Barbara Jean Carey has been seen on The Learning Channel, KTLA, Channel 9 News, Bravo, Discovery and The History Channel. Her web TV show called THE CONFIDENT MIND on GotWebTV.com generated many loyal viewers.

Barbara has been interviewed on Radio Stations such as BlogTalk Radio. She writes inspirational articles to enrich the lives of others for the Malibu Patch online newspaper.

She has been helping people overcome their problems for many years. Barbara has worked with celebrities, doctors, writers, producers, CEO’s, and medical professionals to help them move forward into their desires.

She decided to become a Certified Hypnotherapist, graduated at the top of her class with honors, won several of HMI’s prestigious awards and had a private practice in Malibu by the time she graduated. Barbara works with Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP), Guided Imagery, Handwriting Analysis, Hypnosis, Time Line Therapy, Past-Life Regression (PLR), Huna, and Reiki to further her clients into success. She has an amazing ability to build instant rapport with her clients to help them achieve their goals.

KIMBERLY: You have been incredibly successful in your practice and you have been all over television. What are some of the steps you have taken to market yourself and maybe what are some of the challenges that other mind, body, spirit entrepreneurs might face in that marketing?

BARBARA: Number one is I know a lot of other people that are in my business will say ‘There are not too many people out there. Is the market not saturated?’ I always say ‘The person or client that you are seeking is seeking you,’ that means the two of you are meant to be, that is the connection you have. Everyone else out there has connections with other people but there are people that are just meant to see you.

So you have to completely eliminate in your mind that there is competition, just know that you have the gift, you have a service you are going to offer the world and the people that are seeking that information are the people you are seeking. The next thing is depending on what type of business you have, where your office is located is a really big thing. What I learned is, especially when you are just starting out, instead of going and spending all this money on rent for an office, share an office with several people.

When I first started out we had a 3-office suite and I shared it will several psychologists, psychiatrists. Each of us would have certain days and on the days that we did not have, we would look in to say, ‘I need to use Wednesday between 12 and 3, is that open?’ Then we would do it that way. It saved me a bundle!

KIMBERLY: That is great advice. Sometimes we forget about that or we think we have to work from home. Not everyone has the right circumstances to work from home, maybe there are kids, dogs, and sometimes it is great to go to the office.

BARBARA: I also think we need to kind of keep what I would say is one-upmanship. It doesn’t mean superiority. What that means is that you know what you are doing and you can help them. Sometimes if someone comes to your home they are going to have a preconceived judgment of who you are, what your style and taste is and they cannot help but judge that. Whether you have the most fabulous home in the world or you just have an average home, people tend to judge, they cannot help it. I just think it is better to keep it completely separate.

KIMBERLY: How are you marketing to your clients specifically, is it social media, word of mouth? What works best for you?

BARBARA: First of all, when I first started my business I would send out complimentary (I never say ‘free’ because ‘free’ kind of cheapens it) gift certificates out and say ‘This is a complimentary hypnotherapy session valued at $125.’ I would send them out to chiropractors, doctors, dentists, and I would say ‘Use this for you or give this to one of your customers, clients or patients as a gift, maybe for Christmas, just as a thank you for your business.’

This certificate does not say complimentary on it, it says value $125, but in the letter, it is saying ‘I am giving this to you complimentary’. This way I would have people use those gift certificates. Someone that used it in 2006 is still my client today. You might say ‘They are still your client, have their issues not been addressed?’ What I learned is that with a lot of people once you come in they want to come in on a weekly basis or maybe every two weeks to just check in with themselves, see what is going on.

Another thing that I do is I send those out and then I would get referrals from everyone, so all of my referrals would go out there. What I would do is I would go to my kids’ schools, they would have fundraising events and I would donate a session. This way once they come in and they see what is going on, you end up having them as customers and clients. Another thing that I did was there is an online newspaper called Patch. AOL owns it. It is a free newspaper service and quite a few cities across the United States have Patch online newspaper.

The way Patch works is you can write a blog but it is set up like it is an article and I would end up writing these articles, blogs and all certain different things on issues that I believe most people had. The people would read these and they would call me and say, “Oh my gosh that is exactly how I felt or that is what I do every day. Can you help me?” Then when I wrote enough in there I contacted Malibu Patch, the editor and said ‘I have been blogging for you quite a while. Why do you not do an interview with me? Why do you not do an interview about what I am about and then you would get clients that way also.’

Another thing I did is opened up an Instagram account and what I said to myself is, “How do I want to serve the world?” The first thing that I asked, “How may I serve you?” I do not mean, “How can I be your slave?” What I mean is, “What can I do to better your life?” My Instagram name is TheConfidentMind, that is the name of my business but that is my username, every day I will post an inspirational quote with beautiful graphics and let them start their day reading that. So quickly I ended up having over 3,000 flowers. On the Instagram account it will say this is my website, check me out, whatever, so anyone that wants to have phone sessions, Skype sessions.

KIMBERLY: I know you have your book coming out, The Confident Mind, let us talk about that process. Are you self-publishing, going through a traditional process, what is the process for you? 

BARBARA: Right now I am self-publishing. However, my goal is to go with a bigger publisher and the reason I am getting the book and doing the self-publishing, for now, is because I do a lot of speaking engagements. However, I can market myself to these corporations a lot easier if I am an established author. It is almost as if they take you more seriously, it legitimizes you, so I thought I need to get my book out ASAP, regardless of if I get a traditional publisher or not, I just need to be an author of my book.

KIMBERLY: I always say a book is a big expensive business card.

BARBARA: That is true! I will tell you it is a lot cheaper than what you think. A fellow hypnotherapist of mine published a book through Create a Space. His book was beautiful, I devoured it, I loved all his information that was in there, his name is Ted Marino. He did it in black and white and that cost about maybe $3 a book, while my book, because it is in color, every page is in color, is like $11. The truth is that you are not going to make that much money from your books. It is more about that calling card and the amount of business it can get you. Of course, it can become a best seller, which is wonderful and great. However, at least in my mind, I think if it is going to become a best seller-great, but in the meantime, what I am going to do is use it as a marketing tool for myself.

KIMBERLY: What is your secret for getting for on all television shows? Do you have a secret method that you go about to be able to get on all the different shows?

BARBARA: No matter where I go or where I am I always develop relationships and contacts with people that will allow me to call them and say ‘Hey, I have this new thing, this new technique, I think you would be interested.’ And it’s so important to have a website, you have to have your name out there, content where people can actually see who you are, what you have done, they want to listen to any radio shows.

Here is another great thing and you can Google it. there is this email that you get that is for all the different radio networks and these radio networks tell this one company ‘This is what we are looking for, can you help me find people that would be on our radio show?’ I get this email maybe every few days, maybe once a week and I scan it and say ‘I fit into this category, they would love to have me on their show.’ Then I will contact them and say ‘Check out my website, these are things that I have done before, these are different radio shows.’

Before I even did a radio show, I would say ‘This is the information I would like to share with your clients.’ The best thing to not say to them is ‘can I please be on your show?’ Instead – ‘Hey look what I have to offer you, look how I am serving you, your audience.’ They would call me, talk to me on the phone and say ‘Okay, we are a good fit.’ Next thing you know you have that on your resume that you have been on Blog Talk Radio or whatever station it is.

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