EPISODE 26 - FINAL
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[00:00:00] I looked at the people that perceived the service as great value or good value had a higher number of products provided. Okay, so those that perceived the service to be of great value and really high retention rate. So we're talking 6 to 10 consults. Okay, these people are coming back. They see it as great value.
On average, they received, throughout the duration of their journey through that service, six products. So they might have got a body scan, a meal plan. They might have got some sort of test, whatever it may have been, printed resource materials, a book, whatever. They had a very high number of products provided.
Welcome to How to Build a Profitable Nutrition Business. If you love nutrition and you love helping people and you want to be in the game long enough to keep doing that, then this is the podcast for you. Let's get into it.
Welcome back to another episode of How to Build a Profitable Nutrition Business. [00:01:00] Today's guest is me and I'm talking all about value or And this is a topic that I'm, I'm quite passionate about and I think it's something that probably doesn't get enough attention in certainly in the business space for health professionals.
And it's something that having been a business owner, we had a private practice, which we had a number of offices and it sort of grew quite quickly. It's something that I had to think about a lot early on. And so, the reason I had to really think about it is because in those early years, I didn't get a good retention rate.
I was struggling, okay, so it was quite stressful. I had a family to feed. I was getting lots of referrals, but I would get clients in and they may not be coming back, which was pretty clear I was providing a pretty crappy service, right? Now, At university we're taught to have this perfect consult and have all these considerations with the Australian Directorate of Guidelines and everything like that, which is all great.
Please do not think that for any second am I ever saying that we should not provide an evidence based approach or [00:02:00] veer away from our training. But if your focus is on really adhering and delivering something that is perfect as per what we were taught, It may not always align nicely with what our clients want or what our clients perceive as value.
And so today I'm going to talk about that. Hopefully it's a bit of a thought provoking exercise. I actually did some informal research in this area. So I just sent out a survey and I was actually going to get a panel of guests on here, but I'm potentially going to get this research formalized and partner with the university.
And at that point, when it's published, I'm going to get a panel of experts on and then discuss the findings. And so just for today, it's really just a thought provoking exercise for you to think about your practice. So whether you're a nutrition or fitness professional, are you So focused on providing what the literature says is the perfect consult or the perfect service for your clients.
And does that actually align with what the client wants? So are we truly being client centered? We all want to provide the best [00:03:00] service for our clients, but is it truly what the client come there to get? Okay. And so it's worth discussing. So I was having a conversation with a colleague this week. Now, this colleague is, was a recently new graduate.
And as exactly as I was, they're focused on basically a lot of their training and doing a number of things in terms of what was taught to provide in a consult. And I know from my training, like we had this 60 minute consult. We had to tick all these boxes and consider all these things when you're going through it.
But in practice, we were doing 30 minute consults in our business and that was just because of a lot of our work was Medicare. So we really only get paid for 20 minutes for one, but two people don't have that long of an attention span to sit there and hear about everything can be asked all these questions.
And so we tend to lose them. And so I was having this discussion with a colleague. Um, and particularly one of the topics was about, around weight loss. Okay. So their client that have clients come in and they wanted to lose weight. And as did I, it was [00:04:00] kind of that slow and steady, that resistance to any fad diet that comes out.
And so that then can be off putting for our client because as much as we may not like it and it may not always align perfectly with what we're taught, our clients want results. Ultimately, that is where they will see value. They need results, they're coming there to get them. Now, inherently, that may not really sit well with us, okay?
Like we may be thinking, well, you know, rapid weight loss versus slow and steady. And that was always my thinking, slow and steady wins the race. If you go and look at the literature, and I'm happy to put some in the product, in the notes, podcast notes for this episode, slow and steady has proven to be no more beneficial than rapid weight loss.
Okay, so Aren't we better off trying to help our clients get results faster, but at least with our support, so it's in a much safer manner? Helping them to retain lean tissue stores and get the right [00:05:00] nutrient intake. And so it was really just a conversation around shifting that thinking, well, why is slow and steady better?
Why can't we get them the results quicker, but do it in a more structured format with our support? And so it was really interesting because ultimately if a client comes to you and let's say it is weight loss that they want and if we give them a really slow, dragged out plan and yes, adherent to the guidelines and it's a really good healthy diet but it's just not getting them the results they want.
