Clients can seek massage for stress relief and relaxation, or for therapeutic work on a specific problem. Sometimes a client with an acute problem comes for general relaxation and stress relief. You can’t assume that just because they have a chronic issue that that’s always why they’re there.

I have a chronically unhappy left shoulder due to car accident that I was in over a decade ago. My shoulder loves work, and my shoulder is perennially a thing of curiosity to every massage therapist because it’s so clearly adhesed, plus it moves around when it’s receiving massage work. What this can do, though, is cause some therapists to get “lost” in my shoulder area at the cost of doing work in other areas where I also would like to receive massage.

While therapists often feel that spending extra time in a problem area is part of doing more effective work for the client, the truth is that sometimes clients are also looking forward to other areas being worked. So, how do you strike a balance when you know that you just hit “the mother-load of all muscle problems” and yet you only have an hour? The answer is communication, communication, communication. Ask questions like:

“Do you feel we have worked this area sufficiently?”

“Should I spend more time there, or is it time to move on?”

“Would you like me to spend another 15 minutes here? It may mean that we don’t quite get to cover your arms or legs (or whatever other area is not a primary complaint).”

Share with the client what you are feeling with your hands and what would be the benefit of the additional work, but let their priorities guide your massage plan for the day. If the issue feels like one that would benefit from a more targeted session, go ahead and suggest that the client schedule a time to come back in and focus on that specific area. Make sure you give the problem areas their due, but take care to avoid getting “lost” in a body area.

Time management in the massage room can be tricky. Even with a thorough intake, you never know what you’re going to find until you get your hands on someone. It’s important, though, to keep your word to your clients. If, somehow, you can’t do what you said you would and you need to alter the plan, it’s vital that you keep the client in the loop and have them make the call.

It can be so frustrating when a massage therapist says they’re going to do something for me in a session that doesn’t happen, and some of the areas we discussed never even get touched. When I’ve asked therapists why that happened, commonly what I hear is, “I’m so sorry, I was so focused on your shoulder (or your back, or your neck, etc.), that I ran out of time.” That’s a common challenge for many therapists, of course, but as a client I’m left wondering, don’t I get a say?

So, while of course it is best to stick to what you told your client you would do, if you find that the time has gotten away from you and you won’t be able to deliver on your stated plan, my advice would be to get the client involved. Don’t just keep going and hope that they won’t notice. Honestly, you know they will. After holding an expectation based on your conversation during the intake, they’ll be disappointed, which can break their trust. They may not say anything, and they might even tip you, but you’ll never see that client again.

If you know that you are struggling with this, develop ways to recover gracefully, and always keep the client involved. You can easily say something like, “I’m sorry, it looks like we won’t have a lot of time to address your arms and your legs. If I were to spend more time on one of those areas, which would you like it to be?” That way, you preserve your relationship with the client, even if you don’t get to all the work you’d discussed.

Are you looking to build your client base? When you already have some happy clients returning to see you, but you still have lots of empty slots in your appointment book, the best way to fill those empty slots is through the slots that are already filled. One of the easiest, but most overlooked marketing tips of all is to turn to those clients who are already coming to see you.

Just letting your clients know that you are working on getting busier and that you’d appreciate any referrals is all it takes. A lot of us shy away from doing it because we don’t want to appear desperate or pushy with our clients. It’s important to remind ourselves that they’re already our friends and fans, or they wouldn’t be coming back to see us.

If your client knew that you were thinking of closing doors and going back to that other career—house-cleaning, writing code, waiting tables, or whatever it was—or that you may have no choice but to abandon your massage practice, they would say “No! Hang on. I’ve got some friends I could send your way.”
Why not give them the opportunity to do that before it’s too late? You’d be surprised how not just willing, but delighted clients are to get to help contribute to your success. Try one of these approaches:

• “It was really great to work on you today. Is there someone you know that you think might benefit from this kind of work?”

• “I’m looking to grow my practice by adding 3-4 new clients this month. Is there anyone you can suggest me to?”

• “I’m working on getting busier in my practice, so I’m looking to take on some new clients. Would you be willing to pass along my card to some friends or coworkers?”

Before you know it, those empty slots will be a thing of the past.

One of the most challenging things for a lot of therapists can be finding themselves in an intake with a new client where the connection just isn’t happening. Maybe they look at their shoes the whole time, or they’re sighing and looking out the window. You know, no click. It takes a real dedication to our profession, and a certain level of maturity, to be able to put that non-clicking, or non-connectedness, aside and still provide somebody with a thorough and caring intake to craft a massage plan that meets their needs.

It’s vital that we remember not to take that disconnect personally. Being healers, it helps to realize that our clients, as they are in front of us, are not necessarily in their best state. That’s why they’re here. They may be distracted or grumpy due to whatever’s going on in their life, or from the pain or stress that has brought them to us in the first place.

