Mobile / Work-from-home Massage Therapists: please come chat to me about starting up

[thell]

I'm doing the ITEC Level 3 Holistic Massage, and hopefully will qualify next spring.
I'm not sure what to do, to be honest!

My daughter won't be starting school until next September, so I couldn't take a position somewhere until then - I was thinking of starting very gently with the odd appointment here and there.
There isn't a spare room in my house - the only option would be to use my living room, which is really small - not sure clients would like this, and I have a cat who could be banished from the area easily, but it could cause allergy issues, couldn't it?

Thye most obvious solution is to be mobile...so please tell me if that's what you do, how is it working out for you? Do you have personal security issues? Is it a right old PITA?

Any ideas gratefully received, I'm a bit confused at the moment!!

my mil was an aroma therapist (she is retired now), and she did say the hardest thing was starting out and getting business.

She had a room in her house converted into a clinic and she operated from there.

But it is a business which is incredibly difficult to advertise without attracting the wrong types of clients.

If you're planning to go to people's houses then you need to be especially careful because you don't know these people or who is going to be there when you turn up.

Mil said that she did develop a sense for dodgy clients, e.g. people who would ring saying could they come immediately always set alarm bells ringing etc.

I'm not entirely sure what the answer is, but do be careful where you advertise, i.e. perhaps not in the local paper for example.

Once mil had a few clients she used to only take new clients that had come to her by word of mouth so it was much easier.

Thanks, Wannabe.

I'm maybe thinking of advertising a mobile service in places that mums might look, eg NCT Newsletter...when DD was tiny I would have loved a mum's massage group, ie a few mums taking it in turn to watch the baby while one nips out for a massage.
Or even someone to come to my house in the evening, as I was trapped on sporadic bf duties!

Just wondered if anyone would say 'Yes, I'm a mobile therapist and it's fab!'

bump!

I have 2 friends who are therapists:

one has a room in her house - fully equipped and only used for her massage treatments. She only takes on a client once she has met them first in a safe place. She also sees some clients from another location (shared premises) but I know that the room hire is a lot.

my other friend is a mobile therapist - she offers brief treatments e.g. hand massage, or head and shoulder massage that can be done fully clothed. She goes to work places, coffee mornings etc and gives treatments to several people in the space of a couple of hours. She has a portable massage chair that she takes with her.

My friend with the mobile business has more clients and makes more money than my friend with the treatment room.

Thanks Dolly, that's useful to know.
I think I'd have to learn 'on-site massage' for the seated & clothed variety, those techniques aren't included in my basics course. Worth thinking about

Hello thell - just took a look at your thread with some interest as I'm just about to start trying to drum up some business to work 1 or 2 days from home but I know only too well that it takes a long time to build up a good client base - it's daunting isn't it?

I used to have a spare room in my (previous) home, a flat, which I offered treatments from but always did that alongside a 4 day job. Then I had my dd (now 18 months) and the treatment room became her room! I then moved to our house and have only just turned the spare room into a treatment room and our dd has the box room (poor thing!).

I did do some work from a room I rented in the new year for a couple of months but found that I was really resenting paying for a room to use and the lady I was renting it from started to be too bossy for my liking!

I'm going to do a course in onsite massage in the next couple of months and buying a 2nd hand chair for £50 so I can take my services into offices etc. It's really worth doing I think once you've qualified. You can do the course in a day. Indian head massage and reflexology would be good treatments to offer mobile too. I tried doing some full body treatments at my office (one afternoon a week) but found it a bit of a pain and difficult for people to relax as they were getting undressed in a work environment!

I live opposite another therapist (who I get on very well with) and we have thought about teaming up and offering treatments on a mobile basis for hen nights, girlie nights etc.... could be worth thinking about?

Re advertising with the NCT - I actually paid something like £25 (can't remember exactly) to 100 or so of my flyers in the packs they hand out at the fair they do and didn't even get one call!! I also placed an ad in our local free mag and only got 2 people booked in from that and didn't even make back half of what I spent the advertising. I've always been told that word of mouth is the best way to get known but that doesn't help much when you're stating out! It's worth giving some taster freebies etc. and just networking as much as you can.

A cheap way to get literature is by going to the vistaprint website and just ordering all their free stuff (business cards, postcards (which can double up as flyers etc.) but just make sure you don't pay for anything because they are ALWAYS doing free offers, you just have to pay for the postage which for me was about £7 for 100 postcards, 250 business cards and 25 brochures.

Good luck! and sorry to go so much.....

I have been working from home and in treatment rooms for over two years now. It is a hard slog to get recognised but if you can affliate yourself with either a gym or a club or a mums group for pregnancy then it gets you more noticed. Try networking groups, I go to a great one called my jammy business network its very friendly and welcoming.

Don't put fliers through the doors of houses, lets face it we all just dump them straight into recycling anyway! Don't advertise or pay for advertising in magazines I have done it 3 times with not one call. Word of mouth and getting a website are the main ways.

Don't be scared by the prospect of going to people's houses, if you don't have the intuition to know when someone is on the phone, then you probably aren't in the right job!