Human nature is that they're going to want to try and change it up and get those results faster. And we may not agree with that. But I've been a dietician for 15 years and I haven't had any success in changing human, human psyche or, or mentality around that approach, right? People want fast results, like it or love it.
You can either get on board and help them and do it in a safe manner, or you can stick with your ingrained belief patterns and, and be resistant to it and ultimately, that will probably most likely affect your [00:06:00] retention rates with your clients. Now equally, we also discussed potentially like with diabetes, okay, you might have a client come in and they might have sugars that are quite high and you're trying to help them and so you might talk about low GI and getting lots of fiber.
But something I was always a little bit resistant to was low carb and I was resistant because it was just You know, a little bit fad thinking, dietary fad thinking, and there was a lot of the influencers online who were often recommending some pretty dangerous practices, but they were big advocates of low carb.
And so that built up an internal resistance for me, but as I evolved as a clinician, a low carb diet became a pretty important tool in my toolkit to help clients with diabetes get some good results. Now, I do a low carb diet for clients with diabetes. pretty high, pretty poor glycemic control and I do it with getting plenty of fiber, plenty of protein, lots of vegetables, salads and even some fruits in there.
I still include whole [00:07:00] grains. I just position them earlier in the day because we're more insulin sensitive in the morning and we're less insulin sensitive at night. So these are all things based in science that I'm doing that can help a client but it gets them results and then I can help them longer because I get them results and then they come back.
So, It's, it was interesting just looking at my own internal beliefs as a clinician. We project these ideologies onto our clients, thinking that we're taking the higher moral ground and that they're better off doing it our way. But ultimately, again, you've got to think, okay, well, what's going to get our clients results?
And we can still make diet manipulations and do it in a safe way that's going to get them results that's going to be better than them doing them on their own. Okay, so as an example for clients that might have poor glycemic control, I can implement a low carb diet, get them results, and then over time we're introducing more carb in, we've helped them lose weight, control their sugar, and at the same time introduce more of those certainly whole food, carbohydrate [00:08:00] sources back into their diet.
for a longer term sustainable eating practice. And so it's really about trying to line up what the client wants, what we know long term is best and then meeting in the middle, still staying evidence based, but meeting in the middle to get them the results. And so it's really, really important. I think that as clinicians, We work with our clients, not against them.
Okay, they'll quite often come in and they'll have seen a influencer on Instagram or YouTube, wherever it may be. And they'll come in with quite often some pretty crazy approaches. It's really important. I think if you take a step back, pick out the elements of that you can work with rather than be resistant for the client and really work on getting your clients some results in a safe.
manner. Now, equally in terms of value, okay, so that, so results will be the thing that your clients tend to value more than anything. The next is some sort of productization. Now the reason I [00:09:00] say that is because as a dietician working in the industry, in the business if you like, of information. Okay, so people come to us, we'll talk to them about their diet.
We're not like a physio or a podiatrist where there's a physical animal. They're reminded, for example, that their, their shoulder is sore. They need to see the physio. For the dietician, a lot of the information that we provide, clients can get online. They can look it up and look that information up. Okay, so we need to provide a service.
that they can't get online. And this was great advice provided to me by my mentor when we started our business. And there was a transformational shift that really shifted our business when I really had that focus of providing services that my clients just couldn't go and get online. And so, part of that is about productizing your service, okay?
What's something they can come to see me for that they're going to walk away with a sense of value? Because I know early on, I would just sit there with clients and talk to them about diet and [00:10:00] changes, and I might write a few things down and hand out a few resources, but at the end of it, they're walking away confused, going, okay, yes, There's a lot of information, please remember we retain, what is it, less than 20 percent of what we hear.
So they're walking away going, ah, was that really worth it, did I get anything out of it? Okay. And so you've got to provide something where they're going to walk away and then have that sense of value that yes, this is something that is improving my condition and I'm seeing a value in what's happening.
And so in this survey I did, I surveyed 50 people. And some of the questions I asked was firstly, have you been to see a nutrition or fitness professional? Did you see it as valuable? Would you recommend it to a friend? Was your issue improved? Did you actually get a result out of it? And did you perceive it as valuable?
