In this episode of The Dietitian Success Podcast, I sit down with Jillian Foley, from Nutritionista. We chat about:
- How she started her private practice after working for a gym
- When she decided to take the leap into full-time private practice
- Leasing an office space right before Covid
- How she generates referrals from personal trainers and other healthcare providers
- The decision to give up her storefront and convert to 100% virtual practice
- Staying top of mind for clients
- Navigating social media challenges, like putting effort into Instagram content and getting minimal engagement
Links:
- Follow Jillian on Instagram
- Check out Jillian’s website
- Connect with Krista on Instagram @dietitiansuccesscenter and @kristako.rd
- Check out the Dietitian Success Center membership here
- Check out our Freebies here – PES Statement Cheat Sheet, Client Resource Kit & Business Planning Workbook
Episode Transcript:
Jillian. Thanks so much for joining me on the podcast. So good to see you. for having me. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you for reaching out.
I’m so glad. We were just talking about how it’s so awesome when members of the DSC community actually reach out and just say, Hey, here’s my business situation. I would love to, you know, chat about it. I would love to come on the podcast if you need any guests and you did that, which is so cool. We chatted back and forth a little bit and I’m so excited to talk to you about your business and your practice.
So first of all, can you just tell us who are you, where are you from, and what do you do? Yeah Jillian Foley, nutritionista a registered dietitian, and I’m from the Philadelphia area. I was born here, but I’m just on the, on the outskirts now, which is Pennsylvania, if you don’t know where Philadelphia is.
Awesome. Okay. So tell us about your business. And then if you could just backtrack and talk a little bit about your dietitian career and how it led you to starting your business. Yeah. So I run a private practice. I’m gonna go with majority of the people that see me are for weight loss. And I, I’m going to go ahead and say I’m pretty lucky that it ended like this, or that I ended up here in the first place.
So like, you know, I was a normal girl, ate whatever she wanted when she was younger. Well, I say normal, but I always say you’re one of two people. You either, like, were able to eat whatever you wanted and you were fine, or it was opposite. Like, your family maybe over ate and you never really understood how to eat.
But I do believe at some point in life, most people get to an age where they’re like, Well, how do I eat? Like, I don’t, I was never really taught this. What am I supposed to do? And so for me, I got to, I got to that age and I went to school for nutrition. And I went to LaSalle university. It was really, so I was a young mom and it was really the only place that I could go to get a degree that I didn’t have to like travel with children or, you know, go to a dorm or whatever.
And going through the process of school, I loved it. Don’t get me wrong, but we were led to believe, and I’m going back about 15 years, we were led to believe that if you want to be a dietician, you’re going to have to work in a hospital. And I remember thinking like, like the last thing someone. Once to do after having a heart attack is have me walk in and be like, you know, they can play bad for you.
Right? So I went I continued through it. And don’t get me wrong during my internship. I actually did end up loving being in the hospital. Not so much the process of it, but some of the patients you would connect with, I found like oncology. They really enjoyed like getting to talk with you because it was on a deeper level.
But so I graduate school, I go through my internship. It’s hard to find a job. I think that’s true of a lot of dietitians. I don’t think you realize you have to like, you have to know someone. You can modify your resume. All you want, but if you don’t know somebody you’re one of what I mean hundreds. I don’t know.
And so I end up getting a part time job at a bariatric at a bariatric doctor’s office and I didn’t think that that’s what I wanted to do. But it was a job and it was part time. So I’m like, okay, that’s I’ll take it. So in the meantime, I was looking for another part time job.
Cause I, I need to, I have to pay off my student loans. And you know, I didn’t go through all that education just to like work 12 hours. And so a professor of mine had reached out and said, there is a local gym. That is hiring a dietitian and I think you’d be a great fit and I remember thinking like a local gym That’s hiring a dietitian 15 years ago.
That wasn’t normal. No one ever said that so right in my way I’m like, yes, you know, I’ll go there So I do the interview and I’m working at both places at the same time and I absolutely loved it because you might think like You might have first think like, oh, Jim, like everyone’s just like, give me a goal plan or give me a diet.
