Ever wondered how to create a thriving private pay practice that gives you freedom, flexibility, and the chance to travel the world? In this episode of The Traveling Therapist Podcast, I chat with Jessica Harris, a single mom and therapist who went from barely getting by after grad school to building (and selling!) a successful private practice. Now, she runs a coaching business teaching other therapists how to find cash pay clients and create the lives they dream about.
Jessica shares her journey from working in agencies to launching her own business, traveling with her daughter, and discovering that mindset and strategy go hand in hand when it comes to success.
In This Episode, We Explore…
Connect with Jessica:
Website: https://www.empoweringtherapists.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/empoweringtherapists
Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/privatepaytherapy
Connect with me:
Instagram: @thetravelingtherapist_kym
The Traveling Therapist Facebook Group: www.facebook.com/groups/onlineandtraveling/
Signup to learn more about life as a Traveling Therapist: https://www.portablepracticemethod.com/free-training
Revolutionize Your Private Practice with AI Course: www.kymtolson.kartra.com/page/ai
Bill Like A Boss Insurance Billing Community: www.kymtolson.kartra.com/page/blab
Subscribe to the Podcast:
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Transcript:
[00:00:00] Kym_: Hey everybody. Welcome back to another episode of The Traveling Therapist podcast. I'm excited to have our guest today. She's got a very cool story.
[00:00:08] Jessica Harris, thank you for being here. Jessica, if you could tell us, start out with how'd you go from just being a typical therapist to a traveling therapist.
[00:00:17] Jessica: Yes. I love the question. Yeah. I started out just as the typical therapist making hardly any money after grad school, wondering how I would make it, um. and then becoming a single mom too shortly after I graduated. So really being like, okay, how am I gonna do this thing? Like luckily I finished grad school.
[00:00:33] But yeah, that's kind of where I started just working at like different agencies and stuff like everyone else. And then another person's private practice. And then I decided to take the leap to start my own private pay practice. And that's really where my like true journey began to becoming a traveling therapist.
[00:00:50] So I started my own practice and a little bit into that is when I was finally able to take my daughter on her first like airplane ride. I think she was two at the time I can't remember. So that was really fun for us. And then through starting my own private pay practice, we grew quickly.
[00:01:06] I hired like six other therapists, so we really grew. And then I scaled into building a coaching business now that I solely run. Which is teaching therapists how to get cash pay clients and it continues to grow and explode, which has been incredible. And that's where I ended up selling my practice about a year ago to like solely focus on that. And that's where like the true traveling has now been able to come in because now we have so much more money and free time and it's just healed my heart so much. 'cause I never gotta travel growing up as a kid or anything. I grew up very poor. So it's been so exciting to step into being able to travel the world now.
[00:01:45] Kym_: I love it and I wanna talk about all of it for sure. 'cause every clinician I talk to, 'cause I, I teach insurance. You know how to take insurance if you want to. But every clinician, the dream is private pay. Like how do I just do private pay? And then to build a huge practice, be able to sell it, and then just have this like, massive freedom that you have to be able to take your daughter.
[00:02:04] All these cool places I wanna talk about that is a dream. It's really a dream for everybody. So it's amazing that you're doing it and you're able to help other therapists do that too. I love it. So let's talk about all the fun travel you're doing and then let's get into the logistics of some private pay stuff.
[00:02:17] So we can just hear, people can hear how you're making it work, like the travel and, managing her with school and all that stuff. being a single mom too, so everybody can kind of hear how you're doing that. You've got a season pass somewhere. Really cool. Let's talk about that.
[00:02:30] Jessica: Well, and it's so funny because my first time ever going to Disneyland in my life, it was I think it was about three years ago. And growing up in Utah, like all my friends went to Disneyland growing up, and I had never been, but my first time was taking my daughter maybe it was four years ago, I can't remember now.
[00:02:47] But now we are full-blown Disney. Well, I'm a Disney adult now and then we got a season pass earlier this year, which has been so fun. So we go to Disneyland all the time. We were there a couple months ago for just a quick weekend. We're going in a week and a half for a full week, and we go there all the time.
[00:03:03] So that has been so fun. It's just a really quick plane ride. So that's made it easy. We just came back from our second Disney cruise. Our first one was to The Bahamas last year for my daughter's birthday. And then we just came back from a Disney Alaskan cruise and it was an eight day cruise. And so I was like, I don't know how I'm gonna do eight days on a boat.
[00:03:21] And most trips I'm like done. At the end I'm like, okay, this was fun. I'm ready to go home. I was like, no, I wanna stay on this ship for months. But it was good to be back too. And then just last night. So right before recording this, I booked a cruise with my parents and my daughter a Disney cruise. 'cause we're, I'm a Disney adult.
