As a business owner, you can't avoid the legalities of online therapy services.
There is a chronological sequence that you will go through with every client, from a public enquiry to an archived case. There are privacy issues throughout this sequence.
Here is an overview of the phases of online service provision and some terms you should become familiar with.
Phase 1: Marketing
Marketing involves interacting with the public to inform people about your services.
Sales Funnel: Your marketing efforts will look like an inverted triangle or funnel, with many people from the public entering at the top and only a limited number making the decision to become your clients.
Landing Page: This page is where the public lands when they click on a link in a search engine. It is different than the home page of your website. A landing page promotes a product or service. The purpose is to collect leads. A blog post can serve as a landing page. Sometimes landing pages have no menu because you don’t want the public to wander away from the page. Many landing pages have a strong call to action which people click in order to get something they want.
Generic Traffic: This means you are not using paid advertising to bring the public to your online content. They are finding the content by searching for it.
Cost Per Click: You might pay for traffic if you are not getting enough generic traffic. Online advertisers put your advertisement in front of an audience. In many cases, you get billed for the number of clicks on the ad. This cost per click is determined by many competitive factors.
Inbound Marketing: People have questions, and they are actively looking online for answers. Inbound marketing means that the public is finding you because they want a solution to a problem. By providing the public with information, you can help them decide if your services are a good fit for them. This is contrasted with traditional marketing which interrupts people and tells them about services they may have no interest in.
Lead: At the very beginning, someone from the general public might find your website, click on a few pages and fill in a form. By doing so, the person has become a lead. Your next step is to interact with that person.
Phase 2: Qualifying
Qualifying is a term that refers to narrowing down leads into potential clients. These people have not purchased services from you yet, but you have collected enough information to know that they meet the requirements for your telepractice.
Sometimes the lead is a family member or agency contact so it can take several interactions before the enquiry narrows down to an actual prospect for your telepractice services.
Support staff might be involved in processing enquiries. This might take place in person rather than via online interactions. There might be some screening that takes place, to ensure that the prospect is a good fit for the telepractice services that you are offering.
Qualified Prospect: This is a person who meets your requirements for telepractice.
Phase 3: Billing
Billing involves getting a commitment and getting paid. You need confidential processes for formal quotes, contract negotiations, funding applications, signatures, storing credit card information, billing accurately, issuing receipts and storing financial records.
Client: A qualified prospect converts to a client when a commitment is made. You offer services or a product and the client accepts your terms.
Conversion: The step of making a commitment to become a client is referred to as a conversion in your sales funnel.
Third Party Funding: The people getting the service are the first party. You are the second party. When the funding is coming from an agency rather than the people getting the service, it is called 'third party funding.'
Phase 4: Onboarding
Onboarding refers to the early phase of working with a new client. Your words and actions will either build rapport or sabotage it. Your new clients will be getting to know you. They will also be experiencing your tech processes and communication tools for the first time.
Buyer’s Remorse: Be mindful that buyer’s remorse often hits. This means that your new client regrets making a commitment. With new telepractice clients, the technology can be overwhelming for the client. Skillfully improving your onboarding process will help you keep clients and build your practice. If you show a lack of professionalism regarding privacy protection, your clients will feel nervous or offended. Make sure you know how to interact as a telepractice professional.
Phase 5: Maintaining
Maintaining clients beyond the first contract will help your business succeed.
Creating Data: While working with an active client, you will create clinical notes, progress reports, email messages and possibly some webcam recordings. All of this is data about your client. Most likely this data will be created in various forms, in various locations.
Accessing Data: You might retire or leave to work elsewhere. Another clinician might have access to all the information you collected about your clients. Eventually a clinician will close the case, but the data will still exist. Your employer or business will still be responsible for maintaining the privacy of that data.
Phase 6: Preserving
Preserving your physical records and online data and keeping all your information confidential remains your responsibility.
Teaching: The data might be viewed by your colleagues, supervisors and administrators. You might want to present interesting cases at a conference or use your recordings to teach students.
Marketing: You might want to use your success stories as testimonials. You might create a press release about your services.
