Ask Annie: Are People Just Looking For A Quick Fix? I Don’t Offer That!

The fact that you are providing a real and nuanced process rather than a quick fix is actually not a problem. It’s how you’re going to attract the right folks to your work.

Therapists and healers work with me to create high quality, niched programs beyond private practice. The people I work with have a ton of integrity.

What I mean by that is that the people I work with really give a shit about the work they do and the programs they create. They care deeply about the people they help.

As they’re getting clear on their niches, I hear something like this from many of them:

“I like to help people with deep and nuanced transformation rather than quick fixes or practical tips.

I worry that people are just looking for the practical solutions.”

This thing tends to happen:

Once you’ve chosen the topic of your signature program, you might start noticing Reels, Tiktoks or articles with simple tips to solve the problem you help people with.

Some of those tips are useful, or even sufficient for some people.

But those are not the people you’re selling your program to.

Your people are ready for a paradigm shift, and that’s what you’re going to guide them through.

Before they even sign up to work with you, they’ll learn that you’re inviting them to look at their problem in a different way, perhaps questioning some of their underlying assumptions.

I actually encourage you to lean in to the depth and nuance of the solution you offer.

Leave the quick tips to someone else. You get to be known for the stuff you are great at.

The people who want to purchase your program have probably already tried those practical strategies, and have been failed by them, or they’ve already spotted that those strategies aren’t the right fit for them. Maybe some of your people are wondering why those things haven’t worked for them. They might even feel shame that they don’t seem able to fix this problem when some people say it’s simple.

The attractiveness of YOUR offer is that you have a deeper solution, one that perhaps gets to the root of the issue. And your solution is one that they have not yet tried.

You get to tell them:

“You’ve tried these practical tips. It’s not your fault that those things haven’t solved this for you. To have a lasting change in how you experience this issue, here’s a completely different approach.”

And then you name the paradigm shift.

The person who wants to work with you will feel relief and resonance.

I’ll give you an example.

Lots of therapists I’ve worked with who help parents tell me:

“I want to help parents who’s kids are having undesirable behaviors, but I’m not going to teach the parents how to get their kids to stop doing the undesirable behavior. I’m going to take the parents through a much deeper process that has to do with the parents accepting themselves and deeply accepting their child. The behaviors do usually shift quite a bit during that process, but I don’t want to promise that.”

Great! You’re going to work with people ready for a paradigm shift around their children’s difficult behavior.

If they’re like I was when my kids were younger, they’ve already tried about a million tips that seemed to work for other parents. But nothing stuck, and none of it really helped my family to feel grounded at a deeper level.

Don’t hide the fact that you have a deeper solution, and don’t apologize for it. Lead with it.

If you can articulate this paradigm shift well, the right folks will be grateful they finally found you.

Your future participants are smart, and they like hearing what YOU’RE saying because they’re finally hearing something that sounds true.

You’ll talk about the problem exactly as your right fit person is experiencing it, which perhaps includes feeling totally frustrated, h