Have you taken the time to consider what your hourly rate would be for the time you’re dedicating to your birth doula clients? In a recent Facebook Group post for students of Birth Arts International, founder Demetria Clark offered the following example:

If you charge $400 per birth, this is a simple breakdown to consider:

Time with parents – 5 hours (prenatals and phone calls)
Time at birth – 10 hours (sometimes much longer, sometimes much shorter, but 10 is a midline average).

New subscribers to the Inspired Birth Pro updates receive an email requesting their burning business questions. I’ve compiled the list of questions over the years, and I’ve started posting them on Facebook, because honestly, I don’t have all the answers! I also learn from other birth pros, so I really appreciate it when fans take the time to share their wisdom.

If you have not liked the IBP Facebook page yet (and you should!), I’m going to start compiling the questions and responses into a blog post, along with the link to the question, in case you want to add to the conversation.

At a Twitter DoulaParty about a week ago, I heard about some informative YouTube videos for doulas and childbirth educators recorded by Janice Banther. There are 13 videos so far on Janice’s YouTube channel, ranging in length from 2-11 minutes in length. Learn some tricks to getting doctors to sign off on your evaluations, how to schedule doula clients, and how to help clients during birth in a variety of situations.

I’ve been listening to audio recordings of brilliant coaches I’ve discovered over the past month. As I listen to these recordings, I jot down Powerful Questions that I hear. These shift-creating, perspective-changing questions not only help me serve my coaching clients more effectively. They have also had a profound impact on my business and personal life.

One Powerful Question I’d like to share with you is this:

After my own dark season of hibernation over the past few months, I finally feel ready to shift into a new phase of my coaching business with Inspired Birth Pro. I’m considering it a re-birth.

I had a pleasant surprise in my inbox today. I received the latest newsletter for childbirth professionals from my friends at Natural Baby Pros (you are a member there too, aren’t you?), and part of the heading caught my eye – “…Don’t Make the Same Mistakes in Your Business as…” So I clicked on it and scrolled down, and lo and behold, the Biz Tip of the the month was from ME!

Many birth professionals wear more than one hat. Part of that comes from the love we have of birth, breastfeeding, early parenting, and other related areas. Sometimes it comes out of the necessity to bring in more income.

Here is a a question I received about a month ago from Val Peterson of Birthday with Val: I love being a doula!! I would have to say that the most challenging area for me with this work is the financial consistency aspect

Balancing your home life while building your birth business takes practice and experimentation. Many birth professionals are also mothers of young children, and much of the work we do managing our businesses is at home while we’re also mothering and running the household. As business owners, how do we make time for it all?

It helps to be really clear about who you want to serve with your birth business. If you are just starting out, you may have to take a guess for now and adjust your ideal client profile as you gain experience. What’s wonderful, though, about having your own practice is that you make changes at any time!