Happy, Healthy, & Wealthy Therapists | Ep 17: Brand Deals for Therapists: What’s Actually Possible

Released: 03/06/2026

Show Notes:

In this conversation, Amanda and Carrie discuss the intricacies of social media marketing for therapists, focusing on strategies for building a following, navigating brand partnerships, and maintaining authenticity. They explore the challenges of content creation, the importance of consistency, and the impact of comparison on creativity. Carrie shares her journey of starting on social media during the pandemic, her experiences with brand partnerships, and tips for therapists looking to enhance their online presence. The discussion emphasizes the need for therapists to be authentic and relatable in their marketing efforts while also providing valuable insights into managing personal and professional content.

About Dr. Carrie Jackson:

Dr. Carrie Jackson is a licensed child psychologist and private practice owner, specializing in ADHD in children and teens. She is the founder of SoCal Child Psychology, where she provides therapy, psychological evaluations, and parent-focused services for families across California. In addition to her clinical work, Carrie is a mental health content creator with a combined audience of over 165,000 followers across Instagram and TikTok, where she shares evidence-based practical guidance for parents and clinicians across social media platforms.

3 Key Takeaways:

1. Social media growth takes time and strategy—going viral once can help, but sustainable growth comes from consistency, experimentation, and learning what actually resonates with your audience.
2. Brand partnerships can become a real revenue stream for therapists when they align with your actual life, values, and content—not just your follower count.
3. The best therapist content feels human, not polished to death—authenticity, relatability, and messaging that sounds like you will always connect more than generic “therapist speak.”

Connect with Carrie:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dr.carriejackson
• Instagram Launch Checklist

REGISTER FOR THE WEALTHY THERAPIST METHOD WEBINAR HERE!

Connect with Amanda:

• Follow on Instagram: @amandakbcoaching
• Check out the Amanda KB Coaching website

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Sponsors:

• This episode is sponsored by Alma – learn more here
• This episode is sponsored by Jane – use code: AMANDA2MO for a 2-month grace period

Resources & Links:

SEO for Therapists Membership

Therapy Intensives Academy

Happy, Healthy, & Wealthy Mastermind

Free Training: 3 Steps to Booking Your First Therapy Intensive

Free Guide: 3 Steps to Double Your Income

SEO Freebie

Just a quick heads up, everything I share in this podcast is for informational and educational purposes only. It’s not legal advice, financial advice, or tax advice. Every practice and every state has its own rules. So if you’re wondering how something applies to your situation, make sure to check in with an attorney, accountant, or another qualified professional who can give you guidance based on your specific circumstances.

Transcript:

Amanda (00:02)
All right, hi, Carrie. Thanks so much for joining me today. I’m super excited to have you on.

Carrie /jackson (00:07)
I am so excited to chat with you. know we’ve been talking via DMs a lot about social media stuff, so I’m excited to be here.

Amanda (00:14)
Yes,

it is something so many people, sometimes even myself included, have questions about in terms of the right strategies and growth and ideas and motivation and consistently, there’s just always something to be troubleshooted when it comes to social media marketing. So I’m to love to pick all your brain thoughts around that. Brain thoughts is a word, that’s cool. Pick your brain, get some thoughts on that.

⁓ Because you also do, so you have a pretty big following. Remind me where you’re at right now. I think it’s over 165K.

Carrie /jackson (00:47)
Yes, and that’s across TikTok and Instagram. Those are the two channels that I’m on and I’ve got about 80,000 on each of them. So around 160,000 across both of them, which I do want to clarify like this is not overnight. I’ve been doing this for five years now at this point. So don’t expect, don’t expect that to happen to you overnight. Although it can.

Amanda (00:50)
Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, I’ve seen some people literally like blow up overnight and that’s fantastic and it’s so exciting and obviously we love the dopamine hits and a lot of people have to work really, really hard to get those really, really big numbers.

Carrie /jackson (01:22)
Yeah, yeah, a lot of people can go viral with one thing, but then after like that one post, you’ve got to keep it up or else people will be like, no, I’m not really interested in following you anymore. Or you’ll just have to figure out what does work.

Amanda (01:37)
So tell me a little bit about what got you interested and even starting five years ago. Why did you say like TikTok and Instagram? Like that’s something I want to do more of.

