Modernizing Therapy Websites with Effective Marketing by Kat Love Ep.65

Episode Overview

• Episode Topic:
  In this episode of Mastering Counseling,host Becky Coplen engages with Kat Love, a  Founder of Empathysites & Empathycopybusiness and marketing coach specializing in helping therapists with their websites and marketing strategies. The discussion digs into the often-overlooked business side of mental health practice, highlighting the importance of having a professional and functional website. Kat shares her journey of becoming a niche web designer for therapists, inspired by her healing journey as a sexual abuse survivor. The conversation emphasizes the need for therapists to have a strong online presence to better reach and support their clients, especially in an increasingly digital world.
  
• Lessons You’ll Learn:
  Listeners will gain valuable insights into the critical aspects of creating and maintaining a therapist website. Kat Love shares practical advice on overcoming the daunting task of building a website, emphasizing the importance of having a niche and a clear vision. The episode covers the benefits of seeking professional help versus the DIY approach and offers strategies for therapists who may feel overwhelmed by the technical and content creation aspects of website development. Additionally, Kat highlights the significance of having a holistic approach to website design, which includes ongoing support and integration of various technical tools to streamline the therapist’s practice.
• About Our Guest:
  Kat Love is a business and marketing coach dedicated to assisting therapists in establishing a strong online presence through effective website design and marketing strategies. With a background in coding and a deep understanding of the therapy profession, Kat brings a unique blend of technical expertise and empathy to her work. As a sexual abuse survivor, she has a personal connection to the therapy field, which fuels her passion for helping therapists succeed. Kat founded Empathy Sites, a website design service tailored specifically for therapists, providing a comprehensive and supportive approach to website creation and maintenance.
  
• Topics Covered:
  The episode covers a wide range of topics related to website design and marketing for therapists. Kat Love discusses the importance of having a niche and the benefits of targeting a specific audience. She explains her four-phase guided process for creating therapist websites, which includes content creation, design, technical planning, and ongoing support. The conversation also touches on the challenges therapists face when trying to build their websites, the advantages of hiring professional help, and the role of design and images in conveying the therapist’s vibe and attracting clients. Additionally, Kat shares her thoughts on integrating AI tools into the website creation process and the future of website design for therapists.

Episode Transcript

Becky Coplen: So glad to have everyone back on Mastering Counseling. We have a real episode today where Kat loves sharing with us. Welcome to the show today, Kat!

Kat Love: Thank you so much for having me.

Becky Coplen: Yes, this is going to be great, especially on the business side of mental health. Kat is a business and marketing coach who helps many therapists with their websites and marketing. And frankly, a lot of the parts of our jobs that we don’t know as much about. We need people like you for sure. Why don’t you tell us how you got into this line of work, Kat?

Kat Love:  I actually many, many years ago, I actually was counting recently, it was about ten years ago, if you can believe it. Well, I decided that I wanted to start making websites. That’s actually how I started,  getting into this. I consulted with a friend of a friend who was doing website design at the time, and he was like, you know what? It makes a lot of sense. If you have a niche, like not to just go out there and get to be a generalist, which is funny because that’s advice a lot of therapists hear as well. And it is good advice.  It’s great advice. I really took that advice to heart. I sat back and I was like, who do I respect? Who do I want to support in the world who’s doing really great work? I immediately thought of therapist Lilly. It very much was referencing my own healing journey, because I’m a sexual abuse survivor, and I’ve gone to therapy on and off throughout my life, and every single time, it’s just been so helpful and supportive to me that,  it was a natural choice for me to be like, who’s a superhero therapist, you know, hello.

Becky Coplen: I love, I mean, I hate that that happened to you. And thank you for being open about it, but I love how you’re using it.  your talents to give back to the people who helped you. That’s amazing. I mean, websites obviously were happening ten years ago, but I bet even four years ago, really almost four years. Exactly. Your website did your business pick up four years ago? I guess I would ask, with the pandemic.

Kat Love:  Actually, it’s interesting. My business did not. I think it’s because, I mean, it was just level, which was fine for me, but it did not pick up because,  I think therapists had an increased demand during that time. Right? So everybody was stressed out, you know, families were breaking apart, you know, being lockdowns with each other or lockdowns or shutdowns with each other.  and it was just, you know,  a lot of therapists were like, I don’t need a website. I know how to get clients. They’re just falling from the sky.

Becky Coplen: All right, that makes sense. Okay.

Kat Love: Yeah.

