NDIS plan management marketing: connect with participants
Getting Started in NDIS Plan Management: Connect with Participants
By Clickability and LanternPay · Originally published 1 February 2021
Make the service promise specific enough to be checked
Explain what participants can expect when they ask about an invoice, need a budget update or want to change how they contact you. Avoid broad claims such as “fast payment” unless you can explain the conditions and deliver them. A participant should be able to compare your actual service without needing to decode marketing language.
This series is co-written by Clickability and LanternPay. For more information on Clickability, or for more helpful guides just like this one, visit www.clickability.com.au. For more information on LanternPay and its claim payments platform, visit its website.
With all the different puzzle pieces now placed together, you can turn your attention to the main reason you began a Plan Management service: helping clients! And to do this, you obviously need to find and win clients to support.
In our last post, we’ll explore the different avenues you can use to market your business and find clients – and make it easy for them to find you.
Your key message
Now that you’ve identified your business’s attributes, you can develop your key message to market to participants. Whatever you choose, ensure that you keep it simple. For instance, your key message might be
personalised service
fast provider payment
technology first
client-centric experience
one-stop shop for participants.
This message will influence potential clients’ first impressions, so be patient and think about what matters most to them. Again, it’s important to test this with actual participants! Assumptions make for a foolhardy game.
Build your profile
With your key message determined, begin building your profile so that you can be easily found by participants – and then figure out which channels you’ll use to market your business.
First up, create a website and sell your key messages on it. Buy a domain (it looks professional!) and use that same format to set up appropriate email addresses. An @gmail address just doesn’t look as cool; trust us, participants notice these things.
Then, it’s time to make your business known! Set up LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts where appropriate, and backlink to your new website. Go forth into the social world and join relevant groups and follow/like other accounts (like the NDIS).
You can also build a profile on specialist NDIS marketplaces like Clickability, which participants use to find rated and reviewed services. You can customise your details to reflect where you offer your service and how people can access your services, and also gather reviews!
Government resources
Once you’ve built your profile, you need to ensure your details are up to date on the available Government-backed resources. It’s easy, simple, and helps build your presence where it counts most.
[Clickability update, October 2026: Networking must not steer participants through undisclosed interests. Use current NDIA conflict-of-interest guidance and preserve the person’s choice of services.]
Networking
Unsurprisingly, networking plays an essential part in building your business, with referrals being a common way for participants to find and connect with services. It’s important to develop a good relationship with these types of referrers.
For example, locate your Local Area Coordinator (LAC), Early Childhood Partner and Support Coordinators in your chosen area. They are responsible for ensuring a participant’s plan is implemented correctly; get to know them, as they might refer participants to your service.
It’s also worthwhile finding local providers in your area, too. You’ll likely be paying their invoices. To find such providers, you can use the NDIS Find a Registered Provider page.
[Clickability update, October 2026: Collecting a contact is not automatically marketing consent. ACMA’s current commercial-message guidance covers consent, sender identification and unsubscribe requirements.]
Marketing
After you’ve built your profile and developed good relationships amongst your network, you can then engage in different types of marketing. This might include traditional marketing or digital marketing, whichever you prefer.
If you’re interested in traditional marketing, it’s worth signing up for the various expos. Check out the Social Impact Institute’s list of expos for some of the big ones. You can even get a stall for the duration of the expo.
For expos and similar events, be sure to produce marketing collateral, including business cards and flyers. Adobe is industry standard for designing such collateral, but you can also use free graphic design tools like Canva. If you want someone else to do it, hire a freelancer on Upwork and they’ll do the job for you! For printing, Vistaprint is a good place to start.
But now more than ever, digital marketing is becoming an incredibly efficient way to market your business. Email should be your priority. Mailchimp and Vision6 are regularly used in the disability sector and give you a lot of flexibility when designing templates and creating email lists. Put a signup form to your email list on your website or get people to sign up when you’re at an expo and you’ll be able to email them updates and more.
And lastly, explore Facebook Ads and Google Ads to reach new audiences. On Facebook, you can create an audience of people with related interests and push ads to them for a price; on Google, you can pay to appear in people’s search results. Both are good options, with different benefits and results, so investigate to see which is better for you.
What’s next?
Deliver your quality service to participants! Your role is a vital one, giving participants a fighting chance to achieve their NDIS goals. Support them in handling the administrative burden of their NDIS Plan, so they can live the lives that they want to live, how they want to live them.
Use the marketing message to ask practical questions
Ask what the promise means for you: how you see your budget, how an invoice query is resolved and who responds when something is wrong. Check whether a suggested provider has a financial or personal connection to the plan manager.
Compare plan management services by the way they handle your actual needs. The NDIA’s plan-management guidance provides a starting point for questions about roles and conflicts. A referral is an option, not an obligation to buy another service.
Questions readers ask
Can I add everyone I meet at an expo to a marketing list?
A meeting does not automatically establish consent. Follow current commercial-message rules. Official guidance
Does a referral relationship remove the participant’s choice?
No. Conflicts must be managed and the participant’s choice respected. Official guidance
Find a plan manager whose service you can understand
Use Clickability to describe what you need from plan management. Compare reviewed and rated profiles and ask how each provider handles budgets, invoices and questions.
