Amy Bradley Radford (00:00.406)
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Amy Bradley Radford (00:06.668)
Welcome to the Massage Business Success Podcast. I'm Amy Bradley Radford, massage therapist, educator, and the creator of Pain Patterns and Solutions Bodywork. On this podcast, we talk about sustainable business, how to successfully work for yourself, and pain management. What works, what doesn't, and why. Let's get started.
Amy Bradley Radford (00:39.148)
welcome back to the podcast. If you're new here, my name is Amy Bradley Radford and this podcast is for massage therapists who want to build a business that actually supports them, not just emotionally or energetically, but physically and financially as well. So since this has been on my radar a lot in the last couple of months in coaching calls, I would like to talk about the do's and don'ts of menus in our massage businesses. So most massage therapists have menus, but very few massage therapists
are actually using their menu to build their business or even know how to do that. And today we're going to change this. You know, what most therapists have isn't a menu of services. It's just this list hanging around. It's a menu on a laminated sheet of paper that's in your room or your entryway, or it's just a page on your website that lists all of these things that you do. Or sometimes it's just this set of words that technically describes what you do, but that menu is not doing any real work.
or even heavy lifting for you and your business. It's not guiding clients to purchase. It's not shaping buyer behavior. And this last one is the key component to this podcast. It's not teaching people how to spend more money with you. It's just there, hanging out, waiting for somebody to, I don't know, buy a gift certificate or something. And this is where I think there is a massive disconnect in the service industry, not just massage, but especially massage, between having a menu
versus using a menu strategically to grow your earning capacity in your business. Because there's building a menu and then there's building a menu to propel your business. There's this assumption that we all have, that if we create this menu, people will naturally spend more money. And if you have these ad options, people are going to choose them. And that if you list upgrades, clients are gonna upgrade. But that assumption ignores something very important.
and that is called buyer behavior. Clients do not spend money just because options exist. They spend money because something about these options makes them feel like they will receive something, something that they really want and need and something that makes sense to them emotionally. And most massage menus are not designed with that in mind. They are designed from our point of view, the therapist's point of view and not the client's.
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They're also something that we've seen in other places and we copy because that's what we think we're supposed to do. But these menus, they can reflect what you've learned. They can show what you're capable of doing. They can even list what classes or certificates you have. But they don't reflect how people actually decide to spend their money. And as a business coach, this is one of the very first places I look when someone tells me they feel financially stuck.
because your menu is not just a list of services, your menu is a teaching tool. And it teaches your client what you value. It teaches them what kind of experience you provide, and it teaches them what normal is to spend with you. And if your menu is not designed intentionally, then your clients are being trained accidentally to spend the least amount of money possible. And it's not because they're cheap, it's because the menu isn't guiding them anywhere else.
What I want this episode to really bring to light is how to use a menu correctly to not just build your business, but to be the highly overlooked tool you may have been looking for to help you earn more at the table. Now let's talk about how to use a menu to teach your clientele to spend more money with you over time and create another business system. And for those of you who've been listening to me for a while, you know I am all about the systems. So when I work with people as a coach,
Menu design is not a surface level task. It's not just this cosmetic application to your business. And it's especially not, hey, let's rename a few things and hope for the best. Many times the menu of services becomes the foundation or an entire business redesign. And I have worked with clients where menu design led them into a whole new two-year business plan. Not because the menu itself was complicated, but because once we started looking at how
their clients were spending money, everything else became clear and the steps to success formed themselves. So by stepping back and looking at designing a new menu, we start learning what kind of outcomes, and notice I didn't say services, what kind of outcomes are clients actually willing to spend on? How much?
Amy Bradley Radford (05:22.722)
Are they willing to spend in total over time? And what types of experiences inspired people to say yes to any of your menu items so far and where the real earning ceiling in that business actually was or potentially could be? Those are all the things that we learned simply by starting to ask the right questions around a menu. And you know, this part is the part that most people are not talking about openly in the massage field. There is a very real
gap and I live in this gap as a business coach. I see it all the time. And it's a gap between where people are charging 65, 75 or maybe even 85 a session and being able to turn around and charge 125, 140 or 165. And that gap is an average difference of earning anywhere from 50 to $60 more a session on top of those smaller numbers.
And I know what some of you are thinking. You're like, my gosh, how am I going to earn that? Well, we're gonna talk. We're gonna talk about how you actually get there because it is completely possible. I've helped hundreds of people do this and you are no exception. So when we talk about this gap, you're not going to get from here to there by accident. And while it's helpful and I've talked about it,
If you want to get there quickly, it's not going to happen by increasing your rates $5 every six to 12 months. Although that's a very valid approach to business, but we're talking about a bigger gap. And how do you narrow that gap and get to those other prices we were talking about? You do not cross this gap by working harder or performing more sessions. You already know this. And you definitely do not cross it by listing more things on a menu. You cross this gap.
by intentionally enhancing your skills, your client experience, your customer service. my gosh, that's huge. And then structuring your menu so that the clients can understand and feel and choose the value that they're looking for. Because customer service is not a soft skill in this business. And if you don't know what a soft skill is, it means just this icing on the top. It is a deep skill. Customer service is a huge skill.
