In this episode of the Concierge Medical Marketing Podcast, host Steve Schwartz interviews Patrice Bowes of Serenity Solutions, a massage therapy and wellness center. They discuss Patrice’s transition from allopathic medicine to holistic health, the range of services offered, and the shift from a fee-for-service model to a membership-based approach. The conversation emphasizes the importance of self-care, consistency in health practices, and the value of time management. Patrice shares insights on overcoming financial barriers to wellness and the benefits of preventative care, ultimately encouraging listeners to prioritize their health and well-being.

Chapters

 

00:00 Introduction to Serenity Solutions
01:21 Patrice’s Journey in Health and Wellness
02:36 Diverse Services Offered at Serenity Solutions
03:59 Transitioning to a Membership Model
06:52 The Importance of Self-Care
10:53 Consistency and Accountability in Health
12:49 Time Management and Non-Negotiables
17:16 Health, Wealth, and Time: The Balance
20:35 Final Thoughts and Resources

 

Steven Schwartz (00:24)
Hello and welcome to the Concierge Medical Marketing Podcast. I’m your host, Steve Schwartz, and so grateful to have you along on our journey today. My guest is Patrice Bowes of Serenity Solutions. Hey, Patrice, how are you today?

Patrice (00:37)
Hey,

how are you today? Thanks so much for having me.

Steven Schwartz (00:39)
Yeah, my pleasure. Patrice and I have known each other for quite a few years. She is a massage therapist based in Vero Beach, Florida, and does a marvelous job in massage and many other services, which we’ll talk about in a few minutes. But Patrice has run her business for many years along the line of fee for service, providing massage and other different services under the typical fee for service model. And more recently, she’s been moving to more of a membership model that’s working out well for her.

Let’s go ahead and dive right into this, Patrice, and give us some quick background of your education and your history in business so people can get a good idea of where you’re coming from.

Patrice (01:20)
Sure. So I actually spent 16 years in allopathic medicine in Palm Beach County. I worked in various doctor’s offices, managing and OR as well as managing laboratories, stuff like that, and transferred over after working with Palm Beach State College for a while. I transferred over to becoming a medical massage therapist. Just wanted to be more on the natural side of things and help people get a little bit

better quality of care as far as like a complete plan of care, you will. Started Serenity Solutions 2011, 2012, and have been running ever since except for a quick little stint for a car accident. But yeah, so I’ve had the pleasure of getting to know thousands of people in Indian River County and surrounding counties. yeah, it’s been a lot of, it’s been interesting. It’s been a lot of fun.

Steven Schwartz (02:17)
Wonderful. Yeah, it’s again been my pleasure to know you as a friend and as a therapist. Can you share with the audience about some of the specific services that you offer and have offered through your business? I know that massage therapy is literally just one item that you do offer. There’s a whole bunch of different things. Can you share those with us?

Patrice (02:36)
Sure. So obviously medical massage. am one of the only, if not the only workman’s comp massage therapists in the county. I also provide non-surgical lipo and that’s part of a whole weight loss program. So we are very happy to now be teamed up with Radiant Recharge out of Port St. Lucie, who’s offering our IV therapy and our

B12 and various vitamin injections as well as weight loss medications. We’re providing nutritional guidance, personal training, body wraps, detoxification programs, holistic health guidance. I mean, it’s literally a complete plan of care here.

Steven Schwartz (03:25)
Love it. And as we mentioned before, traditionally, was fee for service. A client calls and says, I need a massage, or I need to lose some weight or inches with this Cavie Lipo I’ve heard about. And they basically just hire you. You do the service. But it sounds like you’re moving more into a membership arrangement with your clients to assist them with not just the one thing maybe they came to you looking for, but

to look at them from a more holistic point of view that there may be other services you can provide to help them. Can you talk a little bit more about your membership programs?

Patrice (03:59)
Sure, so we have different types of memberships and different levels of memberships. The decision was made not too long ago that we really, I was kind of really not wanting to do memberships and then looked at it from a complete plan of care, wanted to have that membership, but have the client in mind of an understanding that the number one obstacle for self-care is finances.

So if we could bundle and kind of give a bundle discount under a membership, it works for us as a business. It works for the client as in being able to budget that self-care. So like an example of this is, you know, we have a number of people right now that are doing our bronze exclusive membership for weight loss and they’re getting, they get four 30 minute nutritional sessions with me via Zoom.

I’ll go through your history, we’ve learned everything about you, what supplements you should be on, what we can recommend or suggest. You get two B12 injections to help with your energy and your metabolism. You’re going to get a personal weight loss program. You’re going to get a workout program. You’re going to get a meal guide. That’s $99 a month. So if I were to price that separately, you might be spending four or $500 on that month.

