How to Make 100K as a Therapist

Whether you’ve been practising for years or you’re graduating soon, you want to make sure you’re making the salary you deserve as a therapist.

A quick Google search will tell you that therapists in Ontario typically make between $55 000 and $85 000 per year – but you may be wondering how much a therapist can make in a year.

Here at KMA, we know you can make at least $100 000 per year as a therapist by putting specific techniques into practice.

To help you make the money you deserve, our fantastic founder Kimberly Moffit has offered her top four tips to make $100 000 per year as a therapist.

By the end of this article, you’ll understand four effective strategies to help you make a six-figure salary as a therapist.

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How to Make Six Figures as a Therapist

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1. Establish a Full and Consistent Schedule

To make over $100 000 as a therapist, your schedule needs to allow you to see as many clients as possible.

Your schedule should offer at least 4-5 days per week, with lots of availability each day. If you’re working at multiple locations, at least two days per week should be at the same location.

Building your calendar around these goals allows clients to choose times that work for them without having to push sessions into the following week based on availability.

Ultimately, this allows your calendar to achieve more fullness and maximizes the number of time slots you can fill by seeing clients.

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2. Offer Evening Sessions

Whether you’re supporting adults with full-time jobs or students with heavy course loads, your clients have busy lives. Your schedule must suit their needs.

Offer evening sessions between 5 and 9 pm in addition to your daytime sessions to maximize your calendar.

“Evenings are often times when clients want to get in for therapy sessions after work,” Kimberly says. “This can accommodate other commitments that they have.”

New therapists' evening appointments often fill first, so offer at least 2 – 3 evenings in your weekly schedule.

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3. Work With a Group Therapy Practice

When you factor in tasks like bookkeeping, scheduling, and emailing clients, work hours in a therapy practice add up quickly.

When running a private practice, you’re responsible for all of these administrative duties on top of the sessions you do with clients.

“In our experience at KMA,” Kimberly says, “Clinicians are a lot more likely to make six figures if they are spending their time actually seeing clients – where they make money.”

Working with a group practice over a private practice allows you to focus on the most meaningful part of the therapy process – using your skills to improve your clients' lives.

When you can focus on session work and see an abundance of clients, you build up your income more quickly.

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4. Practice Excellent Client Retention

To make over $100 000 as a therapist, you need to do more than attract new clients to book sessions with you. You need clients to keep coming back.

“You can get all the new clients assigned to you,” Kimberly says, “But your schedule will never build if you don’t keep those clients. To make 6 figures, you need to have a really robust, full schedule.”

To have excellent client retention:

• Set your clients up for success by helping them understand how long therapy will last and what their treatment plan entails
• Create strong therapeutic relationships by bonding and emotionally connecting with clients
• Practice effective scheduling by seeing the same client at the same time every week

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Next Steps for Making 100K as a Therapist

After reading this article, you now understand four ways you can make the $100 000 income you deserve as a therapist.

Under Kimberly’s leadership at KMA, we have multiple practitioners making six figures – who often achieve this quickly.

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We prioritize supporting our therapists by allowing them to focus on seeing clients and creating abundance for themselves. We want our therapists to succeed both at KMA and in their lives outside the practice.

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If you’re interested in joining the KMA team, visit our Careers page or contact our recruiter Tre Reid at tre@kmatherapy.com for more information.

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To learn more about working as a therapist, read How to Find a Job as a Therapist in Toronto.