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in how we create financial success in the massage industry. So customer service is how you earn more money. And I'm gonna take it one step further. The better you become at the hard skill of being able to consistently repeat a high level of customer service, the more in demand you and the service experience you offer become. Customer service is not just about how nice you are in the massage room. It also includes the experience of how people are scheduled.
the experience of how communication happens with you, the details, all the little details from keeping the table warm and the room comfortable to the liking of each individual client and remembering those things. It's how the session flows and inside of that flow, meeting the client's expectations. It's how the experience feels from beginning to end. And I'm not just talking about the massage. I'm talking about from the first time the client made the appointment,
to the reschedule of the next appointment. That is actually the experience. And every one of those elements is included in the one price someone pays for a massage session. And when you charge one fee for a massage, you're charging for all of that, not just the 60 minutes of hands-on time. So one of the biggest mindset shifts that has to happen is this. You stop looking at your business in terms of how many appointments you book.
and you start looking at your business in terms of how many experiences you are creating. Because experiences are what people spend their money on again and again. Not the time, not the techniques, not your certificates, the experiences. And that's what, that makes your menu the bridge between what you know how to do and what your clients are willing to buy. If that bridge is weak, your businesses stay stuck.
If that bridge is intentional and structured and clear, your business starts to move and sometimes very quickly. So that is what this entire episode is about. And everything that follows, the stories I'm going to tell you, the examples, the restructuring is meant to show you how that actually works in real practices with massage therapists and not just theory. So let me ask you this question, because I know you're asking it in your mind. How do you use your menu to shape and guide client behavior and spending?
Amy Bradley Radford (10:04.439)
Well, we're gonna use your menu as a teaching tool, not a sales tool, but a teaching tool for your clients. What massage therapists don't realize is that clients are always being trained by the structure of your business and by your behavior, whether you intend that or not. Your scheduling policies train them, good or bad. Your pricing trains them, good or bad. How you communicate trains them. Whether you're late for a session or they are and how you react to that, that trains them and your menu.
trains them, especially when it comes to the experience they are buying from you. If your menu is set up so that the easiest choice is the cheapest option, and I really want you to listen to this because I see it, it is everywhere. That is what people will choose. Clients aren't paying you the lowest price massage because they don't value you. It's because the structure you've given them tells them that's the safest decision or the one you expect them to buy or sometimes even more interesting and this is a little subliminal.
You are telling them in a very subtle way that this basic massage is the one you are most comfortable offering. And so that's how it looks on your menu and that's what they pick. If your menu is set up as a long list of techniques and certifications and add-ons, what clients learn is that they are responsible for building their own experience. And most people don't want that responsibility. They're afraid. They're afraid of making a bad or poor choice.
and they don't know what to choose. So they're just going to default to the familiarity of price. This is where I see a massive disconnect between how massage therapists think about menus and how clients actually use them. So as a therapist, we think I've listed everything I do so clients can choose what they want and know what I'm capable of. But clients think, I don't know what any of this means. So I'll just book the basic massage. That way I know I'm not wasting my money. And that gap,
is costing you money, maybe a lot of maybe 50 or $60 a session type money. Menu design is rarely about adding anything new. It's about restructuring what already exists so that the clients are gently guided into spending more without pressure, without sales language, and without feeling manipulated. And this is where the idea of packages becomes so important. And I really want you to understand what I mean by packages.
Amy Bradley Radford (12:29.124)
So packages can be a single session appointment with specific add-ons included or up to a series of appointments set up and agreed upon by both parties to create this specific outcome. Packages are not about upselling and they're not about selling three to five massages at one time simply for a discount like buy four and get the fifth free. That is not what I'm talking about. That's again, losing money and teaching your client to spend less with you. These packages are options.
and they are about simplifying the decision process. They remove the guesswork and they also remove the need for the clients to understand your training. So instead, these packages allow clients to buy an experience that they can emotionally understand. And here's the thing about emotionally understood purchases. They don't require a client to be educated in what you do. They don't require a client to understand technique names.
They don't require them to know what myofascial means or what a trigger point is or why a hot towel matters. They require one thing. The client has to feel like you're speaking to what they want. And I guess that's why I'm so direct about this. If your menu is not guiding people into a decision that makes emotional and practical sense, your client will either freeze or they'll choose the safest option, which is usually the cheapest option. And it's not personal. It's what the brain does when it doesn't know what it's looking at.