[00:03:39] Um, it ports out of Barcelona and it's an Italy cruise. So we're going to four different stops in Italy. Which I am so excited for, to combine my love of Disney and Europe. And then also we, I went to Europe with my daughter and it was just the two of us. I was scared. Our life plans kind of changed last minute. So it was just us, but we went and explored the UK Just me and her. We went to England, we went to Scotland, and then we went to Ireland. So yeah, we've kind of been everywhere and it's been really exciting.
[00:04:11] Kym_: She's worldly. Yeah.
[00:04:13] Jessica: I know like she's a world traveler. I never had a passport my whole life until like, I got it less than a year ago, and my daughter has already used her passport like a couple times.
[00:04:22] Kym_: My gosh. That's amazing. That's amazing. I don't know if you ever listened to this podcast, but we did have one woman, Jessica Tapan, tap. I always say her name wrong, but she did a world cruise with her kids. I think they were on that ship for. Was it a year? I don't know how long it was, but they literally cruised the entire world with her kids and she worked and ran two businesses and it's just incredible. They've got programs for the kids. And I wanna talk about that too with the Disney cruises. Like how do you make that work as a single mom? Are you like just loving all the activities so you're just totally involved or, or are, is there time to, like if you wanted to work or run this amazing coaching business, how do you navigate that? Or do you just take all your time off when you're doing these cruises?
[00:05:01] Jessica: Yeah, that's a good question. So yeah, the cruises, this was only our second cruise and, and then for my third one, and I'm about, I'm gonna go on soon, I just take the time off. I don't even connect to internet. People with like the blue text messages from an iPhone can text me so my team can text me if needed.
[00:05:16] But for other trips, like I'll sometimes work a little bit. So like when I went to Europe for instance, I took I think one group call for my coaching program. When I go to Disneyland in like a week and a half because I just came back from the cruise. I am gonna work a tiny bit on one of the days.
[00:05:33] But even then, it's just one group call. The other one I got one of my other coaches to cover for. And then I have got one team meeting 'cause I don't wanna cancel 'cause I had to cancel 'em a couple times. And then the other team meetings I'm like, I'll make up for it. So it's been really cool. So most trips I don't really work much.
[00:05:48] I do like create some content. So I will sometimes like, okay, I'll like on the airplane there, the back I'll like create content. I try and batch out emails and stuff. But now my coaching business is run by, I mean, I still run it, but I have an amazing team that helps support it. And so that's been really helpful.
[00:06:05] So, yeah, it's been really nice. So I, I feel like I can do a little bit of both. Like, I can mostly be really present with my daughter on trips 'cause I do work really hard when I'm not on trips and especially like before and after I'm, I feel like I'm finally recovered from the last trip of like having to work a little bit more. I mean, nothing major 'cause I've got a lot of good systems set in place. But yeah, it's definitely can take some time.
[00:06:29] Kym_: Oh, that's amazing. I wanna dig into all of it. What, how did you crack the private pay formula?. Because I feel like we've talked before on a different podcast, but I feel like you kind of just like stumbled into it a little bit like Right. Or did you take a coaching program?
[00:06:44] I can't remember exactly how you got into that place where you were like, okay, now I'm gonna do private pain, and then it just took off like, boom, you know, let's talk about that to begin with and then kind of dig into, now you're doing coaching, you've got a team and all of that amazing stuff.
[00:06:56] Jessica: Yes. I kind of explored it myself. So I did a ton of research. I knew when I got my LCSW that I wanted to start my practice. So about a few months prior I was researching, I was listening to podcasts from other therapists, like similar to ones like these.
[00:07:11] And I just remember endlessly Googling. That was before chatGPT was around. Really trying to figure out all the things, really trying to figure out exactly what I wanted on my website, exactly where clients are going, where I would go when I saw a therapist in the past, and like how to capitalize upon those types of things.
[00:07:29] And what type of things would like get people to like wanna work with me over somebody else? So I spent a ton of time researching myself. Looking back, I wish I hired a coach because I wasted so much money on things that did not matter
[00:07:44] on people that did marketing , that weren't therapists, which I didn't really realize at the time. Like the difference. I was like, oh yeah, if I'm gonna hire someone to help me with marketing, like it's best if they're a therapist because therapist businesses are unique and we've got a lot of ethical things. So yeah, I wish I hired a coach. I did not for that. I did hire a coach for my coaching program and now I'm like everyone who's growing any type of business, like you need a coach.