When we can be in a compassionate state of non-judgment and continue to be dedicated to our healing profession, or to our healing intent, it allows us to bridge that gap and hold a space of healing around our clients, when they can’t hold it for themselves. In doing this, we show up as truly caring human beings, available at our best for each client, and our practice becomes a space where they can trust that their needs matter.

Massage therapy can be a very fulfilling career, but it can unfortunately end up being a short one for many of us. That’s because certain energetic self-care is absolutely indispensable, but often overlooked. Most of us who practice massage find a way to mind our body dynamics, but do we take care to maintain good hygiene needed to keep our ‘energetic field’ clean?
The same openness and sensitivity that allows us to feel pain points on a client’s body also make us vulnerable to what is called energy transference, where we take on aspects of the pain body of the client we are working on. Massage therapists can develop soreness in their arms or wrists after a day of massage, which they think is just normal fatigue from the work done. Sometimes, though, it can come from this energy transference. Without having a way to clear that, it’ll wear us down.
The best suggestion I have is to make a routine of rinsing your hands all the way up to the elbows in super-cold, ideally ice-cold, water after each client session, with the explicit intent of releasing and shaking off any energy that you have taken on that is not yours. If cold water is not available, you can also briskly wipe each arm from the elbow down and off past the fingers several times as if you were brushing off dust or crumbs.
Whichever method you use, it’s most important to do it with the intention of clearing out anything that’s not yours. Afterward, you could even put your hands together and take a few deep breaths, feeling your own warmth and energy coming back up to the surface.

Beware the dreaded hangnail that subtly, but painfully lacerates an invisible path through your client’s skin! Of course, we’ve heard about it, or maybe even experienced it (ouch!), but no it’s never happened to us; we’ve never been the perpetrator of the hangnail crime. At least, we think we haven’t..

Fingernails, like hair, have no nerves. So, unless we check—or have a client willing to object, which many aren’t—we’d never know. I know I’ve received a massage more than a few times where the intermittent presence of a ragged tiny bit of nail was an impediment to my otherwise enjoying a good session.

What to do? Well, one simple habit that many good therapists develop is to check their fingernails against their forearm before each massage begins. Simply rock each of your fingers side-to-side, brushing them against your bare skin to feel for any irregularities, hang-ups, snags, or anything else that will get in the way of a delightfully soothing massage session.

To take care of them when they do turn up, make sure you keep not just nail clippers, but also a good, fine file in your self-care kit to smooth down the sharp edge of the clippers’ cut so that you don’t just trade one impediment for another.  It’s much better to be on your clients’ “most wanted” list for giving excellent, effective massage than to be guilty of the dreaded hangnail crime.

On occasion, I’ve run into licensed massage therapists who have experienced boredom with their massage practice and had decided to move on to a different career. I know this happens for some, but, for myself, I honestly can’t imagine ever getting bored with the practice of massage.

There are just so many wonderful, pertinent, and directly useful techniques that I can imagine a lifetime of learning. So, here are some of the things that I found that have really expanded and renewed my practice whenever I was beginning to feel stale in the past:

• Trigger Point Work: This is an awesome, tremendously effective technique for loosening stubborn areas of chronic spasm.
• Structural Integration and Myofascial Release: Classes on these were invaluable in teaching me how to create space for muscles in the first place, in case they had no room to expand before they could be worked on.
• Thai Massage & Yoga: Incorporating elements of these have made for great additions to my practice.
• Nutrition: I’ve seen others who have taken classes on this to integrate into their massage practice. Do you know the effects that additional Magnesium or Potassium can have for your clients’ muscles?
• Energy work (Craniosacral, & Reiki): Others I know have also integrated these into their practice to great effect.
• Learn & Grow: In Washington State, we have a requirement for twenty-four hours of continuing education every couple of years, and that’s great. If your state doesn’t have a similar requirement, go take a continuing education class anyway. And if that twenty-four hours doesn’t satisfy your curiosity, double it, triple it. You’ll see. Just keep learning and keep getting better, and you’ll never be bored.

While we are primarily massage therapists, we’re also health practitioners or wellness practitioners. Really, as far as that goes, the field is still so young. There is a tremendous amount of information and knowledge to be brought in, and we are in the perfect place to do that because of the intimate and trusting relationship that we get to build with our best clients.

There are so many tools and also such a fulfilling achievement in helping alleviate other’s pain that boredom is merely a state of mind you can avoid in your practice.