Becky Coplen:  I didn’t think of it that way, but obviously you would know. Let’s think about a therapist or counselor who, you know, wants to. Maybe they have a few clients, but they want to build a website and it feels so daunting for them. How does that process of them connecting with you go from meeting you all the way to they have a functional website? Well, not just functional, probably an amazing website.

Kat Love:   thanks for asking. My service is pretty unique. I will start off by saying that the way that a typical website design service works,  may not be the same as how my service works.  but for me and Empathy Sites, which is my website design service for therapists, we have a holistic program that walks the therapist through. Creating content, getting their site designed and then also ongoing support after we launch their site.  and so it kind of takes that daunting aspect out of it when you get support along the way like that.

Becky Coplen: For sure to know that if something goes wrong or they’re not, you know, if clients have confusion that they can go back to the same people who created it and  get that fixed. That must be really good. What  strategies would you suggest,  for therapists who maybe don’t want to reach out?  sorry. There’s my bug sighted somebody.how would you encourage people who are more introverted or maybe completely terrified of the idea of a website and technology and all of that?

Kat Love: Yeah. So I think the websites I will first validate are a lot. There’s a lot that has to go into them, onto them. And also technically. So first of all, if you’re feeling nervous about creating a therapist website, you are totally not alone in feeling that way. the good news too, though, is that there is a lot of support out there. There’s kind of two paths that an overwhelmed therapist could take. One is to do,  seek out DIY kinds of resources. So that might be a course.  It might be YouTube. There might be some free options, you know, watching tutorials and things like that.   and I don’t know if there would be any books or anything, but  there are lots of free resources on different aspects of putting a website together as a small business owner. Well, then the other path is to hire help. And I think when a therapist is trying to hire help, connecting into the types of areas of the website that are the most overwhelming might help guide who to go to for help. For instance, if you are really nervous about writing your website but you feel okay about, you know, the software side, then perhaps you’re just going to want to hire a writer.

Becky Coplen: Okay.

Kat Love: Or if you are nervous about the tech stuff, but you’re like, you know, I love writing. I would love to, you know, pick up that skill myself. It could be also kind of like a call though, like you DIY parts and then you hire for other parts. Well,  and actually, I guess there is a third path where you hire someone that can do all,  you hire someone that can help with all aspects altogether. Yeah.

Becky Coplen: Okay. All right. At your website, Katlove.Com,  tell us about your organization. Is it you doing all the writing and all of the software design and everything, or do you have other people as well? How does that look?

Kat Love: Yeah. With my website design service, I have a small team. it’s me and two others, and we or the program where I support you with writing content, finding images, and technical planning. That program right now is a one on one program with me directly. So a lot of therapists really enjoy that. They have that one on one,  look into it because it’s very specific to you and it’s very flexible to you and what you’re needing help on.  the aspects that you’re finding challenging in the content creation process.  and   that is,  that is with me,  directly at this time.

Becky Coplen: Okay. That’s really great. Like their own personal coach, which I myself admittedly teach and  if I had to design a website, I would definitely be hiring the full. I might do a little bit of writing, but  the design. And that was a question too, like, is that just the software? But you must have special design skills as well as color scheme, the structure of the setup, the links. Just talk to us about that for a little bit.

Kat Love: Yeah. Yeah. So that is another yet another aspect that gives us onto a therapist website. Right. So it’s a lot of things coming together. The design is definitely important as well. So like you’re saying  the aesthetic of it. Yeah a lot of therapists coming in, they’re like, I just really want something that’s light and clean and modern and inspires hope. In my website, visitors and design do play a big part in that, right, Mary?  The other aspect that’s going on visually on a therapist website are the images. And that is also something that is so important to get right as far as I like to think of it as expressing a little bit about who you are in the therapy of,  or in the context of your therapy sessions. So expressing who you are and also where your clients want to get to with your health. So really reflecting that destination that they want. Yeah. And there’s a way to find images that kind of connect into both.

Becky Coplen: Okay.  this is just kind of off the cuff, but are you finding you working a lot with some eye things?  in writing. And has that been a part of your organization now as well, in just the last year or so?

Kat Love: That is a great question because actually three, 3 or 4 years ago I designed a software. This was before I was a thing. I designed a software that actually writes therapist websites.  Well, I currently do use that software as part of the program.  you get free access if you’re working together with me. If you’re not working together with me, you can also use it, which is great.  and now that I am becoming more accessible, I am considering integrating more AI into the program as well.  Because I do think that it is a great tool. It is something that you can really get once you know how to use it, you can really get great results with it.  but it does take some thinking and understanding and learning. Whereas,  like the software I designed, it doesn’t require any of that. You don’t have to know how to prompt it or, you know, put in the right words or, you know, make the right follow ups or anything like that. It’s just kind of,  so there are software options that I do recommend, and I am definitely included in that.