[00:08:07] so I learned a lot of it myself and yeah, essentially I just figured out where are clients looking for therapists and when they find them, what types of things are gonna make them go like, yes, I wanna work with this person, and how to simplify like the booking process. So I dunno if you want me to go into some of the specifics
[00:08:26] Kym_: Yeah, I'd love, like, so how do you figure out that part? Like what are they looking for and why are they gonna choose me? Like what is the formula for that, for somebody listening?
[00:08:35] Jessica: Yeah, so what I find is the main places that clients go is Google. And whether that is they're finding your website, they're finding your Google profile, or they're finding your therapist directory, most commonly psyched today, and that's where most people are going. So I like to simplify rather than trying to get find found in a million different spots.
[00:08:54] Let's go where they're looking. And then when they find your website or they find your Google profile, or they find your psych today, what's gonna make them go like, yes, I wanna work with this person. And first of all, they have to find those things. So to find your website, you need to do SEO, which is search engine optimization.
[00:09:12] It's, you know, a ton of confusing things that end up being simpler the more you learn it. But it just teaches you how to get to the top of Google. So you actually get found your Google profile, which is essentially like the little spot that's like the maps with the reviews. I teach therapists how to get found on that, so they're not like, you know, the 20th spot down. They're not showing up at all how to get shown up at the top.
[00:09:33] And then same with your psych today. Like what can you do to show up higher on there? Which includes like continuing to like, like add a video. That's one of the biggest things.
[00:09:43] Continue to add fixtures, update your profile, those types of things. So first and foremost, it's about getting found and then when you do get found. How can you get the edge over other people? How can your messaging speak so clearly to your ideal client where it's like a no-brainer for them? Where it's not the typical generic especially on psych today, it's like. Are you dealing with this? Are you dealing with that or, my passion is helping clients who are struggling with X, Y, and Z and making it all about them, or using therapist jargon.
[00:10:14] We focus on speak straight to the pain. What are they saying on their intake forms, on the console call on the first session, and how can you use that language? How can you make the design of your website good? Because that's gonna make a big difference. How can you get like getting reviews from colleagues for your Google profile? Because people see reviews and even if it's just from colleagues. 'cause we can't ask clients. I don't ever tell someone to ask a client.
[00:10:38] I know that's not ethical as therapists. But just seeing five stars, even if it is from colleagues like that, makes a big difference. And then how to just simplify the booking process. So often I think a lot of people like overcomplicate it. They end up having like back and forth email messages forever.
[00:10:56] The client falls off, so how can you simplify it? And especially if your cash pay 'cause. A lot of people like, yeah, they would like to use their insurance, and it's not about pressuring them to pay out of pocket, but if the value is there and they're not leading with, I need to use my insurance. If that's the case, like, okay, well like here's what I offer.
[00:11:15] But if the value is there and you've got the confidence in the price, then a lot of times they're more than willing to be like, oh, okay, yeah, that's totally fine. Like, and they're willing to make it work. So there's a lot of different components, but I find that it kind of boils down to those three things.
[00:11:30] Kym_: That's amazing. Yeah. So you're doing all those things. You're consistently booking private pay clients. When do you decide, okay, I think this needs to be a group. When do you move to that part for you, at least in your story? Yeah.
[00:11:44] Jessica: No, that's a good question. It was when I was kind of full and like, especially as a single mom, I was like, Hey, I really wanna like, capitalize on the time I have with my daughter because I, like, I'm now splitting time with her dad. And so like, trying to figure out that I'm like, when I do have her, I wanna be really present. I don't wanna work outside of the hours that I want to work.
[00:12:02] I only wanna to see anywhere between 15 to 18 clients a week. And 18 clients a week was like my max, like nothing more than that. A couple weeks. I think I had like 16, 17 clients and once I hit kind of that 15 to 18 range, at that point it was like, okay, well I'm still getting people consistently reaching out.
[00:12:21] 'cause especially the last month before I filled up and like really the month and a half before, like it was really exploding. And so I knew it wasn't just gonna suddenly stop. And I'm just kind of more of a driven person where I'm like, well, I don't want it to just go to no one or have to like send it out.
[00:12:37] Like I would rather. You know, continue to grow this. And I did know previously that it would be like cool to grow a group practice. And so yeah, that's when I started hiring and kinda was just one person at a time and someone in my personal network. And yeah, it was really exciting to be able to do that because then, I mean, we were just continuing to get more clients at that point,
[00:12:58] Especially once I hired her, like we, on average, were getting anywhere from five to 10 new, like full fee private pay clients each week, which I feel like was only possible, like, I wanna caveat this because I had other clinicians, a couple of them, like knew them and you know, then knew like, so a lot of them were finding us from Google.