Carrie /jackson (01:48)
So I started during the pandemic during, yeah, it was 2019 or 2020. 2020, I guess, is when I started. And honestly, I started just because it was fun to do. And like most people during the pandemic, was like, you know what, I’ve got a lot of extra time at home. I am bored. And there were a lot of accounts that I saw on TikTok where they were sharing information about mental health that was not accurate and not helpful.

And I was like, you know what, let me see if I could do this too. And I started just creating content for fun and really enjoyed it. And then after that, it really did start to take on different directions where I wasn’t always just sharing education, but I really did start with the idea in mind that this is fun. And also this is something I could use to market my practice down the road because I wasn’t in private practice at that point either.

⁓ So it’s changed over time, but started during the pandemic.

Amanda (02:48)
Yes, when we all had so much time on our hands and there really was so, there were so many people speaking to mental health, which is fantastic. And so many people speaking misinformation and especially your specialty around ADHD. Like what were you seeing that like, hold on, I need to step in here and say something.

Carrie /jackson (03:08)
yeah. I mean, I would seen a lot of videos of people talking about different symptoms or signs of ADHD. And I love watching some of those videos because yes, like a lot of people with their lived experience around ADHD, there may be some common threads or things that they experienced, but they aren’t necessarily a diagnostic symptom. And so, you know, that information that they’re sharing on social media, I think it can be really entertaining and helpful, but at the same time, it can lead to…

misconceptions. I would see, if you walk this way, then you probably have ADHD. And I was like, I don’t know about that. I will say I do bump into things a lot, which is something I would see on social media. But still, that can happen for a lot of different reasons. So those are some of the things I was seeing. Did you start your accounts during the pandemic too, or was it after?

Amanda (03:48)
Sure.

It was afterwards because I was working at my agency through, I left early 2022 and I think I started my Instagram account maybe like five months before I started private practice because I just started seeing more people. I was in all the Facebook groups. So I had my personal account in some Facebook groups, but then I kept seeing all these like follow me threads of like, here’s my handle on Instagram. And I’m like,

Is this a thing us therapists are doing now? Okay, I guess I have to create an account. So yeah, back in 2022.

Carrie /jackson (04:36)
Oh, wow. Yeah, I forgot that a lot of like the therapist social media stuff started with just Facebook. But then, yeah, there wasn’t there weren’t a ton of people who were doing social media back in the 20, 2019, 2020 time period. It was just brand new. And well, for me, at least, like it was discouraged during graduate school. And so I was really scared about getting started with it.

Amanda (04:51)
Mm hmm. Yeah.

Carrie /jackson (05:02)
And I’m sure a lot of therapists feel that way too because you hear so much about like the bad things about social media, the ethics around it. But we’re living in an online world now and things are changed and we need to take that into consideration.

Amanda (05:17)
Absolutely. I think I was listening to a podcast the other day that I don’t remember if it was the host or the guest, but someone was like, it really doesn’t matter what you think about social media, what you think about AI these days, because your clients, whether it is therapy clients or like your other healthcare professional or a copywriter, like your clients are using those things. And so you, if you want to be found, have to also have some kind of presence on those things.

And so again, you were here just sharing helpful information and then did realize the potential of I can market my practice here too.

Carrie /jackson (05:46)
Yeah.

Yep, absolutely. was like, okay, this was fun to start with. But now actually, I want to use it as a tool to grow my private practice. And then it took on brand partnerships as another avenue, which was really exciting. But also, I had no idea that would be even a possibility. Like as a therapist, I just thought that brand partnerships were something that influencers did and you know, sharing their makeup, their clothes, and I love following them.

but I did not think that that was something we could ever do as therapists. So it’s really grown over the past few years and I’m excited that a lot more therapists are open to social media as a way of marketing themselves now because it truly is how so many people are finding therapists or services.

Amanda (06:37)
Yes. And I’m really curious about the brand partnership stuff too, because you and I have quite a bit that we do. You and I are both Jane ambassadors. So clearly we have some success knowing that this can be a thing that works. it is a very, it’s kind of like one of my most fun ways of earning revenue in my business is like, I get to just make a reel or do a story set or something like that. So what was your experience starting to

get these random DMs from people or people emailing you, how did you suss out this one’s sketchy, this one’s not gonna pay enough, like how did you experience that?

