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Doula Business Advisor: Marketing is Education
For many years, I thought of marketing as a “business” aspect of my work, something that was necessary, but distasteful, and essentially different from the work itself. I have learned to reframe that perception. A good doula has the heart of a teacher. Education is integral to the role. I began to realize that marketing is really just another form of education, that we natural birth and breastfeeding advocates must get the message out about why our services matter in the world.
Why should someone want to take my childbirth preparation or breastfeeding classes or learn about baby wearing? Why should an expectant family want to consider hiring a doula? What’s good about giving birth without an epidural or cesarean? How can postpartum doulas meet the needs of new moms and their families? Why does that matter? Why am I the best available choice (among all of their choices) to meet their needs? Marketing answers the question “why?”
The Doula Business Advisor blog is designed to support the establishment and long-term sustainability of private doula businesses. Patty Brennan is the author of The Doula Business Guide: Creating a Successful MotherBaby Business.
Doula Programs: Doulas as Outreach Workers?
Experience has demonstrated that newly-trained doulas joining a community-based doula program will require additional training beyond the core topics of the standard birth or postpartum doula training curricula. Since doula programs are often aimed at families with limited resources who are considered to be at risk, ongoing education on medical and social risk factors is needed. These include signs of premature labor, smoking cessation, substance abuse, nutritional concerns, differentiating between baby blues and postpartum depression and between postpartum depression and postpartum psychosis, and more.
As a doula trainer, I am acutely aware of the multitude of related topics that I simply do not have time to cover in my basic doula workshops, or can only mention in passing. These include domestic violence and the doula, cultural competency, perinatal grief and loss support, effects of sexual abuse on childbearing women, setting and maintaining personal boundaries, and more! I would be extremely hard pressed to just pick one of these topics as the most important.
Doula programs need to provide enhanced training that addresses these topics so that the doulas feel truly prepared to provide skilled support to the families served by the program. Lack of preparation will blow the inexperienced and idealistic doula out of the water. She needs some tools and a good, strong base of administrative support from program staff.
Have other programs found this to be true as well? How have you addressed these issues?
The Doula Programs blog provides a forum for doula program visionaries and implementers to consider common challenges, ask questions, and learn from each other. Patty Brennan is the author of The Doula Business Guide: Creating a Successful MotherBaby Business.
Birth & Parenting News: Helping Families
Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. The theme is so simple. And I find that whenever we are engaged in gratitude, our worries, fears, and anxieties tend to take a back seat. Fear and gratitude cannot occupy the same space. Extending our help to others is a natural response to counting our blessings. Here are some ways to help.
Donations for Holly Prater
Holly Prater is the single mother of two young daughters. She has been a birth consumer advocate for many years. Recently, Holly suffered a spontaneous brain bleed. As a result, she has lost the ability to use the right side of her body and will not be able to return to work for some time. Although the family remains in good spirits, the road to full recovery will not be possible without outside help. Please send donations in any amount to Holly Prater, 5432 Southlawn Dr., Sterling Heights, MI 48310.
Campaign Provides Diapers to Families in Need
March of Dimes and Huggies are working in partnership to help provide diapers to babies in need. One in three families in the U.S. has had to cut back on basics such as food, utilities, or child care in order to provide enough diapers for their babies. As part of the Every Little Bottom Campaign, Huggies will donate up to 20 million diapers in the U.S. over the next eight months, including two million diapers which were given to ten local diaper banks across the country. March of Dimes is working to raise awareness about the issue of diaper need and is encouraging individuals to donate diapers to partner diaper banks.
Resource for Postpartum Families
Lotsa Helping Hands is an online resource to help set up meals, childcare, visits, and anything a family with a newborn might need. Everyone wants to help the family but sometimes the parents have a hard time asking. This website makes it very easy to ask for and receive much needed practical help!
Birth & Parenting News Blog
Each Wednesday, we highlight the latest news items, research results, consumer alerts, and legislative action alerts of interest to expectant and new parents and the professionals who work them.
Doula Business Advisor: Is Doula Training Tax-Deductible?
Doula training may be tax-deductible under the following circumstances:
- You have income from your related business during the year that you are claiming the deduction;
- You have an established business and income related to doula services represents an additional revenue stream.
- You have birth or postpartum doula income and you took the complimentary (birth or postpartum) doula training as continuing education, to enhance your existing business.
Let’s look at these each briefly. Basically, for #1, you need to have income in order to claim an expense against the income. The IRS will allow you to claim a loss wherein business-related expenses outweigh gross income, yielding a net loss on your Schedule C, BUT you must have income in the same tax year as the expenses claimed or you do not really have a business. So, if you took your training in 2010 but have not made any doula income, then your training is not tax-deductible.