This is also why I tell therapists to stop building menus like you're building a resume. The client isn't hiring you based on your credentials. The client is trying to solve a problem. Even if they can't articulate it to you well, they just want to feel better. They want relief and they want to feel like their body is being cared for. They want to feel calm. They want to feel peaceful. They want to feel like someone really understands them and that's what they're buying.
So when we talk about using a menu to build your business, we are really talking about using your menu to quietly answer the client's unspoken or spoken question, which is, what should I choose and will it be worth my money? And your menu should feel like guidance and not a test. When your menu feels like guidance, clients do something beautiful. They relax. They start shopping and they start trusting. They stop trying you out and start investing not only in themselves, but you.
Amy Bradley Radford (14:52.848)
And this is what raises your income in the long term. Not one time add-ons, not random upgrades, not random suggestions, but trust. Trust, consistency, and a repeatable experience with you. You know, this is why traditional add-on menus tend to underperform. When you offer a base massage and then list like five, 10, or even 15 possible add-ons, and each one of those is 10 or $15 each, you are asking your client to make
all of these multiple decisions and each one requires this justification. Do I really need hot towels? Do I really need hot stone? Well, I've always thought about having it, but I'm not sure. Do I really need it? And each one of those triggers a moment of, I really need this? And the mind will simplify it for them. The mind will completely let it all go and most people will tell you no. And what's even more important to understand here is that an add-on doesn't change the frame of the basic purchase. So the basic
The is this base service. They use it as an anchor. It's a safe place. It's your 60 minute massage. And that 60 minute massage with no fluff and nothing added to it feels really safe. It feels like an anchor. And everything else feels optional or indulgent or unnecessary and unknown. So even when clients do add something on, they usually only add one thing, not three, not four. And there has to be a reason why they do it, like a birthday splurge. It's not
necessarily a normal request. I want you to really think about this. I want you to think about the clients that walk through your door and how often they're saying, my gosh, that was so great. Put that on my massage. I'm gonna spend 30 more dollars with you every time. It doesn't happen. It happens for special reasons or when you create a Valentine's Day package or something like that. But it doesn't just happen all the time. And when you upsell to people when they're on the table, yeah, that doesn't feel so great. It doesn't feel so great at all when they came in expecting to spend
$85 and they leave and they have to pay 115. So they keep their spending ceiling low and your packages need to become your anchor, not your base massage price, not your base 60 minute massage price, but the packages need to be that anchor. Instead of having a massage that everyone's gonna pick at $60 or $75 and then asking clients to climb upward in small increments,
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packages need to start higher and feel complete. The question no longer is, should I add this? The question should be, ooh, which experience do I want? So as you're redesigning your menu, you need to ask yourself, which experiences do my clients truly want? And there's clues everywhere about this. If you think you don't know what your clients want, I want you to actually sit back and start having more conversations with your clients about things they're interested in or.
even what they're watching on YouTube for exercise or self-help or yoga or anything like that and talk about them because then you're going to find out what it is your client is really looking for from you. And an experience is a very different buying decision. And once clients are used to choosing experiences instead of time, they become much more open to spending more because the value is clear. So to take all this information and turn it into real life application, I have some coaching client
case studies that I wanted to bring to you and because it really helps you understand not only the coaching we do, but how we took this information and redesigned their business model in a way that propelled them emotionally, financially, E, all the above, into a space they really wanted to be inside their business. So I want to share a story from a newer therapist coaching client of mine, because this is where I see so many people accidentally set themselves up for confusion from the very beginning.
And a lot of times it's because we're copying. We're copying what we see out there. We're checking off the list of a new business. Okay, menu, check. Okay, know, room decorations, check. We're just doing the things. We're walking the path that we think we should. So this therapist was fairly new and she was trying to design her first real menu option. And she had so many fun ideas. She had a lot of interests outside of massage that fit in with massage. And so there were many unique things that she wanted to offer.
and she was trying to figure out how to create a sales piece, a menu, that people could look at and pick from. And she did what all of us do. She created a baseline menu with time options, like 30 minutes, 45 minutes, 60 minutes, 90 minutes. And then she created categories that were relaxation massage and therapeutic massage. And the therapeutic version was only five more dollars at each level than the relaxation massage. But there was no explanation as to why.
Amy Bradley Radford (19:43.365)
There was no reason as to why it was higher versus the relaxation massage. There was no description. There was no understanding of what you were getting. There was no showing how the difference was. It was just a different price and not that much either. And then she had that classic long list of add-ons, aromatherapy, hot stone, cupping, hot packs, castor oil packs, and this whole range of things people might be curious about. And each one was about a $10 upsell. Now here's the problem with a menu like that.
if I'm the client, that menu doesn't help me understand what you can do for me. And it doesn't guide me into a decision. It doesn't tell me what I should choose based on what I need or what's in front of me. It just hands me options and expects me to know what they mean. And when I look at that menu, I automatically go, I'm gonna do the cheapest relaxation because I'm gonna test and see how things are and I'm gonna spend the least amount of money to see what this person can offer me with that.