Carrie /jackson (07:14)
Yeah, I remember my first brand partnership that was like a legit one that somebody reached out to me about. And it was when I had less than 10,000 followers. And I grew to 10,000 followers pretty quickly, like within a year, because also it was, at that time, I would say it was a little bit easier to grow during the early stages of the pandemic because there weren’t as many people. But I remember this app reached out to me and it was related to organization and planning. And they

wanted me to create a story set and a reel about their app and how it could be useful. And we talked through like negotiation of the pricing and we talked about like what the deliverables would look like. So what content I would create for them. And I knew it was real from that brand because the DM you could just tell it wasn’t like they’re sending this out to everybody.

But when I started, remember getting a lot of comments on my page like, we would love to collaborate. And people would comment. And it would be just like this random brand, like maybe a jewelry brand or something that’s completely unrelated. And it was a scam. I’m sure you get those on yours too.

Amanda (08:24)
Yes.

100 %

yes, lots of jewelry ones.

Carrie /jackson (08:32)
Yeah, they’re always Jory and it’s like, can I

send you a DM or can do you want to collaborate? And so I sound so sketchy and it’s always on the comments. But I remember that first one that I did go through with and it was really when I had like a smaller following. And, you know, it was like something that I was like, okay, let’s just try it out and test it out. And then since then definitely have expanded the types of types of brands that I’m partnering with as I’ve grown my account more and

Social media has changed. I’m not just posting educational information either.

Amanda (09:06)
Yeah, there’s definitely again ways to tell ones that are more spammy and especially when it does just feel like a copy paste kind of job versus people who are very clearly saying like, this is what you do. And we’re excited about how you can help with this goal or mission or whatever it is. So there’s obviously in terms of getting brand partnerships, there’s the people reaching out to you aspect. Have you also gone and pitched yourself for brand partnerships? And what does that look like?

Carrie /jackson (09:30)
Mm-hmm.

I have. Yes. So I have pitched myself and I do this more when I’m like on it, when I am more organized and I’m like, okay, this is really one of my goals. And the way that I approach that is first, I mean, even taking a step back, I think about like what my brand is and what I share online. And like I share ADHD. I share my life as a therapist and private practice. And I do share some personal information. So I have ADHD myself and I’ll share

Amanda (09:41)
Mm-hmm

Carrie /jackson (10:04)
you know, some things related to like meals, just life, like travel, other things. although that’s a smaller part about what I share. And so I think about what types of brands do fit with those areas of content that I’m posting. And there have been times where I do create a list of brands, like, these would be a really great fit, or I already use these brands. Let me reach out to them. And all I have done is send a DM to their Instagram account. I’m like, Hey, like this is.

who I am, you know, and I would love to chat about a collaboration. Is there someone that I could connect with? And you would be surprised by the number of brands that send you a DM back and they’re like, we would absolutely love to chat about it. Here’s the best email for us because a lot of brands have specific partnership people who have these emails and they are dedicated to that. So sending a quick DM.

It’s a great way of honestly connecting with them or also websites for the brands often have a partnerships email that you can connect with, but you should shoot your shot. You should send them to brands because I’ve been shocked by some of the big name brands that I have collaborated with. Like for example, Brooklyn and I collaborated with and that was from me DMing them and I felt like they were such a big lifestyle brand that there is no way they would say yes to me, but you can absolutely collaborate with brands that are lifestyle brands and that are bigger brands.

Amanda (11:27)
Yeah, they don’t all have to be just mental health related topics. It can be just regular life because us therapists are still regular people too who also use brands and things like that. yeah, I think it’s, again, it’s just a fun way to do something different in terms of your marketing, in terms of just how you make money too. I had, I forget which brand this was that I worked with, but one of the like brand, I guess,

Carrie /jackson (11:27)
Yeah.

Amanda (11:57)
coordinator or point person was like, kind of just see like brand money is kind of like monopoly money. It’s just kind of fun. It feels a little fake, but like it’s so fun to give out. It’s like, I love that. I will never forget that this is my monopoly money. But it’s also not monopoly money because it is very real. And I always look at my numbers across the month, across the year. And I think last year in 2025, I brought in like almost 35,000 from brand partnerships. And so

there is a huge potential for making a good amount of money where you’re not working the same way. know so many therapists have this like, I’m tired of just the one-to-one, but I don’t want to scale into a group or I don’t want to do coaching. Like what are the other options out there? And brand partnerships are a very real one.

