Today we’d like to introduce you to John Silver, PhD.
Dr. Silver, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
FREE SEX THERAPY! That was how my psychotherapy practice was listed on AOL if you were on the Information Superhighway in 1995 searching for “Therapy in Los Angeles.” Thus, began my trip through Cyberspace 20 years ago.
I had just sold my business The Counseling Center of West Los Angeles that I had started in 1979 and was looking for a new challenge. I had been running my business as a Private Practice I called Counseling Until Midnight since I stay up all night and have found that we are most successful in business when we do what we like to do.
I turned to the “Information Superhighway” to spread the good word, driving up the on ramp at snail-like speeds with a personal computer, Windows 3.1 and a dial-up modem. My little old computer brought back memories of 20 years before while working at the RAND Corporation where we did some of the early work in the integration of computers and psychology. In those days, computers took up entire walls and the Internet was called the Arpanet and was used to link the government and universities together (in case of nuclear attack). In 1991 the Arpanet became the World Wide Web (or the Wild Wild Web as it was called) and was accessible by anyone with a personal computer and a telephone line.
Webcams were not in use yet and Internet pages took sometimes 2 minutes to load. Communication was by email and chat (Instant Messages they were called). There would be no Skype until 2003. I decided to use the World Wide Web as a vehicle to reach out and help more people than I could in a little psychotherapy office. I learned about the new Internet and taught myself how to build and code websites for maximum exposure (now called Search Engine Optimization or SEO). In designing my website, I thought free email advice was a good advertising shtick. One of my certifications was as a Sex Therapist. AOL (the main Internet Service Provider (ISP) and search engine at the time) serendipitously combined Free Email Advice with Sex Therapist on my Website, resulting in search results as FREE SEX THERAPY.
That fortuitous blooper shot me to the top of search engines having to do with Psychotherapy, Los Angeles, etc. I parlayed that into more exposure on the Web by getting listed on every Mental Health website and potential referral resources like Dr. Phil I could. I wrote articles like Learn about the Differences between Online Therapy and Office Counseling and included them on my Website. I was able to expand it further by answering hundreds of email questions from around the world.
Since “Counseling Until Midnight” was still coming up in search results, I attached Online Therapy to the name and became “Online Therapy and Counseling Until Midnight”. It took about 2 years of intensive work doing SEO and website composition to solidify my position in relevant search results. Cable Internet and Skype had evolved so that Webconferencing was now available, though the audio and video were primitive at best.
As a result of my efforts to monitor my traffic and fine tune my Web Optimization tactics, my practice had migrated back to the top of most searches for Online Therapy, Los Angeles, Night Hours, Psychotherapy, etc. I had begun during the Wild West of Online Therapy, evolved with the times and now was practicing the Art and Science of Telemedicine and had a portable business I can take anywhere when I semi-retire, as I am doing now.
Has it been a smooth road?
Besides the evolution and changes any small business goes through in 40 years, similar to child development from conception, keeping it alive in it’s infancy, shepherding it through it’s slow growth childhood, taking risks of expansion in its adolescence, stability in adulthood and declining in old age like during semi-retirement, practicing quality and ethical Psychotherapy is a process of continual education, training, experience and personal awareness as evidenced in the re-licensing of 36 units of Continuing Education every two years and the requirement that one has to disclose any violations of the law or a complaints to Ethical/Legal boards and organization. Evolving changes in society, politics and medicine need to be adapted to. The nature of the work itself, probing the depths of the psyche is challenging.
Listening to traumatic experiences has to be compensated for through self-care. One’s personal evolution effects one’s work in terms of counter-transference and how that effects the therapeutic relationship. Sharing some of the worst (and best) things people can do to one another has effects on us needs to be processed.
We’d love to hear more about your business.
“Online Therapy and Counseling Until Midnight, Directed by Dr. John Silver, offers Board Certified Online Therapy, AASECT Certified Sex Counseling, Licensed Marriage, Family and Child Therapy, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Modern Psychoanalysis. We have been in the Private Practice of Psychotherapy here in Los Angeles for over 35 years and Certified Online Therapy for over 20 years where we do Online Counseling Locally, Nationally and Internationally at Doxy.Me/DrJohnSilver.
We have provided International TeleMentalHealth to people around the world, including Russia, China, Afghanistan, Brazil, the UK, the Middle East, the Caribbean, Canada to name a few.
We have always offered a Free Phone, Office or Video Consultation, Private, Secure, Encrypted HIPAA Compliant Online Offices and are available from 3PM until Midnight, PDT, Mondays through Saturdays for Same Day Appointments. We are Listed in Who’s Who in Mental Health on the Web, are Clinical Members of numerous International and National TeleMedicine Professional Associations were given the 2015 Los Angeles Award for Counseling Services and our Credentials have been Verified by World Information Networks, LLC., Online-Therapy.Com and Psychology Today.
Contact Info:
- Address: 2100 Sawtelle Blvd., Suite #204,
Los Angeles, CA 90025 - Website: DrJohnSilver.Com
- Phone: (310) 268-8282
- Email: [email protected]
Getting in touch: VoyageLA is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