Most people do not purchase two or three different add-ons and casually spend 30 or 40 more dollars. Nobody really does that. You think about your own menu. It sits there. Once in a while you have a change or you might actually get in a real salesy mood and kind of get some people to spend more, but they'll all filter back down to this anchor-based massage. So no one does that. They buy the result or they buy what they believe the experience will do for them. So when we redesigned her menu,
It wasn't because her ideas were bad or any of these options she was offering were something that weren't going to be wonderful for the client. It was because the structure was making it harder for clients to spend money with her. One of the things I work on with coaching clients is a concept I call the power of the hour. And if you've been listening to me, you've heard this before, but what it boils down to is this. Actually, I'm gonna tell you where it came from. It came from the desire of massage therapists wanting a consistent budget.
And when you have lots of different prices inside your schedule and lots of different times inside your schedule, and you have blank areas where you're not earning money, then you are losing money. And so the concept of the power of the hour came into this. And what it means is that if every one of your clients is booking the same hour in your practice, or everybody is spending close to the same amount because they're choosing a same timeframe, your business becomes easier to budget
Amy Bradley Radford (22:07.694)
and easier to schedule and easier to propel forward. It doesn't have all these unknowns. When you're making your budget for the month, this week, you know, week number one, you might have three half hours. And so, you know, you're going to be down so much money. And then you had some blank spots that were filled by 45 minute massages. So you're down some money and it's hard to know what's going to come in because everything is a little random. When you take the random out of it and create what I call the power of the hour,
it levels out the earning field for you and it makes a huge difference inside your business. So we took that concept and we started to apply it to her business model, her menu, the fact that she was brand new in business. And she had these half hour and 45 minute options for people, which people are going to pick. And I didn't want her to get stuck in those where then you have to transition people out of half hours. And so we really started
teaching clients what we wanted them to do, and that was book an hour. So we simplified her menu. We created a relaxation massage with only a 60 and 90 minute option, and we defined it very clearly. It was a full body experience, a true Calgon take me away. I might've just dated myself there about how old I am, but it was this true meaning of what people think of, I just need a massage to just check out.
And it's the kind of massage people book when they want to decompress. We use these words. And then we created a therapeutic massage with a 60 and 90 minute option. However, it was $10 more. And the menu actually explained why. Focused spot work, more communication, time working towards goals, dialogue to ensure that you get what you came in for. And the client could look at that menu and understand what they were paying for.
If they had specific needs they wanted addressed, therapeutic massage would do that and the therapist would follow. And again, because she was new, I only kept one 30 minute option, but it was positioned down the page as an introductory offer only. It was a way to sample her work. It was not an ongoing booking category. It was a way for people to come in and test and see if this was going to be a good fit for them.
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and then they would turn around and schedule a 60 minute massage. Because if you allow that 30 minutes into your schedule all the time, and I know this is probably gonna go against some of the things that you learned in school or even outside of school, but you are training your clients to spend less with you with that half hour option, to be open all the time. And let's be honest with ourselves because this is what we do as massage therapists. How many of you,
try to pack 60 minutes of value in that little itty bitty 30 minutes of massage and then you end up going 10 minutes over because well, you had the time because you couldn't schedule somebody else in that time slot and then you created this amazing experience in 40 minutes that they only paid 34. So this is a great bonus for your client. Of course they're gonna continue to book that 30 minute massage because you gave away so much. All right, let's move on. So then we added the packages to her menu.
We did some discussion on this because we talked about, you know, pre-deciding some of these options and combining them with either a therapeutic massage or a relaxation massage. But when it was all said and done, she still wanted people to have the ability to pick, to pick and explore and try some different things or to have suggestions brought to them based on things that she thought would help their body the most. So what we did is we created a relaxation massage with two enhancements that the client could pick.
bundled together into one price, all bundled together and set. So instead of listing $10 add-ons, clients could choose two enhancements, prepackaged into a price and experience and pay one flat upgrade price. So if her relaxation was $75, the package took them to $95. And if they chose the therapeutic in the same package, it tipped them over $100, which is a huge thing for me.
My goal for all of my coaching clients is to teach them how to get to 100, stabilize their business, $100 per session, stabilize their business and then go past that. So, and then we decided to create an ultimate experience. And this was a 90 minute session with four enhancements included. And it has to be 90 minutes because you need enough time to actually deliver those pieces well. It's hard to shove four enhancements into a 60 minute massage along with a base massage.
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And so we decided to do that as a 90 minute and it was priced around $145. So now her business has some structure and the clients could build into this over time. They could try enhancements without doing any math and they were buying one price. And more importantly, they were buying one experience. And this will train her clients. And this is the part that I really want to hit home.
