Hey there wellness entrepreneur. Welcome back!
In today’s blog, I am introducing the Workshop Series, “A Case Study Special.” So over a few episodes, I will be interviewing my clients and their experiences with workshops. Now these workshops are sometimes live, sometimes collaborations, sometimes in-person, sometimes online.
The purpose is to inspire you on topics, different creative ideas of how you can utilize workshops in your business in many different ways. So the title “workshop” is really just a starting point, because some of my clients do challenges. Some of my clients do in-person running form clinics. Some of my clients do free master classes or in-person paying to our workshops collaborating with a specific studio.
So you can read about all their ideas, all their success, and be inspired to put on your own workshops or events in a way that really lights you up and serves your audience, so that you can start signing more clients, get fully booked, and hit your 100k year, whether it be in-person or online or a hybrid of both.
So I hope you enjoy these very inspiring case studies!
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Also Read: Explore the Best Online Wellness Programs for Your Business
Alison: Hey there wellness entrepreneur! Welcome back!
Today, I’m honored to have on special guest Dr. Lynne Virant who’s been on the podcast before so we’ll link previous episodes where she goes more into her entrepreneur journey.
Today, we’re talking specifically about her workshops and how she uses them to consistently bring patients into her office and she sold some online programs through them as well.
Question to Lynne: So Dr., can you tell us who you help and where they can find you to start?
Dr. Lynne Virant: Yes, so as Alison said, I’m Dr. Lynne Virant, physical therapist, but also a running and walking movement specialist. So that’s who I help are people who run and they’re struggling with an injury and they just can’t get over it or recently, what I’ve really expanded to is helping people who are recovering from a surgery and they’re still having difficulty with walking and what I found is that there really aren’t any specialists locally that are helping people with that. So it’s been neat because I get to work with people from all ages and ability levels.
Alison: So awesome. I love that.
Also Read: Boost Your Practice with Cash Physical Therapy Tips by Lynne Virant
Question to Lynne: So you’ve been doing these running form with clinics for a while, which are essentially similar to a Free Master class or a free workshop. It’s an hour long about and it’s in your clinic. How did you first come up with this idea?
Dr. Lynne Virant: Well, it kind of fell into my lap quite honestly. So my office is in a local running store in the Pensacola area and when I started working in this space they had already been teaching a free run form clinic and then when I took over temporarily at the time the training programs for the store, I decided to go ahead and start teaching the running form clinic and the owner was happy to let me do it because he was taking on a lot of his plate and it really worked well with my teaching style and what it is that I wanted to help people to improve. So, I kind of inherited it and then I’ve made it my own.
Alison: Yeah, I love that! You don’t always have to recreate the wheels exactly. When I first started doing workshops, I assisted my mentor and essentially inherited her class as well in some of her workshops and that’s how I got started. So yeah, cool. Okay.
Must Visit: Discover Lynne’s Path to Six Figures in Her Wellness Practice
Question to Lynne: So we’ll start from the beginning. So how are you filling those running form clinics. Where are the attendees coming from?
Dr. Lynne Virant: Typically initially it started with just all in-store referrals. So the staff members here at the store recommending the course to people and then I had to start to develop that mostly and so it became again kind of word-of-mouth through the staff itself and then through my own social media, through some e-mail marketing, and then what I really started to do when it grew was reach out to local groups.
Like there’s a local triathlon group and a local running group and those groups, how I can help them with their sport because they’re a pretty dedicated group and really highlighting how I can help them has been really beneficial as far as because I used to start it off with maybe two or three and it’s kind of ebb and flow but recently, I could say like in the past six months to a year, I’ve had times when I’ve had anywhere from ten to twenty people in the class and then I’ve had some days with some months where it’s not as much. So that’s kind of what we’re tweaking actually is how do we get it more consistent.
Alison: For sure. Yeah! I love that and so there’s an element of trial and error to try to see what marketing channels bring in people and then when you find a place that works, doing, trying to do more of that so it becomes more of a system for you where each month it’s just rinse and repeat.
Dr. Lynne Virant: Right. Exactly. In fact, this month, our approach is to, we have a race right before the form clinic so we’re talking about the form clinic, but we’re also saying, “Hey come in and get some racing tips as well!” That’s our next thing! I think we’re going to try to do this because a lot of people are used to hearing about the form clinic but now it’s like, what else can we get people to do?
So maybe next month might be it, right? And then I think that what might be helpful from that perspective is if people have come before and instead of saying “Oh, I’ve already done that. I don’t need to go back again,” although a lot of times it’s interesting because most of what we really need to do well, we just need to do the same things, but just better right? But we tend to get bored with that, it’s not exciting.
