the club. If you start your practice by paying rent, you can drain your finances quickly.
Consulting, speaking, spokesperson and media work: This can be done from your home.
Marketing
For all entrepreneurial activities:
• Print cards and stationary as soon as you have settled in.
• Update your website and add interesting articles.
• Join the state and local dietetic associations, and the Nutrition Entrepreneurs DPG. Start a mini-NE group in your area. You’ll be surprised at how willing colleagues are to share their experiences, failures and successes. Volunteer on one of these committees.
• Attend any function, social or business-related, and network
• Start a database (doctors, potential clients)
• Keep busy (writing, phoning, emailing, faxing to potential contacts)
• Write articles for DPG newsletters so colleagues can think of you in your new location.
• Give free talks at Rotary, Chamber of Commerce, health fairs, etc.
For private practice: Send letters introducing your practice to doctors, chiropractors, fitness centers, massage therapists and psychologists in your area. Visit doctors’ offices, talk to their staff and leave a handout for their patients
Introduce yourself to PR companies for spokesperson work. Send a change of address to past clients or introduction letters to the local media, PR agencies and food companies.
Image
Change your image to suit your city. I didn’t understand that. When I moved from San Francisco to New York, I was told I look Californian. This was not good. You need to dress to suit your city, and as sophisticated as your clients. I asked a stylist friend of mine to shop with me and bought her lunch. Now I wear a lot of black! This wouldn’t work if I moved to Miami.
Different Cultures
Learn about the different cultures in your city. In San Diego, know Mexican foods; in Miami, know Cuban foods; in New York, know foods from all the countries in the world! This is not as difficult as it seems. During a dietary history, you’ll see what different cultures eat, and use that information to plan their meals to suit their lifestyle.
• Use the Internet and read whatever you can on the client’s culture.
• Expand your horizons with different cultural foods and food practices.
• Don’t apologize because you don’t understand their culture’s eating habits. Explain this is new to you and you will learn from them, and adapt their foods to a healthy meal plan. When I moved from Johannesburg, South Africa, to Toronto, Canada, I had a client threaten to walk out of a counseling session because she had binged on Oreos, and I didn’t know what an Oreo was. She felt I was ignorant.
• Don’t fear taking on a client from a different culture, you can learn a lot and help them as well. Often, they don’t have someone from their own culture who is available.
• When moving to a new country, learn the spelling, metric blood values, and local foods quickly. Taking the country’s dietetic registration exams will get you started. Transcripts of your degrees and internships direct from the college to the new country’s registration department are needed.
Initial Results:
Private practice: You have done all your marketing correctly and did a mailing to physicians. No one responds to your nice letter. Don’t despair. Send out letters again. You will slowly receive a few calls from patients of doctors. Unfortunately they will say:
“Do you take insurance?” “No, that’s not what I had in mind. I need a prescription for diet pills.” “Thanks, but I can’t afford your fees.” “I’ll get back to you.” This leaves you depressed, desperate and wondering if you’ve made the right decision. You have, it just takes longer than you think.
Keep on sending out letters and meeting people. Soon bookings start coming in. If some clients start and then quit, don’t take it personally. It happened to you in your former practice but you were too busy to notice.
Consulting, spokesperson, media work: This is where you have to be the right person at the right time. Even though you are doing all the right marketing, these clients may not have a project for you, or you aren’t right for their current projects. Keep on networking with colleagues, who are your best referral source. If you aren’t right for a job, you’ll know colleagues who are. For example: an African American for a lactose-free food; a young mother for a breakfast cereal; a Spanish-speaking dietitian for a popular Mexican food. When companies know you are a good source of referrals, they will keep you in mind when you fit the right project.
Second Year
Private practice: You are becoming a little more established, not as successful as you would like to be, but receiving a little name recognition.
Upgrade your office or rent an office, budgeting for the slow months – January, December and the summer.
Increase counseling fees.
Speaking: Charge for your talks.
Spokesperson work: Keep in contact with potential clients.
Consulting: Become more active in your local dietetics association and DPG
Media: Continue to send press releases, write articles for local newspapers and update your demo-reel.
Third Year
By now your business should be ticking over nicely. You aren’t inundated, but you are surviving and even saving. Money and the work are coming out of the woodwork.
Invest in an office. Make it look warm and friendly, not clinical.
Increase counseling fees.
Increase fees for talks.
Write a book.
Become the President of your state dietetic association
Become a director for NE
Moderate at local dietetic and ADA meetings
Be a role model and mentor for your colleagues.
Dress and act like a successful professional.
I wish I could tell you it takes three months to go from Starting from Scratch to being Rich and Famous, but I haven’t found the formula. When I do, you’ll know about it. In the meantime, enjoy your move and your new business!