This is going to train her clients to spend anywhere from 75 to $145 with her based on what they wanted, based on the experience they were looking for and what they valued. And this is what a menu is supposed to do. It's not just the listing of options, it's training clients on levels of offering and letting them pick which ones they want. So here's another case study. And it's
It's one of the best examples I can give you of a menu actually reshaping an entire business for somebody who's been doing massage for about 25 years. So this therapist that called me, she was solid. She's experienced, she's trusted. She has had long-term clients, referrals and a practice that looked successful from the outside. But believe me when I tell you, her pricing was stuck. Her rates had gone up very little over the years.
and she was still in that 75 to $85 range after 25 years. And the reason she reached out to me was because she started to have a very specific problem. And I think a lot of therapists will recognize this immediately. She had started out her business offering a $10 discount to seniors. And at that point, early on in her career, it probably helped her build a clientele. It was generous and kind to people on fixed incomes. But unfortunately,
or fortunately she had been in practice long enough that many of her loyal clients had aged into that discount category. So what used to be occasional was now constant and she was losing money. She was making less the longer she was in business. And so she wasn't just offering a discount, she was losing money in a way that was starting to add up really fast. So we had to solve something that's more emotional than it sounds on paper. It wasn't just how do I raise prices?
Amy Bradley Radford (29:09.842)
It was how do I change what my long-term clients have been paying me for decades, some of them, without breaking their trust or feeling like I'm betraying that relationship. Well, the very first thing we did was stabilize her situation. We removed that $10 senior discount and raised her base rate so that all of the clients were paying around $90. Yes, that was a $15 jump for some of her seniors, but I'm here to tell you, so many of her clients said, oh my gosh, it's about time.
you raised your prices and there weren't any real objections. I think there was like one client that was, I'm not sure I can afford this, but she worked things out with her. But when we did that, that cleaned up the immediate bleeding. It took away that problem that was gonna keep compounding. But she still had the real goal sitting in front of her and she needed to get past that $100 mark. So emotionally after we raised everything to $90,
She didn't feel like she could simply raise her hourly rate again and again and say, hey, you know, it's 100 or it's 105 now. She didn't feel like she had that leverage and she was so dedicated to her clientele that she was struggling with it. She also confided in me that she felt like the opportunity had come and gone years ago. She felt like she needed to raise her price. I'm mentioning this because I hear it a lot and she had ignored her intuition and because she ignored her intuition, it perpetuated this
It kicked that can down the road and it made things harder and harder and harder for her to raise these prices. So we talked about going a different route. Instead of asking clients to pay more for the same massage that they've been receiving for 20 plus years, we introduced them to a new option that her clients would actually want. We designed a new menu item that made perfect sense for her. And we didn't guess about this. We sat down and we talked about it and we looked at the real evidence. What were her clients asking for?
What did they comment on? What had she tried in the past that her clients had actually responded well to that she didn't follow through on? What training had she taken that she never fully integrated? And what ideas has she kept on the back burner because she never had the time to build them into something? And what kept coming up time and time again was assisted stretching during the session. Her clients loved the stretching.
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She had taken a class, just a small class, and brought it to the table, and so many of them loved it, but she never turned it into something she offered. They actually mentioned it to her. They had asked for it. They responded well to it. They felt like it extended their massage treatment even another week, and it met a need that was already present in her clientele for more. So we designed a stretching option that was only available in a longer session. It was not an add-on. It was a totally different
package was a different experience and it was a new experience. And this new option was priced at $125 and it was structured and it was about 80 minutes in total. The client got the massage that they knew they would get from her that they were expecting. And then they had an additional 20 minutes of stretching and they could either have the stretching all at the end or it can be interspersed throughout the session depending on what made sense to both of them. But the key was that it was designed and it was repeatable and it was intentional.
And this therapist didn't just slap the word stretching on her menu and hope for the best. We had some ethical conversations about this. So she went and took some classes, got a certificate, got proficient. She practiced at home first and she created a flow that she could do on the table with just about anybody. So she built it into something that she could deliver confidently. She created the customer service experience. And then she introduced it gently. She let clients sample it.
at a reduced price, not for free. That's very important. And I think it was around 110 that was the introductory price and then offered it at full price once people understood what it was. And here's the result that matters. Almost 40 % of her client jumped on it and rescheduled that particular session over and over again. I want you to think about that. These were existing long-term clients. They weren't new people or strangers.
These were people who already trusted her and they were used to a particular price and approach. And they already believed in her value. They just needed a reason, a structure, and a clear option that made perfect sense to them. So that new menu item did two things at once. Totally increased her income per session and it trained these clients, these long-term clients who'd been spending $75 and $85 with her, it trained them in a hurry.
