Dr. Rinki Varindani Desai is a digital health consultant who helps health tech founders and teams move from innovation to adoption, drawing on 15 years as a speech language pathologist, healthcare leader, and educator. She founded Theratactix, cofounded STEP (the Swallowing Training and Education Portal), a seven-figure online education platform for SLPs, and still teaches and contributes to research at Mass General Brigham in Boston.

Rinki shares how becoming a mom pushed her out of full-time clinical work in 2023 and into independent consulting. Her network turned 20 replies into paying projects, and she grew from her first bad-fit client to her first $15K month while working around her son’s schedule. If you’re an experienced professional wondering whether your expertise can become a flexible consulting career, this episode is for you.

Timeline Summary

[0:19] – Laura introduces Dr. Rinki Varindani Desai, health tech consultant, 15-year SLP, and cofounder of a seven-figure education platform

[1:40] – Why becoming a mom forced Rinki to change how she used her healthcare expertise

[2:44] – Creating her LLC on LegalZoom during a late-night feeding with no roadmap for what came next

[3:02] – Why her tech friends told her to stop chasing product management and lean into her clinical lived experience

[3:58] – How a free mentorship program for women helped her see her existing business as stable cash flow

[4:18] – Discovering consulting on YouTube and realizing she could work 10 to 15 hours a week as an expert

[4:58] – The innovation-to-adoption gap in digital health and why founders miss real clinical workflows

[5:47] – Reaching out to her network during nap time: 20 replies, with over half becoming projects in six months

[7:41] – Turning down misaligned founders and insurance companies to focus on mission-aligned health tech clients

[8:29] – Building a consulting business while earning a doctorate, raising a baby, and running a two-person company

[11:40] – Being the first woman in her family to work and wondering if her son will be proud of her

[14:09] – Why her first client was a bad fit and how failing forward led to a clear niche and offer

[15:25] – Hitting her first $15K month and what it means to finally choose who you work with

[18:00] – Why she shelved plans to launch a podcast after Laura asked if it aligned with her goals

[19:44] – Feeling like she didn’t belong while giving a keynote to health tech founders on her market readiness framework

[21:59] – The case for a portfolio career and why you don’t have to tie your identity to one role

5 Key Takeaways

1. Your Lived Experience Is the Asset — Rinki almost walked away from 15 years of frontline clinical knowledge to become a product manager. Consulting let her sell that experience directly to the companies that need it most.
2. Start With the Network You Have — She didn’t run ads or build a funnel. She reached out to people she already knew, got 20 responses, and turned more than half into consulting projects within six months.
3. Alignment Beats Any Paycheck — Her first client wanted her for sales and her network, not her expertise. Saying no to founders chasing trends made room for mission-aligned work that actually moves patient outcomes.
4. Design Your Business Around Your Season — Rinki built her consulting practice around nap times and her son’s first three years. Growth doesn’t have to mean hustle culture, and you get to decide what you’re up for right now.
5. You Don’t Need One Identity — You can be a clinician, consultant, educator, entrepreneur, and mom in different rooms. A portfolio career lets your expertise flow into different vessels without boxing you in.

Links & Resources

• Dr. Rinki Varindani Desai — https://rinkislp.com
• The Expert Freedom community with Laura Meyer — https://getexpert.com

Enjoyed This Episode?

If Rinki’s story of turning nap-time outreach into a $15K month made you think of someone who’s ready to make the leap, send this episode to her. Follow The Expert Freedom Show so you never miss a conversation, and leave a rating and review to help more experts find their path to consulting.

Laura Meyer, host of The Expert Freedom Show, built her advisory business by narrowing a broad background in marketing, sales and branding down to one offer: sales process optimization that helps clients make more money from leads they already have. She now works with nonprofits and for-profit companies in just a few hours a week per client, and she teaches experienced women how to turn their professional expertise into a freedom first consulting business.

In this solo episode, Laura explains why experts with 15 to 25 years of experience struggle to package an offer, the difference between a vitamin offer and a painkiller offer, and the five obstacles that keep a consulting offer from selling. If you’re a mid-career professional who feels like a generalist and can’t decide which slice of your background to lead with, this episode is for you.

Timeline Summary

[0:26] – Laura introduces The Expert Freedom Show and who it’s for: women turning professional experience into a business

[0:54] – Why experts with 15 to 25 years of experience try to cram everything they know into one offer

[1:16] – The carrot cake analogy: your raw expertise needs to be baked into a specific offer people crave

[2:24] – Laura’s early years as the “raw carrot,” saying yes to tasks instead of the strategy work she wanted

[3:15] – Why being good at many things is often the exact reason a consulting business stops growing

[5:17] – A student with two decades in banking, tech and operations who felt she had nothing specific to sell

[6:12] – Vitamin offers vs. painkiller offers, and why buyers will pay 3x for immediate pain relief

[8:25] – A quick exercise: write down the last three things a boss or client complimented you for

[9:09] – How Laura narrowed down to sales process optimization and became known for one outcome

[11:10] – Obstacle 1: a vague who and a vague what. Why one of them must be hyper specific