But actually, I think it’s more like, I think once people get in there, they’re kind of like, just help me. Like, I don’t know that it, I, cause I, I’ve heard a lot of dietitians be like, oh man, you’re going to be in a gym. Like everyone’s going to want a meal plan. And then right away, I’m, I’m against that anyway, cause they’re not going to follow it.
And so, Like I said, I had young kids. I loved, I actually loved working as a bariatric dietitian too because I found the patients were very similar. But I had young kids and when there’s a snow day and the school is cancelled and you have to cancel on that doctor, it doesn’t look good and it makes you feel bad.
And so, the gym had daycare. And I asked the gym if I could work there full time and they said yes, and so that was how I, that was how I worked for a while, eight years, nine years. And then it got to a point where, and I’ll tell you, and maybe you’ll ask me these questions, I don’t know. But like, it was slow in the beginning, I don’t want to make it sound like, oh, I worked at a gym and they just handed me all these people, and it was, it was a lot of work.
And then I got busy and then it got to a point where it was like, I, you start like, could I do this on my own? Like, you know, you start wondering, do I have to work for someone if I’m doing what it seems like most of it? And so then I just started the process. I’m like, okay, what would I have to do?
Do I have to get my own NPI number? Do I have to go through the health insurances differently? And. You know, don’t let me make you think it was easy. It’s all a blur because it takes forever. They don’t make it easy on you. And then it just so happened that it’s always like these series of events, the kind of like, get you there and at the time I don’t think you know you’re on the path, but they get you there anyway.
And so I used to do these local food reviews with different, different restaurants in the area, and we would connect with the manager and then we would, or the business owner, whatever. And then I would like say what I would order off the menu because I would have patients all the time, who would be like, Oh, well, you don’t get it.
I, you know, everyone I with isn’t healthy. So I had to get the burger and I’m like, well, you know, you always have to get the burger. So we started a friend of mine. We started doing these local food reviews. Let me get to the point. I see the manager and he remembers me doing it and he’s like, how’s work?
And I said, no, I’m dabbling with this idea of like me starting my own private practice. And he goes, Oh, I have this woman, she’s running out of space in Hatbarrow. And it’s on, you know, just outside of Philly. And I was like, yeah, I don’t know. And he’s like, well, it’s not that far. And I’m like, I know where Hatbarrow lives.
I live like five minutes from there. And it didn’t, it didn’t feel right per se. Like, I don’t want to say like I trusted my gut. But I went anyway to meet with the woman. I thought I was going to have more time to think. She was like, let me know. And I think that weekend I find a lease and was like, All right, I’m doing this.
And so that’s, that’s what I’ve been doing. I’m going to say it was right before COVID. So it would be January before, you know, the world shut down. And I’ve been doing it since. Wow. Okay. I have so many questions. That was a lot. I’m like, No, that was awesome. Oh my gosh. No, that was awesome. for being so specific because that’s often where some of the best learning comes from, right?
When dieticians can see themselves in that specific scenario or have been in that specific scenario. So, my first question for you is about When you were hired by the gym. So how did you get clients? So, oh, and let me back up for a second. I was also, the reason they were hiring a dietitian, and this isn’t normal, but this could be something another dietitian could look for.
They had physical therapy. And then because they had physical therapy, they understood the billing aspects of the health insurances. And so like if there’s ever, if there’s a dietitian listening and going, I don’t, I’m not there yet. I’m not starting my own practice. You could get in, you know, with a place that already has something like that in place.
Yeah. Fascinating. Okay. Anyway. Let me answer your question. Yeah. No, that’s really, really good information. So again, like you would think working in a gym, people are dying to see you, but I feel like people often, when it comes to us, their approach to us is, I know what to do. I just need to do it. And so then why make an appointment with someone who is just going to tell you what you already know?
So when I got there, I was like, okay, I’m going to put up a signup sheet saying everyone gets a free, you know, 15 minute complimentary session. And I’m going to put my picture up and I’m going to say what I do. And I’m going to let all the trainers that cause they’ve trainers. I’m going to let all the trainers there know what I do.