So we can incentivize people, “Hey, there’s some new information out there that might be helpful and applicable to you,” and then you sneak in all the other stuff that they need.
They’re going to find that there’s some value and then also to hopefully the biggest helpful thing is just word of mouth. People say, “Hey, this is really great.” Kind of pass on. So I always ask people like, “Hey if you thought it was really helpful, like and share your testimonial and then invite other people to it as well.”
So I think that’s helpful to mention too in the e-mail where I remind them about the upcoming course in the bottom. I say, “Hey, if you know somebody or a friend who you run with who’s struggling as well, invite them to the class,” and they send this e-mail to them. So again, it’s just another way to just kind of spread that invitation to the people who need it.
Alison: Yeah, I love that so much gold there!
Also Read: 10 Effective Strategies to Expand Your Email List as a Wellness Entrepreneur
Question to Lynne: Okay, so we got people in the door now and how have you worked on refining? What’s you’re teaching and the call to action at the end, so you’re actually getting consistent discovery visits from those running form clinics?
Dr. Lynne Virant: So that’s been a work in progress and I guess it probably always is to be honest with you, initially my focus was teaching them all the information and then recognizing that there needs to be a call to action at the end of that and that honestly been probably the biggest thing that you’ve helped me with Alison, is let them know what’s the next step and be okay with saying like, “The next step is working with me so that we can help you take on the things, that I’m teaching you a lot faster with less energy so that you’re more successful a lot sooner, you’re less likely to get hurt doing them.” and that has probably been my biggest transition and saying, “Okay, what’s next?”
And I’ve kind of fine-tuned that and just open to now, I just come out and say it so, okay so now they’ve had all this information the next step is to sign up for a discovery visit so that we can take a look at how your individualized running form is going and where are the areas that you need to address. So I did try to initially make it so that I do a cell like go ahead and sign up for this package and what I’m learning is that for me right now, that’s not comfortable. Now I know and a lot of other master classes you go right into that presentation of your package and we’ve talked about that a lot.
So it’s not definitely for me recommending at all. It’s more so like what feels organic to me is inviting them to meet with me one-on-one, show them what I can see from what they can learn and then from there, they can decide if it’s worth further investment of their, they’ve invested a lot of time. Like they’ve done an hour with me. They sign up for another DV. That’s like for me, it’s long. It’s like 45 minutes and what I’ve learned from that is for the most part, people will sign up for at least like three to six sessions from that point because what I really refined is showing them where I can help them and not necessarily giving them what they need to be helped and that’s been definitely a work in progress.
Also Visit: Take Your Wellness Business to New Heights with Personalized Mentorship
I will say really, the key is what works, what feels good for you, as the instructor and the person trying to promote whatever you’re wanting to help, the solution to their problem is presenting what’s the next best step for them, what feels comfortable for you and for me, it was giving a more individualized discovery visit.
Alison: Yeah, it’s a natural organic next step, especially when they have a specific problem like an injury they’re trying to heal or increase race mileage without having an injury then it just makes sense. It’s a no-brainer to take that next step. And it’s a process. I think you nailed that.
Like I’ve done so many workshops and webinars and master classes and even just today prior to us getting on this call, I was talking with my coach on how I’m delivering a webinar on Monday and I’m like, “Okay how can I tweak this to me?” We’re always working on that conversion. But once we get that foundation there, like we have a rhythm of what we’re teaching, strategies and getting more confident in delivering that next step and making it more succinct.
Dr. Lynne Virant: Yeah! That’s exactly it. Finding your voice and what feels authentic to you, embracing that, and not comparing myself. Well other people do this and that’s great and I’ve tried that and what I’ve learned is when I try to mimic what other people do and it doesn’t feel correct in my voice then I know they read it. They can tell when it doesn’t feel like it, “Is she trying to sell me something that doesn’t work?” Whereas if it comes from the heart, then I know when they’re saying no, it’s just not a good fit for them and not because of the way I’m presenting it.
Alison: Sure. Yeah. 100%! So cool!
Must Read: Five Myths About Online Wellness Programs: What’s True and What’s Not
Question to Lynne: So then they come to your discovery visits and we worked on from there selling like one-off in sessions of three to now selling more packages of like six, eight, and even twelve! And the online program as well, tell us how you kind of differentiate whether someone’s the right fit for a package of eight or twelve versus in your online program.
