Issue link: https://www.massageandbodyworkdigital.com/i/121374
editor's note The Success You Deserve A reader recently sent an email insisting we at Massage & Bodywork were "reading her mind." No, we're just listening to the wisdom you share with us. You touch our lives and our editorial planning every day. From the MTs I speak with at events like the American Massage Conference (May 17–19 in Atlanta), to the emails we receive from members, what you tell us about your experiences in the profession helps shape this magazine and ABMP's communications. The end products are reflections of the diversity of your practices. Whether we meet at a conference or you email us at editor@abmp.com, we listen and respond for the good of your practice and the profession. So, please share your success stories, your dedication to the work, and your determination to learn and apply more skills, and we promise to continue to support your practice however possible. We know you can't read your clients' minds either, which is why we conduct the ABMP National Consumer Survey every two years. The results cue us to consumer actions and behaviors regarding massage. We then pass on those results to you and include suggestions, too (see Business Side, "Understanding the Appetite for Massage," page 26, and "The Ideal Massage," page 70). For example, ponder this: when surveyed, consumers who had a massage in 2012 said they sought it out for relaxation and restoration (39 percent), relief of pain or muscle soreness (37 percent), and stress relief (31 percent).* Those are already your strong suits as you put the "ahhh" in massage! That means your next step is to perfect your marketing materials and elevator speech. When clients appreciate the breadth of your skills and the benefits of frequent massage, your appointment book fills itself! Our survey also discovered that consumers find their massage therapists through Internet sources (50 percent) and personal advice (30 percent), so I trust you're singing your praises as clearly as possible—both online and in person—to bring the success you deserve to your practice. I hope you've used ABMP's stellar Website Builder to style your online presence, and that you're using ABMP's marketing materials and ABMP BizFit resources (all found online at www.abmp.com) to help deliver your messages to prospective clients and retain treasured ones. Working together, we have the resources to raise the number of massage clients in the population above the 37–40 percent mark, where it's remained static for the past decade. With an estimated 320,000 MTs in the country, imagine the impact if each one recruits an additional 10 new clients this year. With your bodywork skills and ABMP's business and marketing tools, we can do this! Leslie A. Young, Editor-in-Chief leslie@abmp.com * Statistics courtesy of ABMP's National Consumer Survey conducted by Harstad Strategic Research, January 2013. contributors Dudley Evenson lives with her fluteplaying husband, Dean, by a river in the Cascade Mountains. When not making music and videos, hiking, or gardening, the two love to tone and chant together. Dudley wants to become a life coach and help others live their dreams. 8 massage & bodywork may/june 2013 If Heidi Smith Luedtke isn't busy writing about bodywork, parenting, or psychology, she is studying Swedish—the language, not the massage—in preparation for her family's upcoming overseas move. She spends her weekends visiting museums and galleries in Washington, D.C., or playing at the park with her kids. Teaching bodywork in new parts of the world inspires Art Riggs, and that's a good thing. After all, Dave, his Maine coon cat, needs food. Art's work also gives him a diversion from his growing obsession with golf, as he attempts to stave off the final entropy.