And I got there and it was like, Crickets. And I remember saying, like, it got frustrating. I remember saying to them, like, guys, we’re, we’re a gym, like, we should be, like, prescribing. It shouldn’t be like, oh, there’s a dietician if you want. It should be like, hey, chances are you join this gym because you’re not happy with your, like, health.
It’s a no brainer. And so I would go to the trainers, I would ask them, like, you know, what’s going on. And so what I started realizing was, and I kind of carried this into my, into my own business as well in the beginning. Is just because you talk to someone and they believe in you and they want to send you people.
A doesn’t mean they’re going to remember and it doesn’t mean they’re liars. They just, you know, they forget where B it doesn’t mean that person’s going to follow through either. And so what I started doing was I would, I thought, let me take my own advice and act like it’s a prescription. And so if I had a patient.
Who was like really struggling with working out or staying consistent. I would give my spiel. I would say, Hey, the trainers give you two free sessions and they’d be like, Oh yeah, great idea. And I can, I’m a pretty good read of people. And so if I felt like they weren’t being resistant or like, you know, just pleasing me, I would go, I think I know the right one for you.
Do you mind if I forward them your information? And if they were like, yes, not at all now, every like, Hey, bill just met with Suzanne. She joined the gym two years ago. What I’m doing is I’m making bill realize like, Hey, she’ll keep sending me people. Like maybe I ought to, and I’m not saying it always came, it didn’t come flooding in.
It took a lot of work. And I started like, I would reach out to, and I would just reach out to like new members and stuff like that. But then again, like, again, even as like, even within the company, as my business started growing, I would do it with like, let’s say I found a, like, let’s say I needed a chiropractor for my own back.
I would build a connection with them. And I would, I would do the same thing. I’d be like, either Hey, let so and so know that I sent you or We’re the other way around. I, there were times where I’d be like, Hey, you, you want me to just message her or I’d let the chiropractor know, like, Hey, I just sent someone over to you.
I really feel like she’d benefit. She’s not working out because her lower back’s been bothering her. So I, I kind of took my own advice. If I felt like the gym should be like prescribing it, I was like, well, then maybe I should be prescribing it. And then it’s going to show the people around me that I’m giving it.
And it should kind of come back and I feel like it did. Oh my gosh, that is so brilliant, like so brilliant this idea. It didn’t feel that way. Yeah, but I mean the idea of modeling the behavior that you’re asking for from other people, right? It’s like, how can you expect that? People are going to refer to you if you’re not actually doing the same thing in return.
Right. So I think that’s so, so interesting. And to your point, you know, it, it then prompts build a personal trainer or whatever to keep them from forgetting. Oh, okay. Yeah. And, and then suddenly they have this like, well, thank you so much. I would love to return the favor to you. Right. So that’s really smart.
I just think that’s smart. Yeah, that’s awesome. Okay, so let’s then talk about your, let’s talk about your private practice. So, I think you had mentioned you started to look into the process of getting credentialed with insurance companies. Is that correct? Yeah, so I was already credentialed through. Oh, right.
They had started that process back, you know, years ago for me, but it’s still different to, like, you then have to get credentialed. Even though they had me in the system, I had to get credentialed as myself, as Jillian Foley Nutritionista. Right. Yeah. And so you start this in person private practice, right?
So you were actually renting out an office space. And what prompted you, what made you think, okay, I want to do that versus virtual? Well, so, so virtual wasn’t available until COVID. Or if it was, it was not on my radar and we did not talk about it. Yeah. So, Yeah, I didn’t even, I didn’t even see it as an option.
That was sort of the only choice. Yeah. Yeah. And so then what happened when COVID hit? What happened? In a weird way, it was a blessing. So I told the gym I wouldn’t be working for them. And, well, I’m a liar. I told them it was gonna be, I’m a people pleaser. And so I told them I was gonna be working for them a lot less.