What’d you have for lunch? Was it a burger? Lasagna? Perhaps it was a delicious taco—a spicy Mexican treat with lots and lots of delicious onions? Mmm… Sounds good, but that was your lunch break. Now, you’re about to see a client. Are they going to experience your fine, effective massage technique, or are they going to experience the fragrance of your recently consumed lunch? It’s all about context. Onions smell great at the dinner table, but not so good on the massage table.

We’ve talked about the importance of making sure that you eat enough, so, you can remember that a hearty lunch is a good, good thing. It’ll give you the energy to give your afternoon clients solid, quality work and to feel great while doing it. It’s important, though, to make sure that your lunch stays on your lunch break.

Part of your preparation, not just after lunch, but before each session, needs to include a quick hygiene check—part of which could be a quick tooth-brushing or popping a mint into your mouth.  Maybe you prefer to use a mouthwash. Whichever breath-freshening method works for you, make sure you take a moment for it before each new client.

After ensuring the room is the right temperature, the music is the right style for your client, the atmosphere is professional and you’ve discussed a clear massage plan; it is important that you don’t let your next session be dominated by the smell of garlic or onions from your recent, delicious, scrumptious meal. Minor details such as this can lead to an unpleasant experience to the client and potentially them not re-booking with you.

When I first started practicing massage, I enjoyed something of a meteoric success. My practice went from zero clients to fully busy within three months. I didn’t really think much about it back then, ten or twelve years ago, but these days, I get asked what I did, and so I thought I’d share.

Some of the things I did when I was practicing full time are things you can read about in other articles here on the Findtouch blog. Things like:

• Setting a safe space for clients 
• Listening carefully to what they want
• Palpating before massage 
• Checking in gently during the massage 
• Providing self-care tips and useful feedback afterwards 

These are all things that we’ve heard about, again and again. In addition to those, here are a couple other things that I did, that may or may not be unique, but were certainly effective:

• Educate & empower: Having discovered early on that clients love to focus on and talk about their own bodies, I found that clients are super-excited and feel empowered when they better understand how their body works. So, at the end of each session, I would make a copy of the relevant page from a wonderful book with pictures of different muscles and give it to them. That way, I could show them the particular muscle that was involved and exactly where their injury was.
• Stay close: Whenever I interacted with my clients, I made a point of not doing it while standing across a desk from them or at any kind of distance, but while either sitting or standing side-by-side to reinforce the fact that I was there with them and to break down any distance between us.
• Seek feedback: I’d ask, “What did you like about the session? Is there anything that I could have done differently, or better?” While questions like that made me feel vulnerable and left me concerned at first whether my clients would think I was not fully skilled, I quickly discovered that those questions were received really, really well. In fact, it actually endeared me to my clients in that they not only honestly shared any areas for improvement, but also appreciated the fact that I cared to ask and sought to improve.

I’m not sure which of these practices contributed most to my success, or why, but all together they created the effect of very quickly filling up my massage room with loyal and returning clients who referred others at a brisk pace.

Do you ever get asked to give massage when you’re at a party or other event? I suppose I’m a reasonably social person because I do, inevitably, find myself at some kind of a function or evening reception at least once a week, sometimes two to three times a week.

It is not unusual for there to be somebody in the group there at the event who eventually discovers that massage is my chosen field. As the conversation goes further, the person I’m speaking to, be it a man or a woman (more often a man), starts grabbing at their shoulders or pointing to their neck or back, letting me know how much that body area would love a massage—not sometime, but right now. Not theoretically, but immediately.

What to do about it? My first reaction may be something close to resentment. I find myself wondering, “Doesn’t this person understand that I’m here for the event and not necessarily looking to work at a party where I’m a guest like everyone else?” After all, you don’t ask a doctor to go perform a surgery at a social event, or a hair stylist to start giving haircuts for free wherever they go. And yet, that is exactly what people are doing when they start hinting that they could use a little shoulder rub right there on the spot.

However, instead of my automatic response of being offended, I’ve learned to develop a new reaction, one that turns this kind of situation from offense to opportunity. I smile and chuckle lightly to make the person feel okay about it, and then I palpate the area and I say, “Wow, it does seem like you have some serious tension there!” or something like, “oh my gosh! What a big knot you have there in your shoulder!” By working with this person instead of fighting against their impulse, not only do I leave them feeling heard and accepted instead of rejected, but I create the space to turn this into an opportunity for us both.

After asking when they last had a massage, I affirm their sense that some bodywork is needed, saying something like, “Well, you know, it does seem like you could really use some massage. I’d love to work with you.” If we don’t happen to live or work near each other, I suggest a clinic in their area. In the end, by showing compassion and steering this person to actually receive good bodywork, I get a lot further than by being offended and righteous. So, the next time someone’s being tactless and not respecting your massage profession, just remember it’s your call: was offense or opportunity.