Becky Coplen: Okay. I mean, as I’m listening and I imagine our listeners were all just like, can you just send us a little part of your brain? Because the part where you said you designed your old software years ago, I’m like,  wow,  there’s none of that in here. I am curious, though,  what degree did you get in college to help prepare you for all of this? And or maybe it had nothing to do with the college degree, but let’s go back a little bit into how you have these amazing skills.

Kat Love: Yeah. I do not have a degree in design or in anything computer related. But I come from a nerd family.  and so my stepfather is a programmer and my brother is a programmer,   I learned how to code fairly young. I was on the internet as, like an early adopter of the internet. I would say,  like making websites in the 90s and stuff like that. Well,  just for fun, right? It was just a hobby. It was something fun. Then when I started my previous career, I also had made websites for that previous business as well.  I have a lot of experience marketing from being in business, making websites, from being in business for myself. And then I translated that experience into what I do today.

Becky Coplen: Okay, that’s so awesome. Really cool to learn two new things in your childhood, and learning all of that coding would have such an impact. Now that’s amazing. you talked a little bit about, you know, your, the websites for therapists really reflecting their passion and who they work for.  just tell us a little bit more about that. Do you do, like some as part of the process? Like an intensive kind of interview with the therapist to really understand them, what makes them tick, or how do you get that vibe of the therapists, or do they fill out a lot of paperwork? How does that look?

Kat Love: Well, I think the vibe is there and it’s not as much,  a process of like pulling it out. It’s more of like an allowing or a surrender to the vibe that already exists, you know? I think what comes through is when we start to or when any therapist is working on their website, when they start to really pour into the aspects that do need to be in a website. So the aspects like the images, writing,  event planning,  thinking through some of the bridges that need to be built between the website and the practice. So things like, you know, integrating an EHR system. So even like the technical side, when you start pouring into creating all of this for the website, I think it’s just natural. The vibes naturally happen, you know?

Becky Coplen: Yeah.

Kat Love: I don’t know that there’s like a specific exercise to do. It’s just more like you get into the energy of it and  it appears.

Becky Coplen: Yeah. And so maybe this varies client to client. Is it more like you meeting them online or in person. And they ‘re giving them suggestions, but they’re actually typing in the plan or the or copying and downloading the pictures. Or is it more they give you a vision? You or your team creates things, models, templates and then you send them to your therapist or counselor and then they say they don’t like to change this. Which do you do more?

Kat Love: I have a four phase guided process okay. And so  for us again this is different from what a typical designer would offer. Typically a typical designer will  say, hey, therapist, great that you want a website. Where’s your, you know, navigation plan and your content and send me your images too. Right. So most designers start with just saying, like, I can design a website, but you have to provide the content on that website, which is really hard for most therapists to do alone without support, because you don’t get trained in grad school around what it is that needs to go onto a website, or how to write a website. Even if you’ve done really amazing academic writing, or academic writing and sales writing that needs to appear on a therapist website has nothing in common. So it makes sense if you’re like, okay, I need to put a website together, but I don’t know how,  that makes total sense.  and so over the ten years that I’ve been in this space, the process that I do now acknowledges that that’s really hard. It includes this program that helps therapists write their website, find the images, and do all the technical planning without any stress or overwhelm, because it’s fully it’s like a fully guided process. So a therapist doesn’t have to, like, do stuff on their own. It’s all like step by step with me. Gotcha.

Becky Coplen: And is that where the two the empathy sites.com and then empathycopy.com. Those come into play there. Yes, okay. So katlove.com is where we might find you. But then these are other parts of your organization for the actual writing.

Kat Love: Yes we’re writing on websites. Yeah okay.

Becky Coplen: All right. Very cool. So  one thing I’ve been thinking is we’ve been talking because we talked about niching down in the beginning and how a lot of therapists and counselors do that.  website designers, not as much. How many designers like you would you say there are in the country for therapists and counselors? Have there been more developed since you have? Are there lots? Are there not a lot. I really I really have no idea.