Carrie /jackson (12:42)
Yeah, I love that you are sharing about how like, how there is an earning potential for it to be a really nice like side income. And certainly you can make more money depending on just how much you want to devote to your content creation and like your strategy around content because yeah, for me, it’s part of what I do. It’s not everything that I do, but I really enjoy it like, and I am very selective about the brands that I partner with, which I’m sure you are too, right? Like

I don’t partner with any brands that I feel like would not be a fit for me or who I just would not actually use myself because it’s not going to come across as a legitimate partnership anyways. And I want to share things that are actually helpful for my audience. so like, yeah, you know, thinking about how it can really help you financially. My first year, I definitely don’t think I made more than

like two or $3,000 with brand partnerships. It was a very low amount, but over time it’s definitely grown. And I think like when I was looking at my overall income, like in the last six months of, where are we at? 2026. So the last six months of 2025, by focusing more on like sharing about my personal life, I was able to make almost 50,000 from those six months alone. And I was like, that’s an insane amount for a therapist when

We are often making that much in community mental health, right? That was my first salary when I had a PhD. And the fact that now I am making that just from brand partnerships alone is wild. And it’s a lot of fun to do too. It’s a lot of fun to do. Yeah.

Amanda (14:21)
Yes,

yes, yeah, that’s awesome. And I know like me looking at some of your content, a lot of what I see when it’s, you know, related to even just lifestyle stuff, like you incorporate it very easily. It’s like, here’s the makeup I’m using or here is the ⁓ drink that I’m drinking. I saw you post about your Ember mug recently. Like there’s just so many easy ways that you can say like, this is just a part of my day without it being like the typical influencer who’s all up in your face about.

you know, let me do my makeup routine in front of you or something like

Carrie /jackson (14:54)
Yeah. And I love those types of videos, but those aren’t something that I am always fully comfortable with, right? Like saying like, let me review this type of makeup. But you’re right that there are so many ways that therapists, we can just incorporate what we are doing ⁓ and using on a day-to-day basis, right? Like if you are in private practice, you have all of the tools that you are using because people are asking about those regardless. I always get questions about even like I have a work backpack.

that I use that people love and I get so many questions about that. So sharing just this is what I’m using, this is what I like ⁓ and your normal content, you would be surprised by how many people actually really like that. And also it makes you more of a real person if you’re showing that type of content on a regular basis, right? You don’t have to say, this is my morning makeup routine, but you can say, hey, I just got ready.

My skin’s really dry, so I use this moisturizer and just like tag it very simply. It can be just very, very small pieces like that. It doesn’t have to be anything big that you’re doing. Yeah.

Amanda (15:58)
Exactly. Yeah. Simple is sometimes

way more than enough.

Carrie /jackson (16:03)
Yes, simple is definitely more than enough. yeah, with content also, it is always changing. I’m sure you have seen this with social media. That’s one of the challenging things I think, like as you’re growing your social media and trying to really like tailor it for brand partnerships or for clients is that what worked a year ago is likely not working now. And so to

be adaptable in your social media content is something really important if you do want to pursue it as a marketing strategy or as a brand partnership avenue for additional income because you can’t use the same things that you were using five years ago. I cannot. I mean, we don’t see any of those TikTok videos of people dancing anymore, which I am happy for because that’s not me. Honestly, I can’t do the, I cannot do those videos.

Amanda (16:49)
No. No.

No, no coordinated dancing for me. I did musical theater in high school and like that was enough.

Carrie /jackson (17:00)
my gosh, I did not. I am not coordinated at all and just like my, would not feel comfortable sharing it.

Amanda (17:07)
⁓ huh. Yes. Or it just, would take too long to like perfect it. Even some of these like lip syncing reels. I’m like, if I try to record that one, it’s going to take me five minutes instead of like the seven second audio bit that it is. So like, I’m not going to do it. And that’s fine. Like it could be fun, but I’m acknowledging where my skills are and where they are not.

Carrie /jackson (17:27)
Yes, my gosh, some of those lip syncing audios, they’re so long that I will have to redo it multiple, multiple times, like 20 times sometimes when it’s really long to actually get it where it lines up or where I remember the words because it’s not easy to just say it in one go. ⁓ Content is harder than it looks, yeah.

Amanda (17:34)
Mm-hmm

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Yes, yes. And I think that’s where a lot of people, and again, including myself, kind of struggle with the consistency of like when the moment sparks and you are feeling creative or you got out of a session and you’re like, ooh, I can do a talking head reel or a B-roll or something on it. Like when it strikes in the moment, it can be very easy. But when there comes time to like…

I think I have to post X amount of reels or posts per week or per day, or I should be batch recording my content or what’s the strategy around what I’m posting each week or month. Like once we start to get into the, do I do it consistently? I think that there is a very real struggle with like, how do I maintain that momentum? Especially if I’m not getting those quick dopamine hits of like, I gained a thousand followers from this or everyone sent it or I made a bunch of sales or something like

When you do something you’re so proud of or you worked so hard on and it gets like 200 views and like your best friend likes it, it’s like, okay, how do I keep doing this? So you’ve been doing this for five years. What has helped you to keep momentum and consistency on it?