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to spend more with her as normal behavior. And so once we had that stabilized, we built a second option. It is more like a spa option. Take care of me. Get to try some really, really great relaxation things. Hot towels, just the whole luxury customer service approach. And a smaller percentage of her clients, maybe 10%, chose that one regularly. More people chose it as a specialty item like a birthday. So we knew,
that that particular item was okay, but it still wasn't what her clients were. So we started looking at more things that she could bring into her practice. What she learned was instead of being stuck at a base massage that everyone expected to cost the same forever, because that's how she had trained them, she created an experience. She created a new level inside her business and had a menu that actually built her business instead of just describing it. And here's the lesson.
You don't always raise income by raising your base price. Sometimes you raise income by creating a new experience your clients already want and giving them a really easy way to say yes.
Quick pause here. If what you're hearing is helping you think differently about your work, you're welcome to join my email list at amybradleyradford.com. That's where I share deeper teaching, clinical insight, and updates on classes and resources without any hyper pressure. All right, let's get back to the episode. So, you know, another place that menus tend to break down is when they are built entirely from the therapist's educational journey. You know, I see this on business cards.
or I used to see it on business cards. I see it on websites where if you took a prenatal class, you add prenatal massage. If you do myofascial work and you took a myofascial class, you add myofascial massage. If you learn trigger point therapy, you do trigger point massage. It just becomes this line, this bullet point of your education. And over time, your menu simply becomes a reflection of just everything that you've studied. And the problem is your clients don't book with you based on what your curriculum, your
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School profile, clients book based on what they think will help them feel better. So when menus get long, where there's 15, 18 different massage types, clients are not seeing options. They are seeing overwhelm. And overwhelmed buyers do not spend more, they spend less. And I can almost guarantee that in a menu like that, 80 to 90 % of your bookings, I want you to, if you have one of these menus where you have 15 different types of massage that you offer, I want you to sit back and look at it.
and look at what 80 to 90 % of the people are purchasing and it's gonna fall into two or three categories. That's where things are being consistently rebooked. The rest of it, it just needs to go away. It's just unneeded noise on a menu that you developed probably a long time ago that is no longer serving you. And that menu prevents the client from having a clear view of what it is you have to offer. And so that's why refinement is not about losing options. It's about upgrading
to your business and services. So if you have a menu like that, I want you to consider that it was probably developed early in your career, you started out with your business plan and hasn't been refined as you've evolved. And as your business evolves, your menu has to evolve too. Otherwise, you're running your current business with a really old map and it is not going to go anywhere. So what needs to happen is that you, again, take that step back and ask, what are my clients?
really wanting? What do they actually want to buy? What am I hearing my clients want? What are they repeatedly asking for that I'm kind of ignoring? And what are they raving about? And maybe what are they not seeing on my menu that they've requested anyways that I could bring into my new menu? So the work here for yourself is all about refinement. Not because you can't do all of those things, but because your business just needs some clarity. So I want you to refine your menu down to a few things you're really good at.
really good at that clients consistently buy and that you can deliver in a repeatable high level way. Then I want you to build packages that the clients actually want inside that structure. Because once you refine and package intentionally, you are retraining your client base to spend more money with you over time. More money with you over time, not just the new package you're offering, because you're going to offer more packages down the road, because we're going to narrow that gap.
Amy Bradley Radford (38:30.258)
that we were talking about. So this process allows you to evolve your services in a way that's very financially and energetically sustainable instead of feel like you're throwing things on a menu and hoping they sell. So I have another case study for a coaching client and this story represents a different kind of stuck. And honestly, this one is extremely common for therapists who've been practicing a while and they care deeply about their clients.
So this coaching client came to me wanting to raise her prices, but she felt like there wasn't anything left to add. And when I looked at her business, there wasn't. I understood immediately why she felt that way because over the years, every time she learned something new, she just simply added it into her massage at no charge. She had learned cupping, so she added cups for free. She had learned aromatherapy, so she added aromatherapy for free. She decided she wanted to bring more customer service in.
and brought hot towels and all of these other customer service details and she added them for free. So her clients had been receiving this upgraded premium level session for a $75 price point for a long time. And then she hit the wall that many of you either have hit or will hit. And you can do a $5 increase once and you might do it again, but after a while it doesn't change your life. And by that I mean your clients will accept it, but it isn't enough.
to really push you into that next level of your business. It doesn't change your business structure enough. And it doesn't change the fact that you're giving away a lot and receiving less than you should. So we had to take a step back and admit something very honestly. The opportunity to charge for more enhancements, that was gone. It had been gone a long time ago. That horse left. It left the arena. And because those enhancements had been included, it was her base massage.
So we had to completely stop thinking in terms of add-ons for her. There were no more add-ons. There was nothing more we could add to her massage that was going to create this shift. And her clients had been trained that every add-on was for free. So instead of what else can we add, the question became what new level, completely new level of experience can we design that feels truly different from what people already get? And here's what made it possible.