Because Because I had started my own practice and it was hard to say that to them also because I teach classes there. I teach spin, I teach silver sneakers, aerobics classes. And I felt like they might be like, all right, well now your competition, you have to go because I’ve seen other dietitians come and go to that gym before.
They surprisingly said, you know, we like having you here and we feel like we’ve been down this road before with other dietitians. And we don’t want to cut you off. Your patients love you. They would obviously follow you anyway. So let’s like see if we can we can just say like we’re affiliated with each other.
So that was, that was neat. Cause I, I didn’t want to lose my classes. I do love teaching. And so COVID comes and obviously like everyone else, I thought, okay, I’m done. I’m not paying my bills. I don’t know where I’m going to live. Like, And then, and then we were allowed to go virtual, and I was like, Okay.
And I, I reached out to everyone and I said, Hey, we can, we can do virtual now. And I’m going to go ahead and say almost everyone stayed virtual with me. And it was a really neat segue actually. Cause then I didn’t have to feel like I was leaving the gym and like kind of leaving them like high and dry, you know?
And so now I would say, so, so since then I had a big decision in the beginning of this year, my landlord decided he was gonna Up my rent to like a not great number and I took a look at my numbers. I’m trying to learn to do that, to not be like, Oh, what am I, what do I feel? I’m like, why don’t we look at our numbers show?
And I took a look at my numbers and I’m like, okay, like I forget what it was, but I’m like 17 percent of your patients. No, no, no. What was it? No, no, no. It was like 20 percent of your patients are in person and like 5 percent of them are from this area. Why? You don’t have to be in half. What do you, is it, you know, and I had to ask myself some questions.
Is it ego? Do you like having a storefront? I did. It was cute. But I always joke, no one passes by my window and goes, Oh, you know what? I’ve been wanting to lose weight. Like let me know. They find me in other ways anyway. So, I’m actually back at the gym running space from them. Oh, cool. It’s actually, it’s, it’s great.
It’s better than I thought it would have turned out, actually. Great. Yeah. And so do you just rent, do you just pay them rent every month? Is that kind of, Oh, cool. So now you have, you still have a, an in person presence, but then it sounds like the majority of your clients are online. Okay. Very cool. That’s so nice.
You get the best of both worlds. Yeah. Yeah. And so how did you build, then how did you build your practice to a full time income in those early days? Like what worked for you in terms of actually getting clients? Well, I mean, it’s the things that we spoke about, but I always joke with my, I always joke with my patients, like you’re stuck with me for life.
I mean, I have, I have one of, I have a patient and we, I mean, I love them. I really do. And we have been working together for, I don’t even know, 10 years. Because I tell them, if you’re smart about it. Then you never hit your goal like you think it’s about weight loss and sure like, of course, I want to help you lose weight.
I want to help you feel better, but it, it evolves and it changes. And we talk about so much in there that a large group of like a, a big part of my. of my patients. They’re, they’ve been seeing me forever and I’ve also learned that if someone stops seeing me, they’re not gone forever. I mean, I just had a guy the other day, he like walked past my spin class and I’m like, no way.
And then like, sure enough, someone’s like, Hey, a patient of yours from like five years ago wants to join the gym and said, he’s been looking for you. And I’m like, you know, and then you reconnect, it’s like an old friend. And so I feel like a lot of them don’t leave you and then word of mouth. So I’ve, I was tracking, I probably get like, let’s say two, let’s say two referrals a week, I get, I ask every one of them, Oh, great.
How did you hear about me? And I’m going to go ahead and say, most of them say, Oh, so and so told me about you, or they might say a friend of mine told me about you. a year ago and I’ve been following your post and you said something the other day and it really hit home and I, you know, I thought it was time to reach out to you.
So I think it’s just, it’s I’m at a point where it’s like, I don’t really have to try for it anymore. It’s just stay consistent with what I’ve been doing for years. That’s the one area I’m not afraid of. Like, I don’t, I don’t do that to myself anymore. I’m like, Oh my goodness. Like what if, and sometimes people leave me, you know, sometimes I, you know, and it happens and that’s a lesson I’ve had to learn, I’m either not right for them or they wanted a meal plan and they didn’t want to and then I’ll talk about how they feel when they eat the chips or, you know, not everyone is in the right place for me.