And then I also asked around some cost. And then importantly, I asked what services did you get? And I kind of categorized the heat. And so some of the services I, I looked. that were diet analysis, [00:11:00] body scans like an in body machine or vault, one of those meal plans or recipe eBooks, online courses, potentially some testing, whether it was hydrogen breath testing or whatever it may be books, training programs, whatever it was.
Okay. So it was really about adding some value to a service that your client couldn't just get online. And so there was some really, really. fascinating results. And again, this is informal research, but it still was quite thought provoking for me. And I'm just going to go through some of those results now.
Now I know a lot of you will be listening to this. So I'm not going to talk as if you're looking at the screen, but I'll be looking at the screen as I go through it. Now, please bear in mind that this is a very limited cohort. I think I only had about 52 people respond to the survey. And they, I shared it into groups fairly widely, so there weren't necessarily people that were associated with me.
There will be some, of course, but in terms of the findings of this survey may not carry a lot [00:12:00] of weight. It's really just a thought provoking exercise at this point, but it certainly has been a point of discussion to then potentially do some formal research in this area. And so, I'm just going to go through some of the key things that, um, we looked at that were a product or a service that were provided and what the response rate or, or the perceived value from people that received that service.
And there's a lot of people that would have received multiple services, uh, or multiple products as part of a service. So I'm just breaking these down individually. Now, a cooking lesson was one that we had. Now, there wasn't many people that actually replied to this, so there's very little weight in this, but whoever did, it wasn't perceived as too valuable.
So that's interesting, okay? So we used to have cooking classes in ours, but we've only got one person that got that. And I always thought that was a great thing. Uh, addition to a service was to have some sort of cooking facility and do it could have been the way that we ran the program potentially, and this person, it's all de identified data, so I don't know who it was.
It may not have been a cooking lesson with us, [00:13:00] but whoever it was, it wasn't really valued as useful. Now, a diet analysis. If you are in the nutrition space, this was the standout as a product to provide to your clients. Now many of you will probably do it, but it's worth mentioning here that you want to do a diet analysis to really, that's a service that someone can't get online.
You know, well, not to the best of my knowledge, there's probably an online platform somewhere you can enter your diet. But this was a diet analysis. Now, we used to use the FoodWorks software. We'd do a diet history. We'll get them to use Easy Diet Diary and then pull it into there and we could give them a breakdown of their diet.
They're really important, particularly when you've got clients that have micronutrient concerns. So you're looking at maybe supplementation or modifying their diet to really increase it. But we had a really high rate of people that had a diet analysis would recommend the service to a friend. They perceived the value as either good or great.
So the two highest out of the five, so really good. And they [00:14:00] stuck with the service. So they had anywhere between, say, two to five services or six to ten. So I asked that question, was, How many services have you seen? Like how many times have you been to this clinician? So it's all good and well to say, yes, I'd recommend it to a friend.
Well, yes, I perceive it as value, but these people are giving up their time and money to come and see a clinician. And so if they're coming back multiple times, then it's clear that they see this as a valuable service. And so diet analysis was really important. Some sort of test, some sort of pathology test or breath test or whatever it may have been received as good value.
Again, limited cohort. This one, there was only three people that responded, but there was a sense of value there. Supplements. Okay, so some people will sell supplements. It wasn't something we ever did, but this was perceived to be of pretty high value. Again, limited cohort. But pretty good value, so it was either good or great, with only a small percentage actually saying it was no value of all, at all.
Now, I broke the meal plans down, [00:15:00] obviously with meal planning software, this is something that I was particularly interested in. A generic meal plan versus a customized meal plan. Now, those that had a generic meal plan did not see it as that valuable, so it was of no value at all. It was kind of a mix across.
how they rated it, um, but the one thing that wasn't there was great value, there was good, little, moderate, no value at all. So it was a split across them, um, and only about half would recommend it to a friend. If you then go and do a customised meal plan that's tailored to that person, then there's a significant increase.
It's great and good, really high percentages return there. Basically it, uh, improved their condition. And they're very likely to recommend it to a friend. Then, recipe e book was pretty similar to a customized meal plan. Okay, so it was perceived as valuable. High recommendation to a friend. Written or printed material, so some sort of resource to follow up on.