Amy Bradley Radford (40:55.582)
this client also taught yoga. And I know she's listening to this. She listens to all my podcasts. So she's probably smiling at this moment going, was me, it was me. know exactly who this is. So she had been thinking for a long time about offering something more immersive, not just a regular massage with a few extras, but this ultimate experience where clients received real one-to-one time with her with their movement, their stretching, their positioning, and personalized coaching. Some real attention.
not just some stretching, but this full experience of being guided and completely supported in a way that they couldn't get in a group class. And then they would receive a massage after that. We even talked about layering more things into it, like spa-like transitions, a steam cabinet, a shower, know, things like that, to create this full two-hour package, this full two-hour container of this new experience.
The point wasn't that she needed every detail. The point was that she needed to think like a designer of experiences and not just a massage therapist providing some techniques. And so this is where I'm gonna bring this up again. I want all of my clients to cross that $100 mark and beyond. And the reason for that is I've seen it, I've experienced it. Once you pass that $100 boundary for each session, something changes. It's almost like this invisible line.
Once people are willing to spend that amount with you, you can take them, you can take what they're willing to spend and continue upward over time. And it becomes possible to build your business even into the next hundred. It also changes your world. And we'll talk about that a little more at the end. So with this client, we knew something important. There would always be some clients who stayed at 75, maybe $85 massage. And that was okay. That was okay that they stayed there. But there would be a certain number of clients
who would pay double or even two and a half times that amount for this premium experience. And once we built that into her menu, what happened is exactly what we wanted. Her average income per client crossed well over the hundredth mark. Average income. And it's not because every single person paid more, but because enough people chose the premium experience that the business as a whole changed financially.
Amy Bradley Radford (43:12.743)
And what I loved about this is that it wasn't just good for income. It was just flat out fun. It gave her something exciting to offer. It created this VIP option, a take care of me at a higher level option and something that people would come back for more. So my friend, this is what menu strategy looks like. You're not trying to force every client to do the same thing. You are designing levels and every business is a little different.
And so you choose those levels based on what your business tells you it needs in order to achieve your goals. And you know me, we talk a lot about the emotional side of business because quite frankly as a massage therapist or maybe in general, I don't know, but because we're touchy feely people, I find that the struggle with business isn't business, it's emotional. So one of the biggest benefits of intentional menu design is not financial, it's emotional.
When therapists have a clear menu with well-designed experiences, they stop feeling awkward about money. They stop this improvising. And heaven forbid they stop apologizing. So instead of saying, well, maybe we could do this or we could do that, they just confidently guide their clients toward options that already exist. That confidence is felt by your clients. And confident guidance is one of the strongest drivers of high spending.
in service-based businesses. People want to be led, but they want to be led gently, clearly, and with care. So I wanna circle back to that $100 boundary just a little bit. I've mentioned this throughout this episode and other episodes, but it's a boundary. It's a boundary that massage therapists get stuck under. And when you pass over it, it is a real turning point.
for you, it literally shifts you into a different income bracket of $60,000 and up, and you're making five to $6,000 a month instead of three to $4,000 a month and stuck, you can keep going. anything below that threshold, your income growth is slow and fragile, just like we've talked about in these case studies. And it ends up depending on volume. How many people can you get in the door?
Amy Bradley Radford (45:27.581)
How many massages can you do and how much effort is it gonna cost to reach a certain dollar amount? And you know, when you're above that threshold, you not only gain flexibility, you gain longevity. And that is my other thing for coaching, is I want massage therapists to realize you can do this for a long time. And when you're above that threshold, you can see fewer clients, you can offer more care, you can protect your body, you can reinvest in your business and yourself.
and you are not going to cross that $100 boundary by accident. You're gonna cross it by enhancing your skills intentionally, focusing on how you provide customer service, designing these experiences, not just sessions, and using your menu as a system that teaches clients how to spend with you. So this is why menus matter so much more than people think. And really, your menu is either working for you or against you.
So there's one more piece that fits into this conversation and it's about me. want to share it not as a sales moment, but as an example of how menu design and experience can evolve over time. This is my next case study, it's me. So when I first started doing massage, one of the things that I personally was deeply interested in was aromatherapy.