And maybe I’m not in the right place for them, but I’m going to go ahead and say, like, my retention rate is fairly high. And then it’s just all the other stuff I do is more like maintenance. That’s awesome. And so how has your business changed then over the last I think you said you’ve been running it full time for five years.
How has it changed? From back then to where you are now?
I dunno that it has. Mm. How have I changed or how has my business changed? I would say both.
I’m gonna say like as far as the way I practice, I mean, I’m always trying to stay in the loop and stay current and question my approach. I try to, I work on listening. I work on not always feeling like I need to have an answer when someone says something to me. So in those ways, I will say, I’ve probably, I don’t want to say change, I want to say evolved.
And my business has changed, changed in the sense of like, I’m becoming more organized. With the way I approached the numbers and the stats, know what’s coming in and knowing what’s going out. This might sound weird, or I don’t know, we’ll say. So I had a therapist that I used during my divorce and we got to a point where like, I’m a pretty quick learner.
And we kind of separated. But I always joke that when you run your own business by yourself, you have no one else to talk to, right? That’s why I listened to your podcast. Like you’re on my team. You don’t even know it. So I reach out to him and I, so, Oh, I should also tell you that when I was dabbling with the idea of starting my new.
With starting my own business, the one woman who was in charge of billing with the company I’d worked for, and she’s not there, so I don’t feel bad saying it. She basically was like, Oh, well, you wouldn’t be able to do that. You wouldn’t be able to do what I do. Yeah. And so I got, you know, I, she’s not wrong.
I don’t, I don’t know business. I don’t know what you do. And so he says to me, Well, tell me what you do. So I explained to him what I do. And he goes, come here. He goes, I’m going to show you your name on this paper. So it’s not breaking HIPAA. And he goes, watch. And he puts the units in and he hit send and he goes, that’s the only thing that you haven’t been doing.
He was like, you could handle the back end. Yeah. So that was like a, that was a big deal for me to be like, Oh, I, I can do this. So I reached out to him in November and I was like, I talked to myself about my business. I’m doing a good job, but there are things that I need to work on and I’m too close to the tree to see the forest.
I said, and after all you handle people’s mental health and this affects my mental health and I want you to be my business coach and can we use it on health insurance? So I see my therapist. Like every two to three weeks and we talk about business and my emotions around the business and yeah So that has changed that has made me be Even if I’m resistant to something he says it helps me take a step back, you know over that week and go All right.
So what was going on there? Why don’t you want to do that or why didn’t you want to hear him say that or you know? Wow. That’s so, that’s really cool and cool to just hear how you yourself and your business have evolved. I think particularly I appreciate the point around, even though I think you said it as sort of a small point, but the piece around organizing yourself and paying attention to the metrics and stuff like you’re five years in and this is, you’ve developed this process.
Like this doesn’t happen on day one, right? Like these are all learned stuff. skills that take time to develop, right? And if you’re in it for the long game, which it sounds like you are, and I hope a lot of people listening are, you know, if you’re in it for a long, for in the long game, you have this attitude of like, I’m just going to continue to improve and get better, better, better.
It’s never a destination. It’s just like my business skills, my organizational skills, my You know, just running my business are going to get better every year. And that’s so thank you for mentioning that. I think that’s actually really, really interesting. So tell me a little bit about marketing. Like what do you do for marketing besides word of mouth?
Because it sounds like word of mouth is really your biggest marketing engine, which is amazing. So what else do you do? So I do, I do social media. Mostly just Instagram and Facebook. In my opinion, it’s not great. But I’ve also had to teach myself. I always ask myself, who am I talking to? Am I talking to the, you know, 10, 000 likes I wish I got?
Or am I talking to the 13 people that like, Really valued it. And if I just keep it to that, cause you know how it is, you put a lot of time into it, you think you’re so like clever and then like 10 people like it. But throughout the week, I’ll have someone say to me like, Oh, I really needed to hear the dinner meetup.