[12:18] – Obstacle 2: jargon like “operational excellence” that confuses buyers into saying no

[13:15] – Obstacle 3: the everything offer. Lead with your juiciest 10% and let the rest show up in delivery

[13:36] – Obstacle 4: waiting to say it perfectly. Why enthusiasm sells more than polish

[14:25] – Obstacle 5: the curse of knowledge makes your most valuable skill feel too easy to charge for

[16:31] – Niche clarity comes from reps, not research: Rinky lands six med tech clients from six discovery calls

[19:08] – Laura’s homework: ask three people in your target market what they’d call you to fix in an emergency

5 Key Takeaways

1. Lead With a Painkiller Offer — Buyers pay a premium to solve an urgent problem, not for a nice to have. Your painkiller offer may only be 10% of what you know, and that’s exactly the point.
2. Range Is Delivered, Not Sold — Your full breadth of experience still shows up when you serve the client. It just shouldn’t be the thing you lead with in the market.
3. Make Your Who or Your What Specific — If both your audience and your outcome are vague, you don’t have a painkiller offer. Pick one to make hyper specific, but not both when you’re starting out.
4. Your Easiest Skill Is Probably Your Offer — The curse of knowledge hides the expertise you use on autopilot. If people keep coming to you for something you think is no big deal, that’s a signal.
5. Clarity Comes From Conversations — More research and journaling won’t define your niche. Your first handful of sales conversations with real potential clients will teach you more than months of planning.

Links & Resources

• Laura’s free Offer GPT: https://go.getexpertfreedom.com/consulting-offer-explorer-gpt/?utm_source=podcast&utm_campaign=expert_freedom_show&utm_content=EP006

Enjoyed This Episode?

If the raw carrot analogy made you rethink how you’re packaging your own experience, send this episode to the expert in your life who’s too good to stay where she is much longer. Then follow The Expert Freedom Show and leave a rating and review so more women can find it.

The question I get asked more than any other is, how do I actually get clients? Do I post everywhere, become a LinkedIn influencer, stand on a street corner with balloons? In this episode I’m going to encourage you to do none of that, because there are three simple ways to land your first clients using the relationships and networks you probably already have.

I’ll walk you through the Dream 100, win win referral partnerships, and the Beta Client Blueprint we teach inside Expert Freedom for reaching your first $5K to $10K a month without an audience. If you’ve been doing all the right things online and still aren’t getting hired, this one is for you.

Timeline Summary

[0:00] – Cold open: why referral clients are the only ones worth your time, and how CEOs really hire

[1:05] – You’re doing the right things to get clients, just in the wrong order

[2:47] – Fear of being judged pushes new experts toward cold audiences, who are harder to sell and close

[4:03] – Visibility and an expert brand come later; a new business survives on cash flow first

[5:00] – Strategy one: the Dream 100, born when Chet Holmes applied the 80/20 rule to his sales list

[6:06] – How to build your own Dream 100 and focus on proximity to the right 100 buyers

[6:50] – A student lands a five location hair salon on the spot at a networking event

[8:16] – Strategy two: win win relationships with fractional CFOs, ops leads, and financial advisors

[9:17] – Why referred clients close faster, stay longer, and spend more than cold leads

[11:10] – Going for quick wins while building for the long term, plus the 30 Days to Clients guide

[11:52] – Strategy three: the Beta Client Blueprint for your first $5K to $10K a month with no audience

[12:33] – The give and the ask: discounted services in exchange for a case study or testimonial

[13:30] – Your first offer is not your scale offer, and getting on the field is how you find out

[14:41] – New to business, not new to your expertise: the unfair advantage of trusted relationships

[16:43] – The best sales skill is an offer so valuable that mentioning it is enough

[17:32] – Putting all three strategies together, and why none of it requires an audience

5 Key Takeaways

1. Right Strategies, Wrong Order. Posting, building a brand, and growing an audience all work, but they come after your first clients, not before. Cash flow keeps a new business alive long enough to do the visible stuff later.
2. Build Your Dream 100. List the 100 organizations or people you’d be the best fit to serve, then focus on getting in proximity to them. Being in front of the right 100 beats virality to 200,000 strangers who would never hire you.
3. Referral Partners Close Faster. The fractional CFO, ops director, or financial advisor already talking to your ideal client can send you work that arrives pre trusted. Those clients close quicker, stay longer, and spend more.
4. Give Before You Ask. Early on you don’t have case studies or testimonials, so offer slightly discounted services to your network in exchange for one. That’s the Beta Client Blueprint, and it’s how you reach $5K to $10K a month without an audience.
5. Your First Clients Are in Your Network. The people who already know, like, and trust you would rather hire a trusted resource than a stranger online. You’re new to business, not new to your expertise.

Links:
30daystoclients.com/?utm_source=podcast&utm_campaign=expert_freedom_show&utm_content=EP005

Enjoyed This Episode?

If the Dream 100 or the Beta Client Blueprint gave you a clearer path to your first clients, you probably know another expert who’s still posting into the void waiting for the algorithm. Send this episode to her. And if you’re getting value from the show, follow it, rate it, and leave a review so more experts can find it.