Kat Love: Yeah. My understanding or like insight into that is a little bit limited because I am not trying to find designers so much. But over the years I have actually made a lot of friends in this in the same space that are doing the same thing. I would say I probably have like five friends, okay, that are like doing websites because we refer to each other too. So like. Because we’re all doing slightly different things. Like there are some designers that are doing just templates, right. This would be a good match for a therapist who has a little bit of that tech savvy and is like,  I could learn how to use a template. Like I would watch tutorial videos. You know, I’m fine with spending a Sunday afternoon on YouTube, you know, like learning the platform or whatever. Like, and so there are templates and tools. Some designers are doing that. Some designers are also doing more advanced stuff. Right. it might be like a group practice that really needs a lot of, you know, ads integration and conversion tracking. You know, the, the. Most advanced kind of stuff that you probably see in the therapist website space. You have the whole spectrum of designers out there that are all offering different levels of support. And that’s why I love to encourage therapists to really connect into what they’re needing in terms of support, especially if they’re feeling overwhelmed because there is going to be a good fit solution for them out there. As far as who can help.

Becky Coplen: Sorry about that. It was muted. That is good to know. Five is kind of what I was thinking was possible. Obviously there’s more. Is that like, you know, them all, but I didn’t think you knew a ton of people because I don’t know personally,  I’ve ever met we’ve had other guests on here who do parts of this work, but I feel like someone this specific we have not had before. So it’s   interesting to learn about.  and then as far as, Do you do? Do you find a lot of therapists and counselors? I know a lot of them are very busy, but the ones that are starting out, do you have to do a lot of,  when they talk about funneling and getting people to their page? Is there a lot of time spent on that as well?

Kat Love: So you mean,  how to attract website traffic?

Becky Coplen: Yes, yes, that’s what I mean. That’s a better way. Yeah.

Kat Love:  That is a great question because it is something that is important to think about because a website really isn’t built for it and they will come. It’s more so like a tool that you can add to your marketing toolbox. And once you have that tool, you can use it within the context of a more robust marketing plan. And that marketing plan should include marketing tactics that send traffic to your website.   a lot of those tactics are not on the website itself. They’re more so things like building out a referral network or,  you know, doing public speaking, volunteering. So it could be community level items like that. It can also be other forms of online marketing. Having a Psychology Today profile, if you think about it, that’s a great way to get traffic to your website.  or the other, you know, social media as well, right? If you’re going to build out a social presence, that would be a way to build some traffic to your website as well. there’s so many options for getting your amazing website seen and in front of people and getting it to start attracting clients.

Becky Coplen: Very cool, very fascinating.  I imagine you only work online. I mean, like, you’re not having anyone come in to work with you, or it could be wrong.

Kat Love: It’s been great because I work totally online. So through zoom calls my clients can be located anywhere in the world. And I was also abroad for a while, so that was really amazing because I was living in Greece for 14 years, and I had actually established and grew this business from there.

Becky Coplen: Wow. That’s awesome. You said Greece. That’s it.  That’s so basic. How cool. I don’t know that anyone else on here is selling that as well, but many people travel. But  to have been there that long. And when did you come back to the US?

Kat Love:  last November. So just like a few, a few months ago or feels like. Yeah.

Becky Coplen: Okay. Well, that’s so awesome. I have not been to Greece, but it’s somewhere. It’s somewhere that I would love to go, for sure.  I’m trying to think. What else do you want to go into here? I know one thing. This might be too personal. So you don’t have to answer, but, Have you ever. I know you had great appreciation for many of your therapists, and not that there were many, I don’t know.  Did any of them hire you for this type of work, or would that be considered unethical? I don’t know.

Kat Love: I think it would be considered a dual relationship or dual. Is that what it’s called? Dual relationship? where you know, you’re not supposed to like therapists aren’t supposed to have like two  eyes. Relationships with one person anyway. But all my therapists can definitely follow all my content and sign up for my newsletter if they want.  Because I have three blogs now, and so lots of free,  helpful content out there.  but  it’s actually been really helpful in a way, to be calm, so specialized in therapist websites because it’s actually made it easier for me to find a therapist when I need one, and also find a therapist for my friends  okay, even friends of friends. I’ve kind of become a little bit of a therapist. Finding an okay person in my circles.  yeah. Whenever anyone needs a therapist, I send them a little form,  to fill out and about, like what they’re struggling with. then I put together a spreadsheet of options for them, it’s just as a public service.  and because I love and care about them often, they’re my closest people.  Yeah.