Doesn’t have to be like amazing. Like it just has to be like, I mean, you know, potatoes and broccoli, like it doesn’t have, and so when, and I hear that a lot and I remind myself. That’s what it is. It’s, it’s not letting people forget who I am. I always say it’s like a car commercial, you know, just cause you see a car commercial doesn’t mean you’re going to go out and buy a car, but one day you’re going to need a car.
And you’re like, Oh, there’s that one car commercial I saw. So I, I look at it like that. My rule is one to two posts a week, no pressure. Sometimes I think it’s dominant. It’s at the end of the week. I’m like, Jill, just put it up, just put it up. I’m on my stories more, but that’s easier and that also goes away if you don’t like it.
And then I also do I do seminars. So in the meantime, I’ve built connections with gyms. And I think, so it, I still kind of do the same thing. Like I have a couple of local gyms and like, again, I’ll say, Oh, how did you hear about me? And it’s like, Oh I come from Erica’s gym and, you know, she told me that I need to reach out to you.
And so like, I always keep an eye on that. And if I, if I know someone in that neighborhood, I will send someone over there. But I also do seminars. Probably not as often as I like, but I always seem to do one around the new year. Sometimes they’re free, sometimes they have to pay, but I think that also like there’s another there’s another gym that I will go to and I’ve gotten people from there.
So I just kind of try to get myself out there. Really? Yeah. Totally. Yeah. And I, I so appreciate your point around social media. And I think, you know, we, in this day and age, we sometimes forget that like each individual interaction with your post, whatever that might be, is a person. That is an individual person.
We do forget that. Yeah. Right? It is an individual person. And think about the last time you were, you know, standing in front of 10 people giving a session in person or whatever, right? It’s like Right. It’s pretty awesome that you can put one post out there and, and influence ten people. Like that’s pretty amazing.
Right. And I think we sometimes lose sight of that because of just, yeah, how, just the narrative around social media and, you know, whatever. But yeah, it’s really so much, the more I’m sort of, the more I learn about social media and as things change and evolve, it’s like, it’s now so much more about those deeper, richer connections with a few.
You know, versus these like viral moments that like, do they really amount to anything? Who they never see you. Yeah. Right. Exactly. I just put up a, I put up a post and I wasn’t going to, cause I really try to keep my page light and I put up a post about 9 11 and I couldn’t believe how many views it got. I got like 73 shares on Facebook, but that was my, that was like me going, well, I don’t But what does that do for anyone?
Good job, Jill! You figured it out, but it’s not going to get you anywhere. No, I know. Isn’t that fascinating? We’ve had that same experience too, where a post has, you know, gone like, I’ll say mini viral. Because it’s like, you know, I wouldn’t say it’s viral viral, but it’s like, But like, for you, you’re like, wow, it’s like my other reels or whatever.
But it doesn’t necessarily actually have a direct business impact. I think that’s the important thing for people to remember and note, is like, it’s, it’s still like there is still a, process that needs to happen of somebody building the know, like, and trust factor with you as the person who’s creating the content.
One piece of content is not necessarily going to do that. And so, yeah, I just think that’s such an interesting conversation. Yeah. What do you feel like, have you tried anything marketing wise that you feel like does not work or has not worked for you? I, no, I, no, I can’t say so. Although I will say this I just started writing blogs.
And because of you, because I, I will say that I feel like blogs are saturated. I mean, I could easily say the same thing about Instagram. Mm-Hmm. , I feel like blogs are saturated. I’ve heard you talk about blogs a couple times, whether you’re interviewing someone or talking about yourself, but then it occurred to me, I found you through a blog.
And I was like, oh, there’s a connection here. So I started doing blogs and I thought, cause like one day down the road, I want, I want a big part of my business to be courses. And I’m like, then you need to draw traffic to your website. Cause I didn’t always have a website. I didn’t feel like I needed.