Carrie /jackson (18:55)
Yeah, well, consistency absolutely does matter, but consistency doesn’t necessarily mean you have to post every single day. ⁓ But being consistent three times a week is better than posting every single day twice a day and then ghosting your audience for one or two weeks. So I always recommend coming up with what is the bare minimum consistency that I could post on during a bad week? Because let’s be real, when we’re planning, we’re usually

planning for the best and what I could do on a really good week. So if I am super busy, I’m tired, and I say, you know what, I can post three days a week, that is great, right? So having those expectations for yourself reduce is already a really helpful strategy. ⁓ And then with what you were saying about like when you post and you get 200 views and you’re like, my gosh, like why, right? Like first off, I have had that plenty of times. I literally had a real…

or a TikTok yesterday get like 90 views total, which is like horrendous, but that’s going to happen. And sometimes it’s truly nothing that you are doing. It can be something that you’re doing, but I recommend taking a look at every piece of content that you are creating as just information and use it as like a test, right? So, okay, I’m going to try out this type of content, what worked, what didn’t work. And then when you find what does work doing more of that,

will also lead you to be more successful, get more of that dopamine hit, and you’ll feel better about doing it. ⁓ Another tip, and I feel like I’m all over the place with these, but another thing that I have found really helpful for me saying Insistent is moving from a place of I’m going to create this content to moving to I’m going to document my life. And by incorporating content into my regular day-to-day,

that has been super helpful for me. So rather than saying I am going to set aside every single morning at 9 a.m. to create this content, like what I will do is how you said, like you might get out of a session and you will have this good idea for a reel or for content. I write it down in the Notes app on my phone so that that good idea is there. And then I can go back to it and record it at a time that works really well.

And then for like B-roll videos, which is just when you’re taking videos of you doing different things, I literally record what I am doing throughout the day so that it doesn’t feel staged. It doesn’t feel weird because I’m just making it a normal part of my life. And like the more that you can incorporate into your day-to-day life, the less weird it will feel and the more consistent you can be.

Amanda (21:42)
Yes, I remember you and I were at a Scotland summit last summer and I had shared with you like I feel like a real influencer now because I got a whole second phone just for recording because I was finding it was actually really hard for me to want to be on one phone all the time even like documenting my like little here and there what am I doing throughout the day thing because I have I have a hard time with like trying to set

Carrie /jackson (21:47)
Yes.

Amanda (22:11)
tech boundaries with also creating content because again, there’s very real reasons that we need to create content. But something about just having it be like, now this is my work phone. This is where I do my recording. It has actually made it feel a lot easier to just have that boundary of I do not have to be on Instagram, documenting things, coming up with ideas, whatever it is all the time because I don’t have this phone on me all the time.

which is so funny because I didn’t feel that way when I was just doing therapy and marketing mostly with my website. was like, everything can be on one phone and my therapy phone is just an app on my phone instead of a separate line, but something about doing content creation. like, I need to have a whole separate phone to have the boundaries that I need, but still be successful and consistent.

Carrie /jackson (23:01)
Yeah, have questions for you about that. But I do remember you telling me that when you were like, got this like new phone for me to really be an influencer. And I remember thinking like, but you already are an influencer. Like you are. But it does feel different. Yeah. But like having the separation is super nice. Do you only have like, do you use the content creation phone as like for calls or anything? Or is it truly just like videos and photos?

Amanda (23:30)
Yeah, truly just videos and photos I have. ⁓ I took Instagram, Facebook and what else? I don’t do a ton of TikTok. I’m recently starting to experiment with it, but I took all the social media apps off of my personal phone. So now the work phone has those apps and it’s where I take my videos. It’s where I do photos that I use for like stories or something like that. So literally if I’m posting on Instagram, it’s from this whole separate phone. Cause I am trying to not just

Carrie /jackson (23:46)
Smart.

Amanda (24:00)
be on all the time, because it is so easy with a DM that comes through or an idea you have for a post or something like that. So every now and then though, I will be on my personal phone because I forget my work phone at home or something and still take photos or videos. But then I just share it to the other one so that I am not re-downloading Instagram back onto that phone.