I have been fascinated with essential oils for over 25 years. I remember the first set of 10 oils that I bought and how I just fell in love with them. I loved learning about them. I loved trying to understand which oil matched which condition because to me it just fit. And so for me, aromatherapy has always felt like what I call vibrational medicine. It's very subtle, but it's powerful. And it affects the nervous system in ways
that don't require explanation or some huge analysis. And because I work heavily in pain management, I learned very quickly that pain is not just muscle pain, and you all know this. Pain also shows up as depression. Pain shows up as anxiety. Pain shows up as fibromyalgia, adrenal fatigue, autoimmune conditions. So when I was working on tissue, I could feel that there was another layer happening in the body. One that I wasn't trained,
Amy Bradley Radford (47:43.564)
one that none of us are trained to verbally process, that's not our job. And honestly, I didn't really want to step into that as a therapist. It's not in our lane. Stay in your lane. But it was also something that I didn't want to ignore because I couldn't. I could tell that it was there. And so over time, I noticed that I would reach for the same oils over and over again for specific presentations with my clients. I would reach for a certain combination of oils when someone was overwhelmed.
a certain combination of oils when someone was clearly in an adrenal crash and certain oils when inflammation and autoimmune were vying for attention before I could get pain to subside within somebody. And so eventually I just began blending these things intentionally. It wasn't random, there was a lot of intuition involved, but there was strategy. And so I created these blends, I pre-blended these blends using my oils in some blank bottles.
and to address particular nervous system states that were interfering with the body's ability to settle and respond to the manual work. And you know, something really interesting happened. When I used those blends consistently, my clients began asking for them. They absolutely noticed the difference and they felt more settled during their sessions. They recovered differently afterward. They could tell that the oils calmed something in them.
so that the work I did went further. And they started asking for them, for home. And so I did what problem solvers do because that's what I am as a problem solver. I systemized this process. So I created a small line of blends, which I now call a line essential oils that correspond to specific emotional and psychological states. So instead of handing a client a box of oils and asking them to smell 10 different bottles and choose one,
I actually created this laminated chart and it had specific categories and there were specific emotions inside each of those categories and those categories matched the oils that I had blended and put together. And so there were emotional patterns or stress patterns or inflammation patterns and that laminated chart allowed the client to scan through that and go, well, that's how I feel and that's how I feel and that's how I feel. And they would select three of them and that those were the oils we used on them that day.
Amy Bradley Radford (50:08.678)
So the clients just had to check off what resonated with them and the chart selected the oil. We didn't have to discuss what was going on. We didn't have to talk about all the, because, you know, we're all on a time limit. And if you open up that door, some people will walk through it for a long time telling you about what's going on in their life. And so we didn't have to discuss it. We didn't have to analyze it. I didn't have to put myself in a position where all I could do is listen and not respond because it's not my job.
and we didn't have to dive into their emotional processing. We just got to address their nervous system quietly, but efficiently. And this is why it fits into this conversation about menus. Because what I realized is that aromatherapy was not meant to be an add-on. That's what I realized for me. And that's where some of this menu design is coming from, is my experience with my oils. My oils weren't meant to be another $10 upgrade.
It wasn't meant to be this complicated choice. And it became part of the experience I offered my clients. And because of that, and because of how far we went down that road, my clients wanted to purchase these for at-home use. So they would use them at home and I would use them in their sessions and it created this continuity. They were able to manage their own care. It created deeper results for them. And it became part of the overall customer experience I provided.
And then later as I began teaching and bringing, I took my blends to classes because we were teaching pain management. So I'm like, hey, try this and see if it helps. Therapist asked if they could purchase them as well. And so that's how this line expanded beyond my own practice. But the important part for this episode is not that I sell oils. The important part is this. I turned something complicated into something very simple. I removed decision fatigue. I removed guesswork.
I removed random selection and I built this structure around it. And that is what a good menu design does. It doesn't add more noise and it organizes all this value. I wanted my clients to get the greatest value from me and from something that I firmly believed in. And I created this menu around it so that it was simple, simple for them and simple for me. For therapists that use this particular oil line in their practices,
Amy Bradley Radford (52:33.307)
it becomes a session tool and if they choose a small additional revenue stream. This isn't a multi-level company. This is just sales. This is just purchase oils, retail, pay your taxes, all done. But it is another structured way to enhance client experience. So if you're curious about it, I'll leave a link in the descriptions. You can explore it for yourself. But whether or not you use my oils, the teaching principle remains the same. When you design your offerings intentionally,
and reduce friction for your clients, spending becomes easier. And that is what this entire episode has been about. So I wanna leave you with this. Your menu is not just a list of what you do. It is a map of how people interact with your business. It is the teacher of spending behavior and it is one of the most powerful tools you have for changing your financial reality. So if your income feels stuck, don't just look at your schedule.
Look at what your menu is teaching people. And I'm going to put this here as well. If you need help redesigning that menu, thoughtfully, sustainably, and uniquely to you, that's the work I do with therapists every day. And I'd be happy to help you. There's no pressure, no hype, just some structure and clarity. So until next time, my friend, please take care of your body, your energy, but most importantly, your business.
Amy Bradley Radford (54:02.484)
Thanks for spending this time with me. If this episode was helpful, subscribing or leaving a review helps other therapists find the show. For classes, resources, and ongoing education, you can visit amybradleyradford.com or join my email list if you'd like to stay connected. Take care of your body, your clients, and your business. I'll see you next time.