Becky Coplen: No, I love that. It’s amazing that you are, you know, always seeing different types of content. And then to have such a connection to so many people would be really amazing. do you, See this organization changing in the near future. Do you feel like it will remain status quo, or will you have more partners and people working for you? Or what do you think may happen in the next 5 to 10 years?

Kat Love: You know what? That is a big question. I’m wanting to hold steady. Really? I love what I do. I find it so fulfilling to work with therapists. My team loves working with therapists, too, which is really fun. I love having a team as well. That’s been also really fulfilling and satisfying to help, find talent, grow their skills, and create, like, a positive, fun team environment.  yeah. I’m having fun with it. No plans to,   you know. Yeah. Super exp right?  like, I think I think we’re going good. I might start offering some group programs. because there is, I think I am seeing a bit of a need for. This type of support around the website content.  and so that’s an idea I have and I might explore that, but we’ll see.

Becky Coplen:  I’ve definitely seen counselors, therapists, all types of people that there’s been a lot of group work or intensives,  that are going on where people will work, you know, many hours in one day, but they are seeing 20 to 50 people.  to work on something. I feel like that seems to be. I don’t know that it’s a new trend, but I definitely am hearing more about it from the people that I’m talking with. I know what I was going to ask about was the focus of your blogs since you said you’re writing three. Do they? What are the focus of each and where can we find those?

Kat Love: So @katlov.com that’s my marketing and business consultancy brand. And so you can find marketing and business consultancy content on kotlov.com backslash blog empathy copy.com backslash blog is where you can find my writing related therapist website, writing related content and then empathy sites. Dot com backslash blog is where you can find my website design and website strategy related content. And so  all of them are ready, ready for you to consume. I think I have over I have hundreds of posts. I couldn’t even tell you how many posts I have because I’ve been blogging. I’ve been blogging for years,

Becky Coplen: Oh that’s amazing.  so do you. Would you say an average? Maybe you write a blog a week, one each week for all three? Would you say on average?

Kat Love: I have gone through different phases. I think after having been in this business for almost ten years,  there’s definitely been seasons to my business, which I think is pretty normal. I feel like I see that also in the therapist, like the coach as well. Yeah.  So there was a season where I was blogging weekly, and then there were seasons where I blog more monthly,  or maybe even less.  It really depends on where I’m at in, in my business and how my priorities shift around my goals.

Becky Coplen: Okay. Yeah. Great.  well, let’s just kind of end if you had any other advice,  I’m going to say not. Well, I don’t know. It includes the therapist, but I kind of want to. If there’s someone that would love to go in your line of work,  what would be advice you would give to someone that would really like to have a job like this? They may not want to be the therapist, but they would love to support technology with software. What would be your advice for them as far as schooling?  and life experience?

Kat Love: I think a lot of the online skills can be learned online. And for me, what’s always worked best, even, you know, in the 90s when I first started doing websites and coding, what’s always worked really well for me is project based learning. And so I would recommend anyone that wants to do anything technically related as a, you know, source of income or to start a small business in that field. I would recommend finding small projects to learn on one platform that I do recommend to any beginning designers that I’ve mentored. I think it’s called idealism One kat.

Kat Love: Better platforms find  you can find volunteering opportunities, and that could be a really good way to. The site is called Idealista and then also Katchafire. These are platforms. I might be saying the name wrong, but essentially you want to look for platforms where you can find volunteer opportunities, and that’s a good way to both give back to the community and also learn a skill. Yeah.  in a project, in a project itself. Right. Because you can be really motivated and like, read books and stuff like that or watch videos, but,  I’ve found the most efficient way to learn a skill is to actually have problems put in front of you that you’re, you need to solve book three.

Becky Coplen: No. That’s amazing. I’ve not heard of those, but Idealista and catch a fire. Something close to that. But,  to be able to actually do the work, I can.  That sounds like a great idea for sure. Well, thank you so much, Kat, for all of your insight. We really got to hone in on, especially the business side and an area that many therapists and counselors struggle with. I think a lot of us, as I talk to people, do it themselves. They’re immensely frustrated. Then they reach out. They wish they had reached out first thing. So thanks for your time and wisdom about these areas.

Kat Love: You’re so welcome. Thank you so much again for having me. I really enjoyed our talk today.

Becky Coplen: Yes, I appreciate it.  and to our listeners,  feel free to check out KatLove.Com  please go on our website Mastering Counseling to hear from our other guests as we kind of tie in all the different aspects and business sides of the mental health world, counseling, therapy, and those supporting us,  in various ways. Signing off for today is Becky. Have a wonderful day.