TherapistExchange Flyer Service
Steve Flowers of Mindful Living Programs is now coordinating the flyer service. You can reach him at 530-898-1495. The flyer service allows you to send a flyer to Psychologists, LCSW's and MFT's across the whole state, just in Northern California or just in Southern California. There is no option to send to just one discipline (you cannot select just MFT's). If you look at the map below, Southern California will be San Luis Obispo, Kern, San Bernardino and all counties south of those. Northern California will be Monterey, Kings, Tulare, Inyo and all counties north of those.
How many flyers go out?:
If you go back to the main page (www.TherapyOnTheSpot.com) and click over to the newsletter page (the little "click here" link), you will find a link called HOW TO BUY MAILING LISTS. Click on it. Scroll down. There you will see the approximate number of therapists in Northern and Southern California. I say "approximate" because the numbers change each month as people retire and new therapists are licensed. An attempt is also made to eliminate duplicates for the flyer mailing where someone holds more than one license.
When do they go out?:
There are usually two mailings a year. You will need to have all your flyer information ready by late December for the mailing that usually goes out in January and by late July for the mailing that usually goes out in August. I say "usually" because we make NO guarantees that the flyers will go out on a specific date.
How much does this cost?:
That depends on the number of people who want to do a mailing. This is a cooperative effort. The cost is divided by the number of people participating. Ed gets a discount for providing the mailing list, but otherwise the cost is divided evenly. So, the more participants, the lower the cost. No one gets paid for organizing this, so you must be prepared to do this in a cooperative spirit. You don't get to be a complainer! Costs are for paper, printing, postage and mailing services. Most of this is handled by Chris Strick at the Graphic Fox in Chico, CA. The final product is sent by "bulk" type mail. The postal service does not guarantee a delivery date for "bulk" type mailings. If you did this yourself, you'd be spending about 20 cents per piece on postage alone. There are more than 50,000 therapists in the state, so you'd spend more than $10,000 just on postage. Then you have the paper, printing, mailing list and mailing services still to pay. It is highly likely that you'd spend at least 50 cents per flyer, so you'd wind up spending over $25,000.
With this cooperative effort, we have gotten the costs down to around $5,000 to $6000 per participant when we've had five participants for a mailing to the whole state. And that includes all your paper, printing, postage and mailing services. But again, there are no price guarantees. It all depends on how many people do this.
Are there any alternatives?:
The weekly electronic newsletter continues to do very well and it is a really low cost option to get the word out about your workshops etc. So, consider placing an ad there. Go to www.TherapyOnTheSpot.com and click over to the newsletter page. Then click on SUBMIT AN AD TO THE ELECTRONIC NEWSLETTER. The electronic newsletter is sent to more than 1800 people each week by email. Ads run for four weeks and cost $12, $24 or $36 depending on the length of the ad. The electronic newsletter usually goes out each week on Thursday evening. It is entirely self-service. You must place ads from the website and pay by Visa, MasterCard or Discover credit cards. I do not accept ads by email, fax or snail mail. If you need to correct an ad, there is also a link to do that. Ads appear as you have written them, so proof read your ad for accuracy before you hit the submit button.
Thanks,
Ed