Carrie /jackson (24:06)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

That is so smart. I love the separation that you have. I’m sure that is good for mental health, of course, but just like other things. I’ve started using brick to really make sure I’m not mindlessly scrolling because it can be so easy to just be on your phone all times if you’re doing content creation. And that’s not good for creativity, I think, with content either. So I try and be very mindful about the times that I am using Instagram and TikTok and

creating some separation between my content creation life and when I’m using social media for truly like myself personally to enjoy it, which I do like scrolling. Yeah.

Amanda (24:57)
Yes.

Exactly. mean, who doesn’t? We all do like to, and especially when we’re doing it for work purposes to make sure we’re not like almost like overlapping the two. And this is something I just thought about too, in terms of like separation and boundaries. I’ve done this a lot more recently. Like I think as therapists, a lot of us want to support one another’s accounts. And so we’re all following and engaging and things like that. And I think a lot of what

I have felt and a lot of what therapists I coach have felt is it’s so easy then to compare of, well, they already did that real idea and I don’t want it to look like I’m stealing from them or now I’m just comparing myself to them and I’m never gonna be as good as them. And so what I’ve started doing is if I notice I’m getting too much into like negative comparison, will not follow. I will unfollow people of like, okay, I keep looking at you and comparing myself and it makes me feel bad.

Carrie /jackson (25:53)
Mm-hmm.

Amanda (25:56)
I don’t need to see that. I can still support you from afar, but you don’t need to have my follow and my doom scrolling of, ⁓ what kind of content can I recreate or take a different version on? Because that honestly kills my creativity because I’m just comparing and not actually thinking about what I want to say and how I want to say it. So what does that look like for you in terms of content you see and do you unfollow people to preserve your creativity?

Carrie /jackson (26:19)
Mm-hmm.

I do and I absolutely support people and following people that are not good for their mental health and not good for their creativity. And if you’re getting stuck in that comparison trap, can unfollow them. They probably will not even notice to be honest, or you can just mute them. There’s a way that you can mute like their stories or their content so it doesn’t show up in your feed if you’re like, I don’t want them to notice that because it’s not helpful for you if you are getting stuck in that comparison.

cycle and I do get caught in that sometimes too and you know, like the best thing for me is to notice like, okay, like what is making me feel bad about this, right? What is making me feel like, my content’s not good or my content should be better than it is. And a lot of the times it is that maybe I have a piece of content that performs really poorly and I would think it would perform better than it does, but that’s how a lot of social media is. And so reminding myself that

With social media, there’s so many things that are out of my control. ⁓ When I am creating content and what does really well and what doesn’t do well is very helpful for me. And taking a step back by muting people, setting aside time where I’m not on my phone at all is incredibly helpful. ⁓ With like, you said some like important things too about how you can get inspired by other people and you want to like…

make sure that you’re not copying them, which I agree 100%. And I also want to say there’s a ton of trends that you guys will see and online people are doing often a lot of similar things. And you can use it as inspiration, absolutely. But the line is make it your own. So if you were to post a trend about EMDR, trauma, or couples work, first off, I would not post that because it’s not about my population at all or the people that I work with.

It’s very normal for a therapist and anybody online to see content that others are doing and are like, I like that. How could I make that similar to what I do? And I think that’s absolutely okay to do, but use different copy, right? So don’t write the same exact text. Don’t write the same exact caption because that’s where it does become a problem. And I’ve definitely seen that happen. So just think about how can I make it my own, right? And that goes back to your messaging and how you do speak to your niche, which I’m sure you have already

talked about a ton because it’s one of the biggest things with any marketing practice, right? How does your message land?

Amanda (29:00)
Exactly. Whether you are trying to get therapy clients or sell something or get brand partnerships, like it is less about the actual thing you are promoting. I have this conversation all the time with therapists of like everyone offers therapy as a therapist, right? It’s not just about here’s why therapy is the answer. It’s not even just why here’s why you want to work with a X type of specialist, but so much of the branding and the messaging also comes down to like

you and who you are because we are also unique in our take on things and how we share things. Like some people speak in beautiful metaphors that resonate with people, whereas some of us need things way more concrete and direct and some of us need someone to be fluffy and some of us need someone to like swear with us. Like we will all have so many different needs that we are looking for and that we align with and so even if the message looks

Carrie /jackson (29:31)
Mm-hmm.