By you committing to yourself, you get it for $99 a month, you get a better plan of care, and I have a client for a lot longer.

Steven Schwartz (05:33)
And is that a 12-month contract?

Patrice (05:35)
Actually, no, it’s a three-month contract.

Steven Schwartz (05:38)
That sounds like a no-brainer, Patrice. It’s a great idea.

Patrice (05:39)
It is

plan of care, budget friendly, and it’s more kind of helping the clients see the value of self care for themselves, if that makes any sense. You we really want people to understand that, yeah, there is finances, things get in the way, but if you don’t take care of yourself, who’s driving your ship?

Steven Schwartz (06:00)
Exactly. I know we’ve had many discussions about this in the past where both you and I are in this sandwich generation where we are caring for our kids or even our grandchildren, as well as caring for senior adults in our life, whether it’s parents or other aunts and uncles and whatnot who are in their 70s or 80s or beyond, and they literally need more help. And we are always giving and serving other people, but

Patrice (06:05)
Thanks.

Steven Schwartz (06:30)
Typically, we as people who give take care of ourselves last. And unfortunately, it seems like we get to a point where we’re burned out, we’re exhausted, we’re frustrated, and it’s like, what’s the problem? right, we forgot to take care of ourselves first. And so can you maybe speak to that for a minute?

Patrice (06:36)
Yes.

Yeah, so it is very

common. As you said, I like the the sandwich generation. It is very common for any of us to put ourselves last, but women especially. And women typically will go through hormonal shifts. We go through weight loss, weight gain, all these different things that trigger us. But we still don’t find the time or the justification to take care of it because.

this one needs this or my mom needs this or that one needs this or we’re being pulled all these different directions. So really the whole reason I got into what I do was to be helping people. And I wanted to create these programs, whereas we could completely help somebody. We’re removing all the obstacles. You know, we’re really, really, really moving it. Removing it. Sorry that we have the we have that

put in place for you if you want to do fee for service that’s fine but if you really want to commit to yourself and you really say I want to get better and I’m going to set a goal three months is our typical goal for most people from start to finish with a commitment of this is how many times I’m coming in we’re going to do the work we’re going to put the work in we’re going to get the results so if you’re going to commit to that we’re going to commit to it financially and say you know we’re going to help you every which way we can

And then we have other projects in place right now to help those that are even struggling a little bit more.

Steven Schwartz (08:26)
Yeah, that’s wonderful. mean, literally $99 a month, three month minimum term. I would think that that is doable by most people. And if someone truly wants to make a positive change in their health and have the accountability and the direction from somebody such as yourself, it’s kind of a no brainer, right?

Patrice (08:47)
It is. I mean, we could easily charge more. I mean, the value, just my skill set. know that, and I have clients tell me all the time, you’re undercharging. It’s not about the money. It’s, really want people to commit to themselves. And like you said, that accountability, we want it to be there. We have different memberships that include IV therapy. We have memberships that say, you know what, maybe they’re not for the weight loss or just for massage.

or for stress reduction and we have a family plan, you know, two people can be coming in and we have our family plans 189 a month. It’s two people coming in twice a month. When you’re a member, also you’re getting all your extras are included at no charge. So if you’re coming in for sound therapy, if you need to have red light therapy as part of your massage, you’re not paying extra for those as a member. So why not? You know what I mean?

Why not?

Steven Schwartz (09:46)
Exactly. And again, that’s a no brainer. mean, typically in our town, what a 60 minute massage is what $89 or $99 or something like that, even or even higher for some of the beachside businesses, right? 129 an hour. And to be able for two people to get two massages each each month for under $200 is just fantastic.

Patrice (09:59)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, plus

sound therapy, plus everything else, plus heat therapy, plus red light therapy, plus vibration therapy, all free included. So I had a client tell me this morning that she was laughing. She was going through. She just signed up this morning and she says, wow, you really put your money where your mouth is, don’t you? And I thought that was that was pretty telling because we do we put our money where our mouth is. We’re not just talking the talk about we want you to get better and be healthy. We’re literally

putting it on the line and saying, know what, we’re gonna do our part. Now, if you step up, you got the rest of it.

Steven Schwartz (10:47)
I love it. how have the results been for your clients who are sticking with the program?

Patrice (10:53)
They’re great. The consistency, always say consistency is key. Whether you’re trying to manage pain or you’re trying to lose weight or you’re trying to, you know, just get more energy healthier, consistency is always going to be the key. So jumping in, I came in once this this week and I don’t see you again for three, four weeks and you’re still battling that same neck pain or that back pain. There is a lot that takes place between visits.