[00:13:16] That was where most people found us. But it helped that once you have more therapists, you just have more options. And there were two weeks where we got 12 clients and one week in the beginning of November where we got 14 and I was double and triple checking. I was like, wait, they're all full fee.
[00:13:31] They're all scheduled. Like It was really cool. And that was when I had five clinicians at my practice, so that definitely helped. But yeah, it was really exciting to continue to grow that.
[00:13:40] Kym_: And then I imagine like you start to get a reputation in the area and then people are referring their friends to you and all that, and it just like snowballs into this huge, amazing thing. Yeah. when you started the group, did you have it in your head that maybe I wanna sell this one day? Or did that just like kind of come along in the process. 'cause it sounds like it all sort of evolved in a really natural way and I'm, I'm guessing it went that way, but the selling it too.
[00:14:03] Jessica: Yeah, it's funny 'cause I remember listening to some podcasts of people selling their practice and feeling confused. I remember being like, why would someone sell? Like you go to grad school, you build your practice, why sell it? And if you don't wanna run it anymore, you hire someone else to manage it.
[00:14:19] And I just remember just feeling confused by that. And then when I got to the point I did, I was like, oh, I get it because there was such a mental load. And even if I had someone managing it. I just like anything that's important to me, I just go so all in.
[00:14:35] So I was so all in on my practice. I wanted it to be the best. I wanted the clients to have the best therapist, to have the best experience. I wanted my therapist at the practice to have the best experience. I wanted to get more clients. And at this point, I'm also growing a coaching business where it was all the same stuff.
[00:14:50] Like I wanted everyone to have the best experience and my brain was kind of exploding and I was like, I can't do everything. And even as I hired someone to manage the group practice, I knew that I would still be involved. And I was like, I love it. And I just need to release that mental load because this is actually what I desire more. Because I just loved the coaching more than I thought I would. The flexibility, like there's a lot more income potentials as well.
[00:15:18] So yeah, it was very organic of just like I can't do both things at once. And it was actually I guess I'll share this. It was when I hit my first 50 k month of revenue in my coaching business that I was like, okay, I think I'm gonna sell this. It's crazy thinking back. 'cause I'd only had my coaching business, at least my coaching 12 week program for five months when I decided that I would sell.
[00:15:42] And it took like three months to like officially sell it. But I was, yeah, like looking back, I was like, I probably should have made sure it was like stable, but I was like, Nope, this is gonna work. Burn the back door, this is gonna work. And yeah. Then the coaching business has
[00:15:58] Kym_: Oh my gosh. That is amazing. Congratulations. I mean, it's just so cool that you've done all this and then the coaching. So how long has the coaching program been around and Did you go right into having a team or like how did you scale it that way to just like having this team doing all this stuff and then you're kind of showing up for the like important coaching part of it. Tell us that. Yeah.
[00:16:21] Jessica: So it was August 2023 that I decided I wanted to start coaching. I was kind of seeing some one-on-one clients and I realized once again, I was like, I don't have the time on my schedule to just do a bunch of one-on-ones. So that's why I decided to turn it into a group program.
[00:16:35] And that was November of 2023 where it officially became the therapist private pay accelerator 12 week program. So yeah, that's how long I've had it. And the team also came very organically, so I was running two group calls a week, and we also had a recorded core and we still have a recorded course and they get a bunch of one-on-one coaching calls and some extra support.
[00:16:53] One of the girls who went through my program, like I was like, she's answering questions on these group calls and she knows a lot of this stuff. So I hired her to, 'cause she knew a lot of the techie stuff , so I hired her to run a group call each week. And then when I didn't have time for all the one-on-ones that people were getting during, in their program, another girl who went through my program and she also had a lot of success too. She was like, Hey, I would if you need support. So I hired her to help me with the one-on-ones 'cause she knew the program. And same with the last girl I hired. She went through the program, had a lot of success
[00:17:26] and so it just kind, kind of continued to evolve. And then I needed people to like help me manage messages and just different things. And then someone to take the consultation calls for new people joining the program. I no longer had time for those, and so I hired someone to do that. So it just continued to grow organically. And then this month, this is what? October of 2025. I'm in the process of hiring three people this month. Two of them are because I've got a couple people going on maternity leave.
[00:17:53] Um, But then I'm hiring another person this month. I hired two people two months ago. I'm probably gonna need to hire another coach for the program in a couple months too. So it's been, it's been cool. I'm like, wow, this is like growing. I have this team and they're,
[00:18:09] Kym_: Oh, it's so amazing. Yeah. That that's fantastic. So it's a 12 week program, is that how long it goes? Okay. And then does it like open and close or is it kind of like rolling where people, like if they listen today, could they just go pop into it or is it like you kind of get on a list and and enter when it's ready again.