I just published my website probably six months ago, so I didn’t need a website to have a business. But if I’m going to sell courses, then I need a landing page. And if I’m going to have a landing page, I got to get people there. And so I started doing the blogs. And then I guess you could say my, my most recent marketing strategy would be so that Jim, that I, that I’m affiliated with AFC Fitness, they I asked them, can I start publishing my blogs on your newspaper?
They’re like, of course we would, we would, we would love content anyway. Right. And so, I’m really curious to see how that turns out. So smart. Yeah. Might as well if you’re already writing it. I’m already writing it anyway. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. That’s awesome. I’m so glad to hear that because I know it’s, you know, blogs are one of those things that tend to be a hard sell.
I think because people don’t see the direct ROI, the direct immediate return. Right. And it’s, It’s, it can be pretty labor intensive to get a blog out there into the world, right? And so it’s really hard. It tends to be that thing that falls to the bottom of the list. Yeah. But to your point, it’s like probably when you’re looking for something, the first place you go still is Google.
You do. Yeah. Like at the end of the day. Yeah. Yeah. I think I Googled how to make more money as a dietician. Yeah. Yeah. And yours popped up. It was well written. And then I think I saw, like, follow our podcast and I was like, Oh, yeah, I followed the podcast. Yeah. Wow. I love hearing those stories. Yeah. Those are always so validating to that.
It’s like, no, still work. This is why I’m doing that. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Cool. Thanks for, yeah. Thanks for mentioning that and just sort of telling that story. So what’s next for your practice? What do you see in terms of your future vision? So I’m I see a lot of things whether I get there or not. I’m getting there.
I’m at a point where I’m, I’m pretty busy and I, and I’m sure you get this where it’s like, you know, you can put this other task on your list, but like, then that one’s going to have to fall off. I, I’m at a point where I know that I want to create, I’ve dabbled with courses and I did a self esteem course.
I revamped it three different times. I will say they sold successfully. Well, well, what’s successful to me, but they did well. The feedback was great because I’m a, I’m a huge believer in Your self esteem and the way you view your relationship with food is what’s going to help you be healthier because if you don’t think you can do something, then you’re right.
So I’ve done well with those. I’m doing a goal setting seminar. I’ve done a goal setting seminar before and it went well, but I want to, I want to make a bigger deal out of it. So, like, I’m in that, like, dabbling with growing phase. Cool. I can’t say I’m very consistent with any of it yet. I hope one day I can look back and the same way I can look back with you and go, Oh, yeah, maybe I was on the right path.
But at the time, it didn’t seem that way. I would like to think that that’s where I’m at right now. And all these little dabbling things get me there. Mm hmm. Yeah. Yeah. I would like to hire another dietitian, but, and I’m kind of in the works with that, but again, it’s, it’s dabbling. Yeah. Yeah. That’s awesome.
And what, what advice would you have for other dietitian business owners that are maybe earlier in their journey? You’ll get there. So there’s a girl she, We went to school together. She’s dabbling with the idea of starting her own practice. And I hear the doubt, but it’s easy to see when it’s not you.
And it, it’s like, I went through all of that. I went through all the struggles with having to get credentialed. Oh, that insurance company doesn’t want to pay you. That is normal. And if you let those little, like, Oh, I don’t have enough patience. If you let all of those little things stop you, then you’re done.
They are all the struggles in the beginning are a part of it, you know, and 5 percent progress is better than zero. Yeah, totally. Yeah. Wow. That was great. That was powerful. I think that, I think that’s what I would say. Yeah. That’s awesome. Well, thank you so much for talking to me today. It was so good to chat with you and hear more about your journey.
Thank you for your openness and just willing to share. I know a lot of people are going to learn a lot from this episode with you. So thank you. Where, where can the audience find out more about you? On Instagram nutritionista underscore one on Facebook. It’s nutritionista. You can check out my website.
Nutritionista267. I know I have all these numbers, but regular nutritionista was taken for like all of them. I know. And we’ll link to all of those in the description of this episode so people can connect with you. Cool. Thank you. Thank you so much, Jillian. Yeah. Thank you for having me. This was great. Yeah, absolutely.