And then a lot of times the client will look at the therapist and go, well, you don’t know what you’re doing. That could be a great therapist. But if you’re not being consistent, you can’t expect results. Look at bodybuilders. They’re in the gym, how often? Three, four times a week. And they’re making gains because they’re consistent. They’re consistent in diet. They’re consistent in that muscle. They get results. If you go, I’m going to go to gym once a month, but I’m expect to lose 20 pounds this month.

It’s not going to happen. You’ve to be consistent and accountable.

Steven Schwartz (11:55)
Right. Having a gym membership is one thing using your gym membership is a whole nother thing entirely.

Patrice (11:58)
That is absolutely

true. That is really true.

Steven Schwartz (12:03)
Exactly.

One thing that we do, my wife and I, is that we actually do time blocking in our calendar. so Monday, Wednesday, Friday, every week, we have it set so that we wake up at 6 AM and we’re walking the neighborhood by 6 15. And we get in over a mile of fast walking. And then once we’re back at the house, we do stretches and whatnot in order to, you know.

help our bodies stay more limber and you we’re in our early to mid 50s here and we realize if we don’t take care of our health and our body no one else is going to and if we don’t take care of ourselves we can’t take care of the kiddos and the seniors in our life who are counting on us so time blocking do you do you recommend that for your clients as well?

Patrice (12:49)
So

we as part of our programs for any of our programs, when somebody wants to do an extended point of care, I always work journaling into things, you know, keeping track of what you eat, keeping track of where your exercise is, making the time because it’s a very common, I don’t have time. I hear that every day. I don’t have time. And that’s an easy thing to say. I don’t have time. No, if you allow it, you don’t have time. But are you letting your schedule control you?

or are you the one controlling your schedule? Everything will wait because we have a lot of wasted moments. Standing in line at Starbucks, sitting in the drive-through, go to McDonald’s, grab something quick to eat. It’s the same thing, it’s all of it, they’re lost minutes, but if we really wanna be serious about it, we will make the time. It’s just the way it goes. There’s no, there’s real.

Steven Schwartz (13:45)
I heard it. Right. Sorry about that. I heard it said recently that you should have a list of non-negotiables and those non-negotiables can and should include weekly exercise, you five days a week, at least an hour or more where you get your heart pumping and start sweating. Having reading, reading something positive, know, success principle books or a book.

in your industry, your Bible, whatever it is that brings joy and fulfillment and growth to your life and other things like spending at least 20 minutes with personal actual time with each of your kids every single day. Not sitting next to each other with everybody on their own devices, but instead put the devices away and play cards, play, you know, Monopoly or whatever it might be.

do drawing together, something that you’re these non-negotiables and literally put them in your calendar and then have that appointment every day for each of these items as if you’re meeting with your most important client. You know, I’m not going to skip that event because that’s my most important client. Well, guess what? Ourselves, we are our own important, most important client. Would you agree?

Patrice (15:04)
Absolutely. I have one more non-negotiable that I have on my list and that is, and my kids do the same thing. Every day you add, you have to do one thing in this world that makes it better than it was this morning. So for like me, I volunteer on a board for children. I have, you know, my grandson might go and help a neighbor or walk somebody’s dog.

Steven Schwartz (15:20)
Love it.

Patrice (15:31)
You have to do something for somebody else. It can be just complimenting a stranger, know, or, you know, sitting and listening to somebody. Whatever the situation is, always put in your path. But a lot of times we say we can’t do that because we don’t have time. You do have time. There’s always time for kindness. So that’s one of my other non-negotiables.

Steven Schwartz (15:54)
love it. And when it comes down to it, it’s priorities, right? What is most important to you to help you with your health, with your mental clarity and sanity in a crazy, busy world that we live in for family, for ourselves? And literally, giving and helping other people is so important. I’m so glad that you brought that up. I heard one time years and years ago, if you’re depressed, what you should do

is lock your front door, leave your house and find somebody who needs help, help them and then you’ll become undepressed. And that always stuck with me. It’s probably 20, 30 years ago that I heard that and I believe it.

Patrice (16:36)
It works. You know, it works. When you start realizing that, you know, your problem might seem huge to you, but it’s minuscule compared to somebody else’s. You know, kind of puts things into perspective. But like you said before, you know, you make that time to take care of yourself, take care of your health. Well, we have an old saying in the industry, either take care of yourself now, otherwise you’re going to have no choice but to take care of yourself later.

So you either take care of yourself in health or you can be taking care of yourself in sickness. Which one do you want to do? You know, so it a little easier right now.

Steven Schwartz (17:05)
Great.