[00:18:26] Jessica: So it is open enrollment so people can join at any time. Yeah,
[00:18:30] Kym_: Nice. what happens when they join? Like maybe you could give a little. A little synopsis of when
[00:18:35] Jessica: Yeah.
[00:18:35] Kym_: joins. Yeah.
[00:18:36] Jessica: So essentially when they join they instantly get access to lifetime access. Now we just switched that lifetime access to our recorded course. They get group coaching calls that they can plug into throughout the week with the community. And then they get, now it's, they get weekly one-on-one coaching calls.
[00:18:53] So every single week during their time in the program, they can book a coaching call with one of our coaches who, and everyone, all the coaches have been through the program. They've had success and now they get to help them. And then they also get access to a Slack group with the entire program. So that way you get to like communicate and work with other people.
[00:19:11] And then we've got a couple of like different, like bonuses. Oh, and they also get weekly SEO reports as well. They get SEO reports, like see how their website is ranking, see how things are doing . yeah, it's been cool. It's like a really supportive community. It's cool seeing people like become friends during their time in the program. The program has continued to grow as of right now, I need to double check, but I think we have about 79 or 80 people currently in the program. It's been really cool to like continue to grow and to be able to have had like hundreds of therapists go through it.
[00:19:39] Kym_: That is so amazing. So how do people find it if they wanted to join? If they're listening, they're like, that's what I need in my life.
[00:19:46] Jessica: Yeah. Yeah. So If you want to join or I just learn more about it to make sure it's a good fit, you can either message me on Instagram at Empowering Therapist. Or you can find our website empowering therapist.com. And if you message me on Instagram, I'll send you some info, send you a quick video explaining the program so you're like, yes, this is worth a consult call or not. And then you can also just go to my website empowering therapist.com.
[00:20:10] Kym_: And does the program start with solo practice or is it all like private pay group practice
[00:20:16] Jessica: yeah, most people have a solo practice. We do have several group practice owners as well, but I would say like 75, 80% are solo practice. Most are private pay only. Some do take insurance and some people like, like panel off of insurance panels.
[00:20:31] But even though the focus is private pay, like yeah, there's for sure some people who. Still take insurance, always wanna take a couple of insurance panels or they wanna completely get off. So, and then there's people who are like brand new, like I am starting and we've got all the setup like stuff for if you're just starting.
[00:20:48] And then we've got some people who are like, I've been around for six months, two years, three years, and it's not going the way that I want it to. And they just want more clients. So essentially the program is, I need more clients. How do I simplify? And that's what we teach them.
[00:21:02] Kym_: So if somebody's listening today, is there like one tip you would give them that would just propel success? If you could think of just one like tip that you wish you had known when you started this whole thing.
[00:21:12] Jessica: My brain is either going to like mindset stuff,
[00:21:15] Kym_: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:21:16] Jessica: and most of my program is strategy. I'm a very like strategy. This is not like a fluffy mindset thing, but honestly, my tip is you need to believe that it's possible. You need to be unrelentless in that you need to stop listening to the people who are keeping you small.
[00:21:33] There's so many Facebook groups that are filled with scarcity, other therapists filled with scarcity, and I get it and like, oh, the economy and it's not possible for private pay anymore and this and that. Step into people who are doing it. There's thousands and tens of thousands of therapists who are having success.
[00:21:51] Like both can be true. Yes, some therapists are struggling and it's hard, and the economy and X, Y, and Z and there's so many people out there willing to pay out of pocket, willing to pay private pay, having a thriving, successful cash pay practice.
[00:22:09] So honestly, my strategy is like don't talk business with the people who are gonna keep you small. Instead, surround yourself with people who have done it and are doing it, and do the mindset work daily. You know, we all have this desired goal and we are here, we have this goal over here, and we have limiting beliefs kind of blocking us from our dream life and to continue to work through those so you can step into, truly being able to create everything that you want in your life.
[00:22:36] Kym_: Yeah, and I mean, it sounds like you've really done that with the traveling and being able to work that into your life. You've been all over the world with a toddler. I mean, a five, I guess she's five or six now, so I mean, oh my gosh. I mean, it's just amazing you've been able to do all that as a single mom.
[00:22:49] Jessica: It's been really exciting and yeah, I would say one of the biggest reasons is because I've worked through those limiting beliefs of realizing I get to do anything I want, and like anyone listening, you can do anything you want in life. You just kind of have to work through those limiting beliefs to get to that point.
[00:23:05] Kym_: Yep. I love it. Thank you so much for coming today. I really appreciate you taking the time.