Advanced Business Strategies: How To Sell A Massage Business

(Massage Magazine Column: "Advanced Business Strategies" April 24, 2023; Author Amy Bradley Radford)

Until a few years ago, I had only met a handful of therapists who had successfully sold their existing massage practice to another therapist. Most solopreneur massage therapists I knew had attempted to sell their clientele list to whomever was willing to buy it—and when that didn’t happen, they simply shut their doors and walked away from their practice.

How to Sell a Massage Business

Selling a clientele list can be complicated due to many factors, including the differences in massage therapy training from school to school, skill level, personalities and work ethics.

Transitioning clients from one therapist to another sometimes does not even work when you give the names away for free. I have observed therapists gifting their clientele lists to a new therapist and then that new therapist commenting that hardly anyone responded to marketing efforts they did.

Most dedicated and caring therapists want to see their clientele taken care of after they have quit massaging, and feel obligated to find someone for their clients to schedule with. The struggle is real when wanting to create quality referral options, because many therapists are already so busy and availability is low. 

Compounding all of this is the fact that most therapists starting out in business do not have the cash flow to purchase an existing business or the experience to manage it.

So, with all this in mind, is it possible to sell your business and actually profit from that sale, upon retiring?

Yes, I believe you can. However, it requires some thoughtful planning and a willingness to invest in yourself by creating an exit strategy with mentoring.

First, You Must Understand What You Are Selling

The massage therapist-client relationship cannot be compared to a storefront business with your clientele list being inventory. A healthy massage practice is 100-plus individual and unique relationships that were built from care, compassion, touch, time and trust, all combined into one.

It would be nearly impossible to sell a list of relationships to someone else and expect any therapist to pick up where you left off with each person. That is the illusion people imagine is going to happen when they purchase or sell a clientele list.

Basically, your massage business is you, and the only way to sell yourself is through replication.

What you need to be selling is the tangible opportunity for someone else to successfully work with your clients. To do that, you must create the opportunity where you invest yourself in another therapist and slowly transition yourself out of your practice as they learn how to take care of your clients as you have.

This is what it takes to capitalize on selling your solo practice to another solo therapist. This is where mentoring can bridge the gap between establishing someone qualified to take over that list and profiting from the years it took to build your clientele and business.

Create a Mentoring Opportunity

To ensure the success of this type of business transaction, the new therapist must be provided with the opportunity to learn how you meet your clients’ expectations as you do. The client wants to continue to receive the same level of massage therapy and customer service you gave, and it is up to you to teach the new therapist how to accomplish this.

Learning how to meet clients’ expectations and being able to adapt a massage flow to a client’s specific needs while creating the desired outcome is how you gained clients. This is an extremely valuable skill. This ability is what you are infusing into a therapist who is buying your clientele and business.

If you teach a younger therapist this skill set, along with a dash of your signature massage moves to create a similar feeling that still meets client expectations, you set the stage for that therapist to successfully take over your clientele. You are also laying the foundation and providing the opportunity for a new relationship to be formed between your existing clientele and the selected protégé, or mentee, therapist.

This is a well-planned exit strategy.

The sale of a clientele list should include a signed contractual agreement that outlines the investment of your time and training. This investment of time is typically weekly training sessions, trading massages, building confidence in a pair of younger hands without crossing artistic boundaries, and a new blending of skills with practice to create the outcome your clients will want from this mentee.

As a mentor, you can also set the contract to support the sale of your business. You could build in the purchase by have a percentage of each massage paid to you for training and purchase of the business and clientele. By the time you have confidently transitioned your clients over to the new therapist, you would have profited along the way and created your own retirement buyout.

Again, all of this is outlined in a contract, agreed upon and followed by both parties.

Exit Strategy Timing & Planning

These contracts are typically a one- to two-year commitment, with the ability as the mentor to cut back on your existing workload as you phase out of your own practice. I have coached mentors on how to increase their rates and lower availability to create demand for scheduling with the mentee.

This is another potential solution for an older therapist who wants to transition to retirement at a slower rate while helping extend their career. It also allows the mentor to continue to train the mentee for greater success. (Who knows? Once you learn how to mentor someone to refer your clientele to, you may shift your focus from simply leaving the table to earning an income by bringing on and training mentees.)

There are many eager, new therapists who would jump at the opportunity to work with someone who could teach them to be successful and provide a clientele. As such, I will give you one last word of advice: Take your time and select a mentee, with much consideration, who meets your expectations as well.

I believe massage is truly an art that is passed from one set of hands to another. Creating the opportunity to teach someone what took you years to understand and build could shift our entire industry in a positive way, all while leaving the gift of yourself in others to continue forward with.

If you would like to schedule a one-on-one coaching call or join the monthly coaching group for mentorship questions and training click here: Coaching Request

Amy Bradley Radford