And this is really important. And I say this equally with meal plans or recipe e books. If you're giving [00:16:00] something to someone with your brand on it, then they're going to be looking at this. They may not retain everything you've talked to them about in the consult, but if you give them some sort of printed resource, meal plan, recipe e book, that's got your brand on it, they're going to be looking at that beyond the consult, okay?
So potentially if it's a meal plan, they're going to have that in their kitchen, on their phone, and they're going to be looking at that over the next weeks to months, with your brand being reminded of you as a business, which is going to be helpful for retention. So printed material was perceived as valuable, then also Physical conditions, so body scan, skin folds, if you're someone that doesn't skin folds, that was perceived as valuable as well.
Really high recommendation to a friend, perceived as great or good value, and again, retention rate, so a lot of return consults. So these are all little products that basically you can provide as part of your service that your client can't just go and get online, they're coming to see you, they're walking away with something, and it's [00:17:00] a real sense of value for them.
Now, importantly, I looked at the people that perceived the service as great value or good value had a higher number of products provided. Okay, so those that perceived the service to be of great value and really high retention rate. So we're talking 6 to 10 consults, okay? These people are coming back, they see it as great value.
On average, they received, throughout the duration of their journey through that service, six products. So they might have got a body scan, a meal plan, they might have got some sort of test, whatever it may have been, printed resource materials, a book, whatever. They had a very high number of products provided.
Now on the flip side of that, those that perceived little to no value in a service got very little product. So it was about 1. 3 products on average per journey, per service, okay? So really worth thinking about how can you productize your [00:18:00] service? How can you provide your clients with something that they can't just get online?
And think about that from a business perspective. Now why is all of this important is because client retention is a lot cheaper than client acquisition. So what do I mean there? Okay, so basically keeping a client that's already come to your service in your service is a lot cheaper for your business than going out and acquiring new business.
Okay, because new business means you've got to advertise, you're doing maybe Facebook ads or social media posts in newspapers or whether it's doctor's meetings, whatever it may be, that costs time and money. Whereas if you already got a client, And you're just providing a good service, getting them results, they're going to come back.
So it's a very low acquisition rate, if you like, or retention rate. They're coming back. So it's a very low cost in terms of keeping them in your service. Now, that's good for their health. Okay. Because the longer they're in your service, the more support you can provide and the better their health outcomes.
That's quite clear [00:19:00] from an evidence perspective, but it's also better for your business as well. Okay. Because You're saving money on acquisition costs and recruiting new members, trying to get new business and they're coming back. And so there was a Harvard review article that looked at it's anywhere from five to 25 times cheaper to retain a client than acquire a new one.
Okay. So to summarize this episode, right? Really important to consider do your. Ideologies, beliefs around a particular health topic, whatever it may be that a client's coming to see you for, do they align with what your client's coming there to see you for? Okay, do not consider whether you're projecting a bit of a superiority complex onto your clients that you know best as the clinician.
Because remember, the client is the expert on themselves, not you. Okay, they're the expert on what they know, need, want. Okay, they're the expert on themselves and what's going to work for them. You're just there to guide them and try and do it from an [00:20:00] evidence based approach. And if we're really to be truly client centered, we've got to listen to our client and listen to what they truly want.
Okay, what are they going to perceive as value so that they can stay in your service, so you can help them longer? And typically that is results, number one. And number two is what's a service you can provide that they can't just go and get online or somewhere else? What's unique about your practice? What are you doing?
that will have them telling their friends about you, that will have them getting results, that's really going to help to grow your business. Alright, I hope that's helped today. No doubt it could be a bit of a controversial topic. There's certainly some thoughts in here that for me early on in my business career, at least, when we had our practice, it was quite conflicting.
And to be honest, I was actually more worried about what other dietitians thought than what my clients thought. And so trying to let go of that Always be evidence based. Please don't think I'm ever suggesting that we do anything that's not evidence based, but it's really about how can you work with your client rather than against [00:21:00] them to get them the results that they want.
Thanks. Do you find this podcast valuable? There may be other nutrition professionals out there will also. If you like, share, and subscribe, it's going to help other nutrition professionals make an impact on the world just like you. Thanks.