Amanda (29:59)
the same on paper, it’s gonna come across differently. so like owning that we are a part of our brand and we are marketing ourselves, not just our services and what we offer. That is the thing I’ve seen work more for me in getting more business in both of my businesses and for so many other people too of like, once I put myself into the frame, it felt easier and it feels more successful than just relying on the thing I offer.

Carrie /jackson (30:27)
So being more authentic and like sharing who you truly are, your personality is, yeah, is one of the keys to sharing your content and marketing because you’re right, there’s so many people who do the same type of therapy or who provide therapy, but they’re not all looking for the same personality at all. And the people that like you may not like somebody else who’s doing a similar type of therapy, but it’s just a personality thing. It’s not even that they might dislike them. It’s just that it’s a better fit for them.

I have definitely found that with all of my content that when I’m showing up more like myself, that is where it is more successful, right? So not being afraid to show who I really am and not being afraid to talk in a way that is similar to how I talk in real life. ⁓ That’s where my content is most successful and people are like, this actually does resonate with me, especially right now in the field of AI. I think so many people are just over these like,

generic cookie cutter type of style and content that they can see through it. And they are like, yeah, that caption, written by AI, or that phrase, absolutely written by AI. And so I absolutely encourage therapists to share who you truly are in an ethical way. But by that, mean just sharing authentically the way that you would use words in sessions with a client, right? So sharing how you actually talk to clients.

and that will come across and will really attract the right people to your account.

Amanda (31:59)
100 % because yes, we all know the therapists speak that we all know like I see the high performing high achieving like I see that stuff so much because I follow so many other therapists and like what your ideal client might not might resonate is not that language but something else like the self-critical thought that someone has or the 87 tasks on their to-do list like they might resonate with something that again, they actually talk about not the label

Carrie /jackson (32:09)
Yes.

Amanda (32:28)
that we put on things. So just talk about things how you normally talk about things.

Carrie /jackson (32:30)
Yeah.

Yeah, that’s something we talked about like on any profiles, right? Therapist directories and like your website, like don’t use the words that you use as a therapist that you learned in graduate school. You need to use the words that your clients are actually going to be saying and that you are actually using. Like the example you gave, high performing, high achieving versus you have 80 things on your to-do list, but you never get them done. You should look at every piece of content like that as, okay, if I was my client, which a lot of us are in some ways, right?

Amanda (33:01)
Mm-hmm.

Carrie /jackson (33:02)
Would I resonate with this or would I be like, no, that doesn’t sound right. And that’s a good way to think through what you’re sharing and what you’re saying on your content.

Amanda (33:12)
Exactly.

One other thing I’m curious about for you, because this is a question I get a lot too, is so you do, obviously you do your ADHD content, you have your therapy practice, you also do some ADHD coaching for parents of a course that you sell, as well as you help other therapists with growing their social media. So you have some various like tentacles of like what you’re trying to market and who you’re trying to market to, but you have one account.

I’ve had so many people say, I open a separate account for this so that it’s more niche and I’m gaining more people? But obviously you can be very successful with having one account doing multiple things. So how do you find balancing what you’re marketing and who you’re marketing it to when it is just under one account? Does it come back to the authenticity or is there a different something that you’re thinking through?

Carrie /jackson (34:03)
That’s a really good question. And I will be honest that I have thought about opening up a different account for like more of my life as a therapist multiple times. ⁓ I have definitely consider it. But in the end, I just know that consistency for me means having one account. And even if I have less people across all of those different areas, that’s okay. Because that’s how I’m going to actually stay consistent and

I do try and find like common threads throughout all of my content areas that I can share that may resonate with people. like ADHD obviously comes up with the work I do with parents. People, I have a lot of adults with ADHD who follow me too. And then even therapists who have ADHD themselves or who just wanna know how to organize things. So that’s more of a common thread that does come across. And I am mindful about some of the content that I share. So I don’t tend to share

content related to like, this is how much I charge as a therapist or this is how you can charge more just because I have a lot of clients or potential clients that can follow me. And I think that if I was in their position seeing that, they might be like, I don’t know. ⁓ Because my account really did start as a parenting ADHD account. And I think it’s great that other therapists share that. I love your content when I see it too, but I do think that for my

client base, it might not be the best fit. So I can share how to grow your private practice without sharing some of those specific financial details. Yeah.