Dr. Lynne Virant: I think so, quite honestly initially like deciding where, what’s the right package fit for them again was sort of a learning process for what feels comfortable for me and not assuming that they want the cheapest thing, right? So assuming that they want to be completely better and if that’s the case then most people especially most of the clients I tend to work with tend to have a chronic issue that they dealt with for a long time and so recognizing that that’s not going to get fixed within even a three-session package and that’s mostly somebody’s introductory. They’re just trying to learn what they can do to improve their running.
For most part, most people that want to make an investment are people who have dealt with the issue for that. I’ve seen that work for me for a long time. And so my initial thought is to present either the six or the twelve-session package when they come to the discovery visit and it almost is a feel, like when I can tell they’re really excited and they have this longer term type of commitment, like a big race coming up in a few months to a year. Like I know that they’re invested in a longer-term commitment whereas somebody’s like just kind of want to touch on it then I might feel more comfortable doing like a six-session package.
However, sometimes they’re not ready for that or it’s just not a good fit for them at the time. And so what I then recommend whether it’s in-person or via like a follow-up email is that I have an online course that’s available to them, that helps to show them some of the basic things they can start to do to improve their movement and so I present that to them at that time and I’ve had a few people take me up on that and what I’ve learned is it actually tends to lead to a longer term investment.
Must Read: 10 Effective Strategies to Expand Your Email List as a Wellness Entrepreneur
They kind of tend to see, “This is what she’s talking about. Is this doable for what I need or no, I need more help, this is the right person to reach out to.” So it almost becomes like the next tier level if they’re just not ready to make that longer commitment at the time.
Alison: And you’re able to meet people where they’re at and journey with all or nothing, right? It’s like, “No there’s a little bit that you can start to do if that’s what you’re able to connect to at this time.” I love that! So much flexibility and freedom in your business and it gives you more confidence on your discovery visit.
Question to Lynne: And you know now we’re in the process of building out a more official online program that you’ll be launching too and you’ll have more confidence with that as well because you know people do want online programs and your skills are able to transfer online, right?
Dr Lynne Virant: That’s correct.
Alison: Yeah, and so now you have the best of both worlds.
Dr. Lynne Virant: That’s what we’re working towards.
Alison: And so huge congrats on your 100k year as well.
Dr. Lynne Virant: That, again, it’s just been a growth process and I’ve been doing this thing by myself since 2014 so almost 10 years and I never would have thought that I would want to be an entrepreneur and then what has allowed me to grow and change and then be authentic to what I’m really good at which is teaching and so the workshops work really well for me because I love to teach. That’s where like the best part of me comes out and you can see my excitement when I talk about it and when I am presenting and so for me that’s really the best way for people to get to know how I am and how and what my approach is to help them.
Alison: I love that.
Question to Lynne: Well any other parting words of wisdom about workshops or this whole system and process that you’ve been repeating over and over and getting so much better at?
Dr. Lynne Virant: Yeah! I think that’s the biggest take is everybody was like, what’s one thing or what’s the secret and the secret is there is no secret. There is no one thing. It’s just starting with the template of, you are going to present information that that people need. I always thought I needed like special information. You can even take what’s already out there. The key is they’re going to hear it from you and you’re the one that they want to work with and if that’s not a good fit, that’s okay. They’ll self select and go somewhere else.
But if they find they connect with you, then they’ll get, then they’re more willing to take that next step. So it doesn’t have to be any big information or something groundbreaking. It just has to be authentic to you whether it’s the workshop or the master class. Whatever that next step or conversion is and then making that big commitment is just having that template and then being willing to make the adjustments especially reflecting on with you, what works, and what doesn’t, and then repeating what works and then for the time tabling, what doesn’t and then coming back if needed.
Alison: Yeah, I love that. Well, thank you so much for your time and sharing your journey and where can they find you again?
Dr. Lynne Virant: So I am pretty active on Instagram. It’s @dr.lynnvirant and then my website as well is getmovingpt.com. I actually had somebody reach out to me via the website from Toronto, so that’s been a, and now you can work with them online. I know so that’s what we’re definitely moving towards as well for sure.
Alison: Awesome. Love that. Can’t wait to talk about that.
Dr. Lynne Virant: Thank you, Alison. Thanks for everything and thanks for the opportunity to hopefully pass on and learn from others so that you can get better faster.
Alison: Yeah, you’re so welcome. Thank you!
Dr. Lynne Virant: Thanks so much, Alison.
Important Links to Visit:
Boost Your Practice with Cash Physical Therapy Tips by Lynne Virant
Discover Lynne’s Path to Six Figures in Her Wellness Practice
Maximizing Attendance: How to Fill Your Workshops Quickly
100k Awaken 1:1 6 Month Business Coaching for the Wellness Entrepreneur