#2 and #3 address the IRS exclusion stating that if the education/training expense is the minimum education required to be active in your field, then it is not tax-deductible. Think, for example, of a massage therapist who wants to write off her entire education to become a massage therapist (not allowed). So, we can get around this if we have an existing business (e.g. postpartum doula, childbirth educator, massage therapist) and we claim the cost of birth doula training as a continuing education expense (allowable).
If you meet these requirements, then all expenses associated with your training — hotel, mileage/travel, and 50% of food on the road — are also allowable deductions. And don’t forget to track any books purchased for certification requirements or the cost of certification itself — all allowable deductions. Just keep those receipts!
The Doula Business Advisor blog is designed to support the establishment and long-term sustainability of private doula businesses. Patty Brennan is the author of The Doula Business Guide: Creating a Successful MotherBaby Business.
Doula Programs: Data Collection is Essential
Is your doula program collecting data on client outcomes?
You should be! Evaluation is an essential component of program development. At a minimum, gather demographics on clients served and keep track of services provided. More and more, funders are requiring that grant objectives be framed in terms of measurable outcomes. Funders want to know specifically how their grant made a difference for the target population. Simply reporting on numbers served and how those numbers break down (i.e., documenting the process) is not the same as demonstrating the value of what you are doing. Outcomes are the name of the game.
Ideally, the clients served by the program should also be solicited for feedback on their experience of having a doula. Involvement of constituents in program development and evaluation ensures that your program evolves in a culturally responsive way.
One collective goal of doula programs should be to demonstrate the value that doulas bring in terms of prevention (lower incidence of complications), health care savings, improved short- and long-term mother-baby outcomes, and meeting unmet needs in high-risk populations. We know that doulas make an important contribution to the field of maternal-infant health. We just need to keep documenting that fact as we endeavor to mainstream doulas.
The Doula Programs blog provides a forum for doula program visionaries and implementers to consider common challenges, ask questions, and learn from each other. Patty Brennan is the author of The Doula Business Guide: Creating a Successful MotherBaby Business.
Doula Business Advisor: Use of Forms with Clients
Overall, doula forms are useful if they help you provide better care to your clients. Every item on a form should be scrutinized for its usefulness and whether or not it is appropriate. Consider the purpose behind every question and eliminate those that are overly intrusive and unnecessary. A good filter to apply is whether or not you will do anything different based on the answer to the question (e.g. a health history). We must trust our clients to share what they feel is important for us to know and follow their lead.
I’m a minimalist when it comes to client forms for private-practice doulas (doula programs are a different beast altogether!). Basic contact information, due date, planned location for the birth, family members’ names, directions to their home, birth history, expectations, and preferences should do it. Let the medical care providers do the charting as we focus on the mother. Less may be more (as in better) when it comes to forms.
I am not saying that questionnaires or tools for the clients’ private use should be eliminated. Some of these are designed to be tools for self discovery or to facilitate communication among all the parties. What are your favorite useful questions or tools that enhance your ability to provide excellent service to your clients?
The Doula Business Advisor blog is designed to support the establishment and long-term sustainability of private doula businesses. Patty Brennan is the author of The Doula Business Guide: Creating a Successful MotherBaby Business.
Doula Programs: Is “free” a good thing?
When people are given something for nothing, are we doing them a favor? In some cases, yes, but only when there is true urgent need and they simply are not in a position to do any kind of payback. Even in these situations, folks should be given the opportunity (yes, Opportunity) to do an in-kind payback once they are back on their feet. It doesn’t have to be contributions of money. They can lick stamps, volunteer to work on a fundraiser, or organize a neglected lending library … but do something! I remember one former client sending us a donation of $5 and I don’t think I was ever so appreciative of any donation to the program than her $5.
In administrating a volunteer doula program over eight years, in which low-income families were provided with free birth and postpartum doula services, I noted a mindset from some clients that was very irritating to me. It was one of entitlement and working “the system” for all they could get (somehow I didn’t think of us as “the system”).
For example, there was the woman who received free birth doula services and then called the program months later to get a “postpartum doula,” when she was really looking for a babysitter. She called back several times in different guises, trying to get free babysitting services from us. She was a user, plain and simple. I didn’t set up a doula program to enable users and I don’t expect our volunteer doulas would stick with the program for long if I did.
Doulas are supposed to empower women and their families. How do give-aways, in which the expectant mother is cast in the role of helpless victim of circumstance, send a message of empowerment? Is any doula program truly free? Of course not! Lots of people (or, in some cases, a few) are working really hard to make it happen. Let’s be realistic here. Everyone should do their share to contribute. And if they truly can’t, then we give, with the hope that someday they will be in a position to pay it forward.
