Why Group Practices Are Switching From Psychology Today
If you run a group practice, you're probably paying Psychology Today $29.95 per clinician per month. For a 10-therapist practice, that's $3,600 a year. For 20 therapists, $7,200.
The question group practice owners are asking in 2026: what are you getting for that money?
The Math Has Changed
We wrote about Psychology Today's broader decline recently, and the data is grim: profile views down as much as 94%, therapists reporting dramatically fewer inquiries, and a directory model that hasn't fundamentally evolved in over a decade.1
But for group practices, the problem is magnified. You're not paying for one listing. You're paying for 5, 10, 20, or more. And each of those listings is competing not just against therapists at other practices, but against your own clinicians. When a potential client searches your area on Psychology Today, they see a wall of individual profiles with no sense of which one might be right for them.
The cost per new client from Psychology Today has been climbing steadily:
If your 10-clinician practice spends $3,600/year and each clinician gets 2 new clients per year from PT (a generous estimate in 2026), that's $180 per new client acquired. Compared to:
- Google Business Profile: free
- Peer referrals: free
- Fit-based matching platforms like StartHere.care: free
- Content marketing: low cost, compounding returns over time
The ROI case for Psychology Today listings is hard to make for group practices.
What Group Practice Owners Are Saying
In therapist forums and Facebook groups, practice owners are increasingly vocal about the declining value:2
"I cancelled PT for my entire group practice after our analytics showed 3 total profile views across 8 clinicians in a month."
"We were paying $360/month for PT listings. I redirected that budget to Google Ads and got more new client inquiries in one week than PT generated in six months."
"The problem isn't just views. It's that PT sends unqualified leads. Clients who just clicked the first profile they saw, not clients who are actually a good fit for our clinicians."
That last point deserves emphasis. For group practices, referral quality matters as much as quantity. A bad-fit client who cycles through three of your clinicians before dropping out costs far more than the revenue from a few sessions.
The Group Practice Dilemma
Group practices face a unique version of the referral problem:
You need volume: multiple clinicians with varying caseload levels means you need a steady flow of new clients, not just occasional trickles.
You need distribution: it doesn't help if all the referrals go to one or two clinicians while others sit with empty slots.
You need fit: matching the right client to the right clinician in your practice is just as important as getting the client in the door. The wrong match leads to early termination, which is bad for the client and costly for the practice.
You need efficiency: as a practice owner, you're already wearing too many hats. Your referral system shouldn't require constant manual management.
Psychology Today solves for volume (poorly, and declining) but completely ignores distribution, fit, and efficiency.
What's Working Instead
The group practices with the healthiest referral pipelines share several characteristics:
Tired of paying for referrals that don't convert?
StartHere.care sends you clients matched on fit — not just zip code. No listing fees. No per-lead charges. No catch.
See How It Works1. Diversified Referral Sources
They don't depend on any single channel. A typical healthy mix looks like:
- 40% peer referrals from other therapists and healthcare providers
- 25% Google organic and Google Business Profile
- 20% fit-based matching platforms
- 15% direct (website, social media, word of mouth)
2. A Real Web Presence
A group practice website that ranks for local search terms ("anxiety therapist [your city]," "couples therapy near me") generates more qualified leads than any directory listing.
3. Structured Intake That Routes Clients
The best group practices have intake processes that assess client needs and match them to the right clinician internally, rather than hoping clients pick the right profile on a directory.
This is exactly what [StartHere.care](https://starthere.care/for-therapists) does, but at the front door. When a client comes through StartHere, they've already told us what they're looking for: their concerns, preferences, communication style, insurance, and availability. We match them to specific clinicians in your practice who align on those dimensions.
For group practice owners, this means:
- Better caseload distribution: referrals go to the clinicians who are the best fit AND have availability
- Higher client retention: matched clients are more likely to stay in therapy because the fit was right from the start
- Zero cost: no per-clinician fees, no per-lead charges, no monthly subscription. We're free because we're building something new and we need great practices on the platform.
4. Community Referral Networks
Group practices that invest in relationships with local psychiatrists, primary care physicians, school counselors, and community organizations get steady, high-quality referrals. These relationships take time to build but pay dividends for years.
Making the Switch
We're not saying to cancel Psychology Today tomorrow (though some practice owners already have). Here's a more measured approach:
Month 1: Audit your PT analytics. How many profile views did each clinician get last month? How many converted to inquiries? Calculate your actual cost per new client.
Month 2: Set up StartHere.care profiles for your clinicians. Optimize your Google Business Profile. Make sure your website is ranking for local therapy search terms.
Month 3: Compare lead quality and volume from your new channels vs. PT. If PT isn't pulling its weight, cancel the lowest-performing clinician listings first.
Month 4-6: Continue reducing PT spend as other channels pick up. Redirect the budget to what's actually working, whether that's Google Ads, content creation, or professional networking.
The Bigger Picture
The directory model served its purpose for a decade. But the practices that will thrive in the next decade are the ones that invest in fit-based referrals, connecting the right client with the right clinician, not just throwing names at a wall.
That's the shift StartHere.care is built around. We believe group practices deserve a referral platform that actually understands the matching problem, not one that just charges you to appear in alphabetical order.
Running a group practice? [Join StartHere.care](https://starthere.care/for-therapists). List your entire team for free and start receiving pre-matched client referrals.
Sources
- StartHere.care analysis of Psychology Today therapist forum discussions and reported profile analytics, 2025-2026. See our full breakdown.
- Anonymized quotes aggregated from therapist Facebook groups and professional forums, January-February 2026.