Amanda (35:38)
Absolutely. And that was the biggest difference for me when I had my therapy Instagram as I was launching my coaching business. I was like, I could put it under the same one because I don’t want multiple ones, but I think there are so many. My specialty is complex trauma and people who struggle a lot in relationships. so literally the content that I would be posting when it’s about therapy intensive, sure, that makes sense of like, here’s why therapy intensives.

help more than other forms of modalities might. And that would resonate with my therapy account. But what wouldn’t resonate is like, yeah, the money mindset stuff or like, we’re all really burnt out and you’re tired of seeing one-to-one clients. Like that would not feel good. That would actively harm the people who follow my account for therapy purposes. And so that was the only reason that I separated it is like, I want to keep this very clean and clear and I don’t know how to do that.

with the content I plan on talking about in the coaching business. So I hate having two accounts because it has made me even more inconsistent with my therapy account, which is fine ultimately because that has not been my marketing strategy. My marketing strategy is all up in the website SEO and now AIO stuff. So that works for me and I’m okay with letting that go.

Carrie /jackson (36:57)
Yeah, that is such a good point because you use social media for a reason different than just the private practice marketing. And that’s a good point to always come back to as a therapist is you could absolutely have a social media account that is not even related to private practice marketing and still just sharing about your life as a therapist and private practice if you are worried about how would this look to potential clients, but it does all come back to

your purpose with social media. so, you know, I agree with you 100 % that if social media is a big marketing, like a big form of your marketing, then definitely you want to be mindful about potential clients could see it. But if it’s not a big form of marketing, you still want to be mindful, but you can be a bit more, you can have more tentacles out and how you share it and share things a little bit differently too. Yeah.

Amanda (37:54)
Yeah, I love that. Cause yeah, think there is so many of us fall under this. I don’t want to be salesy or I don’t know how to like, you know, talk about my openings and stuff like that. But you’re, if you do have a social media presence, it doesn’t have to be marketing or practice. can just be showing a little bit of the behind the scenes of who you are as a human, which if you link it to your website or put a link on your psychology today or whatever, like people might see it. So obviously you’d want to be mindful of what you’re putting out publicly versus what you might want to put out.

privately, but there still can be a point of having an account without it being what people are worried that it could be or look like in the ways they don’t want to market themselves. So yeah, social media is a strategy and there’s not one right way to do it.

Carrie /jackson (38:31)
Mm-hmm.

No, there’s not one right way to do it at all. And it looks different for every single person that I worked with, especially depending on your strengths, like the things that you don’t want to post. But I think we can all benefit from reminding ourselves like why were we on social media in the first place. And it’s usually because we want to have fun scrolling or we want to connect with other people. And so like

educational posts are great, but at the same time, remember that those validation posts and even the humorous posts that people make are some of the best ones that you can absolutely make as a therapist on social media. I enjoy them the most and a lot of therapists do too. And they actually do, I would say right now it’s especially the content that is doing better, is the fun content and the validation content.

Amanda (39:27)
because there is a lot of darkness and a lot of pain in the world right now. And if we just can have a little bit of a break and our doom scrolling can be a little fun and validating as opposed to just doom and gloom, then like, yeah, again, that is the whole purpose of how social media started with at least is like that connection with others. And so there’s a way to maintain that, be authentic with it while also, you know, dripping in and here’s how I can support you in X, Z ways.

Carrie /jackson (39:41)
Yes.

Mm-hmm. Yep. 100%. I agree with you. Yeah. ⁓

Amanda (40:02)
I’m sure we could talk about this forever, because I can think of even more questions I have, but maybe that means I just need to have you back on for another episode at some point. But I want to be mindful of your time too. tell us what are the different ways that you support therapists with social media and any last tips that you have.

Carrie /jackson (40:19)
Yeah, so I worked one-on-one with therapists and business coaching for growing their social media and expanding into brand partnerships. So feel free to reach out to me via Instagram, Dr. Carrie Jackson. I also have a free broadcast channel for therapists, which is where we talk about a lot of these types of things and some other freebies like on how to grow your Instagram that I will definitely send to you, Amanda, so you can link and everybody can access those. But yeah, I’m Dr. Carrie Jackson on all social media.

Instagram and TikTok.

Amanda (40:51)
Yeah, we’ll definitely link all of that in the show notes so people can find you, follow you, and just see all the cool things that you’re doing. All right, well, thanks so much for your time today. We’ll talk soon.

Carrie /jackson (40:58)
Cool, thank you.

Yeah, talk to you soon.