How has your doula program provided an opportunity for clients to do a payback?
The Doula Programs blog provides a forum for doula program visionaries and implementers to consider common challenges, ask questions, and learn from each other. Patty Brennan is the author of The Doula Business Guide: Creating a Successful MotherBaby Business.
Birth & Parenting News: Induction & Prematurity
As more and more women are bypassing Mother Nature and having their labors medically induced, we are seeing a corresponding increase in premature babies. March of Dimes, a long-time champion for the prevention of prematurity, has noted this alarming trend, along with other consumer health care advocacy groups. Some new tools are available for both consumer and hospital/care provider groups.
Increasing Obstetrical Interventions Linked to Increase in Singleton Preterm Birth Rates
When researchers examined the relationship between obstetrical intervention and preterm birth in the U.S. between 1991 and 2006 they found that the percentage of singleton preterm births had increased 13%. The cesarean delivery rate for singleton preterm births increased 47%, and the rate of induced labor doubled. The study authors estimated that 42% of singleton preterm infants were delivered via induction or cesarean birth without spontaneous onset of labor and, consequently, are urging the public health community to play a central role in reducing unnecessary interventions. Read more.
March of Dimes Toolkit on Elective Deliveries
In an effort to reduce the number of premature deliveries nationally, the March of Dimes has created a quality improvement toolkit for hospitals. “Elimination of Non-Medically Indicated (Elective) Deliveries Before 39 Weeks Gestational Age” includes a comprehensive literature review, a step-by-step guide to assist hospital leaders with implementation efforts, and a guide for measuring quality improvement effectiveness over time. This is in addition to educational tools for clinicians and staff, appendices that include sample forms, and hospital case studies. Read more. Download the Toolkit.
Elective Induction?
The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality provides a guide to help women make an informed decision about elective induction. Check out Thinking About Inducing Your Labor? A Guide for Pregnant Women.
Birth & Parenting News Blog
Each Wednesday, we highlight the latest news items, research results, consumer alerts, and legislative action alerts of interest to expectant and new parents and the professionals who work them.
Doula Business Advisor: Abundance
What is your definition of Abundance?
If you are like most people, the first answer that comes to mind has to do with “more.” More money, more customers, more friends, more love, more recognition. Indeed, in my view, these are all good things. Recently, however, I heard this definition of abundance: “Abundance is a spiritual concept and understanding of the limitlessness of it all. Abundance is present in the universe. It is not a place, it is a process.”
Another speaker provided this metaphor: Take an apple and cut it open. Can you count the number of seeds in the apple? (Answer: of course you can.) Now consider this: Can you count the number of apples in the seed?
More and more lately, I am cultivating abundance in my life, a sense of unlimited possibilities. If we want success in business, we must start with examining our thoughts and beliefs about what is possible.
The Doula Business Advisor blog is designed to support the establishment and long-term sustainability of private doula businesses. Patty Brennan is the author of The Doula Business Guide: Creating a Successful MotherBaby Business.
Doula Programs: Free Grant Writing Resource Guide
When it comes to grant writing, a little planning goes a long way. Funding cycles through most foundations are annual or bi-annual. For those, such as March of Dimes, grant seekers have one chance to make a favorable impression or risk waiting another full year.
Actually, it is likely to be more than a year. For example, March of Dimes will put out a Request for Proposals (known as a “RFP”) in February 2011. The first step of their process is to submit a Letter of Intent (according to instructions laid out in the RFP), typically due early May. By June, organizations submitting the most promising initiatives will be invited to submit a full proposal, due in early September. By the following January, funded proposals will receive a check for the 2012 grant cycle. If you are looking for major funding in 2011, you are already too late (though some foundations may have small or emergency grants available).
Start your Grants Calendar today by investigating the most promising funding sources for your initiative. Note their funding cycles, RFP release dates, and so on. Inquire whether or not they have a notification list so that reminders will arrive in your email. Grant planning is a fair amount of work. The quick turn-around is possible (maybe), but very stressful, and not the way to go for those of you who are new to the process. Competitive proposals are ones that are well thought out, with demonstrated support (via “Letters of Support”) in the community.
Center for the Childbearing Year offers a free Grant Writing Resource Guide to help with your search. Just click on our “Free Get-Acquainted Sample Pack” on the homepage and opt-in.
The Doula Programs blog provides a forum for doula program visionaries and implementers to consider common challenges, ask questions, and learn from each other.