Exactly. And one thing that I’ve thought of and heard of for many, many years is that there’s three things that we all as professional people strive for is at some point in our lives to have health, wealth and time. Right. So the idea is I’m so busy right now. I don’t have any time because I’m trying to gain wealth. In doing so, I’m losing my health.

Okay, so that’s not a very good arrangement, right? Or to be retired and you have money and you have time, but you’re not well enough to enjoy your time and your money because you haven’t taken care of yourself 20 years ago. And so it’s like that magic combination of, know, people talk about working all their lives and getting to be able to retire one day and travel and…

Patrice (18:02)
exact.

Steven Schwartz (18:12)
you know, do whatever they want to do and volunteer and stuff. But you need to have time, wealth and health. And if you don’t have all three, it’s going to be hard to achieve what you want to do, live the life you desire.

Patrice (18:24)
Yep. One of the other obstacles, I guess you could call it, that we’ve overcome with people is I’ve had some people tell me, memberships are so expensive. And I’m like, okay, to some people it might be, but think about it this way. How much is a doctor’s visit? How much is it to go to the doctor? And even if you have insurance, okay, great, you have insurance. You have a $25 copay.

Well, if you have to go back to that doctor four times in the month for follow-ups, there’s $100 right there, not including your prescriptions and then the side effects of the prescriptions and then, you have to get something else and then time off of work to go. So if you put it into real perspective, it’s not more expensive. It’s actually saving you money in the long run because you’re going to be healthier. You’re not going to need all this other stuff.

Steven Schwartz (19:20)
You’re saving money, but you’re also saving time and you get to enjoy the improved health through the process.

Patrice (19:25)
Yes, so you’ve got health

and wealth right there.

Steven Schwartz (19:28)
Love it.

Patrice (19:28)
little bit of

self care. It’s only thousands of years old, you know, it’s not like you just invented this.

Steven Schwartz (19:33)
That’s right. This is not brand new stuff, but you know, we all make excuses of, know, I’m too busy. I don’t have enough extra money. Life is too crazy right now. At some point I’ll get to my health, you know, but that’s that’s one of the things I really appreciate about your business is, know, that, you know, for for a while, you know, I was coming to get a massage with you once a week and that really helped me with preventing migraines and that was so good for me.

and learned that through the process of self-care, through deep tissue massage, help keep migraines away. Whereas on the other side, if I got a migraine, ended up at the emergency room on urgent care, it’s a couple hundred dollars for the visit, and I’m sick and miserable and time off from work. You know, let’s focus on the preventative self-care, take care of the problem that leads to the migraine, as opposed to treating the symptom and the hassle of the migraine after it’s happened and

you know, and you’re miserable, truly.

Patrice (20:35)
crazy huh? Sometimes it’s so simplified that it scares some people because it is so simple. Like we automatically as humans think things should be complicated. If they’re not complicated, that can’t possibly work because it’s not complicated. But it is. It’s simple and it’s affordable and it works.

Steven Schwartz (20:36)
It really is.

I love it. Patrice, it’s been a pleasure chatting with you today. Do you have any final thoughts or comments that you’d like to share with our audience?

Patrice (21:03)
Consultations are always complimentary. You can reach us at 772-985-6754. You can call, you can text. Yeah, I just love what I do and I love helping people. So feel free to give me a call and let’s talk.

Steven Schwartz (21:22)
I love it. your phone number one more time, please.

Patrice (21:27)
772-985-6754 you can call or text.

Steven Schwartz (21:30)
Love it, love it, love it. So in the interest of sharing great content on our podcast here, I want to make an offer for anybody who’s listening, who is perhaps a concierge medical doctor or a direct primary care physician or like yourself, somebody who is moving their practice in the direction of membership. My company has our website conciergemd.marketing.

I’ve written a book called the definitive guide to winning with digital marketing for concierge medical practices. The book is absolutely free. All you have to do is go to our website concierge md.marketing, scroll down the homepage to where you see a picture of the book, put in your email address and click the submit button. Our system will send you a link where you can download the PDF of the book. It’s over a hundred pages, tons and tons of actionable, helpful information.

that you can put into practice to help you grow your panel, to transition your panel from an existing medical practice to a concierge panel size, or how to nurture your existing patient base to keep them engaged in your practice. So that’s free with my compliments. If you have any questions about anything you’ve heard on our podcast or perhaps anything you read in my book or any of our blog posts and whatnot, please feel free to give me a call directly. I’m happy to chat.

My phone number is 772-304-2420. Again, 772-304-2420. This has been Steve Schwartz and my guest, Patrice Bowes. Patrice, thank you again for being here.

Patrice (23:08)
Thank

you for having me.

Steven Schwartz (23:10)
Awesome. Have a great day everybody and we’ll see you on the next episode of our podcast. Have a great day.