When you are communicating you must know who you are talking to and you must have a plan for what you are wanting to communicate. Give your target coaching niche the information the desire.
Continue Leave a Comment October 20, 2009
The biggest problem coaches have when they are starting out is deciding on and defining a target coaching niche. I had the same trouble because I thought if I narrowed my niche to a specific target then I would be eliminating too many people and it would be more difficult to get coaching clients.
You must narrow your niche to be able to reach and communicate with people effectively. When you have a strong interest or a passion for a particular group or niche then you are far more attractive to that group and you are better able to communicate effectively.
Turning a passion or a hobby into a vocation is a great way to determine a target coaching niche. Many people spend a lifetime working at a job that has nothing to do with the things they are passionate about. Your passion for your coaching niche is a very attractive component to a successful coaching business.
Accomplishments
Coaches forget to take into consideration all of their accomplishments especially when they are not education or work related. Perhaps you have done charity work in a specific field and excelled in that area.
Many people are superb at one aspect of their job but it is not an aspect that is praised or valued so they don’t realize how much they have accomplished. For example, leadership is an area that is seldom truly recognized or celebrated.
A good way to recognize your accomplishments as they relate to your potential niche is to examine the ways in which you have best served others. What ways have you been instrumental in helping others overcome challenges or reach their goals?
Gifts and Talents
This is another area where most coaches have one superior quality that they don’t recognize until they examine it closer. Most of us have a unique gift or talent that has been evident since we were children but often that gift or talent is not one that is acknowledge by society in a big or official way.
Many coaches are great listeners with huge compassion filled hearts. They seem to be the person in a group or in a family that everyone turns to for consultation of advice. This is often an unrecognized gift or talent. Perhaps you are a great writer and you have a way of inspiring others through your writing. You could be a great story teller and help others by relating your message through story.
Each of us has special gifts and talents as a person and as a coach and you will have the most success when you are able to use your gifts and talents to help those you coach.
Leave a Comment September 8, 2009
The hardest part about writing a great life coaching article each week is generating new article ideas so I have discovered several idea generating strategies. Sometimes an idea just enters my brain and screams to be written but that is the least common method of idea generation for me.
Get Coaching Clients with a Great Topic
Many times I come across a common problem that my coaching clients have and I address that issue. I know it is a common problem because I hear about it in many ways. Often I get questions on the same issue several times over a week or two. I see that people are talking about the problem when I am in a relevant forum or group.
I like to read articles and blog posts from other people in my target coaching niche to see what they are talking about and get ideas from that. I never duplicate another coaches' work but I do get ideas from reading their information. Sometimes those ideas are not related to the main topic but are sparked by a portion of the article or blog post.
I also like to
Leave a Comment July 25, 2009
The idea is to earn more money with less time and effort and to even earn passive income. Coaching is a demanding profession and is limited to some degree by the number of hours in a day and the amount of time you can coach. Essentially you are trading hours for money with one on one coaching.
I think it is important to add multiple streams of income and to mix up the activities in your business day because of the emotional toll from a long day of one on one coaching. You can add relief and variety to your work day and dramatically increase your earning power by creating coaching products.
Group coaching is one product that you can offer to increase your rate per hour. Group coaching has many advantages for you and for the clients. As a coach you are able to reach many more people when you add group coaching and you are able to earn more per hour of coaching.
Coaching clients can pay a lower rate for group coaching and they also benefit from the input of the collective group. There is an electricity and a wonderful group dynamic that is created when people who are trying to deal with similar issues, challenges and goals come together to find solutions. I feel the benefit for everyone increases with well done group coaching.
Leave a Comment June 25, 2009
I have decided not to be gentle in this article because too many coaches are sitting around doing the same thing they did a year ago and losing clients or not gaining more clients. Enough, this type of economic climate presents an interesting dichotomy because people are less likely to feel they can afford coaching yet this is a time when they probably need it the most!
What has happened in our economy is not good or bad it is what happened but it has a dramatic effect on most people in some way. I think our view of the world and the way things work has been forever altered. In other words, most of us will not look at our lives or finances in the same way we did four years ago. I think that is a good thing but the point is that there has been a shift in perspective and it has affected everyone!
More Need for Coaching
You can choose to sit back and say that you can't get new clients because people don't have the money for coaching or you can see that these changing times provide a great opportunity for coaches. Many people feel they are facing a lot of challenges some they have never faced before. That describes a person who could benefit from coaching and that means a potential client for you!
Leave a Comment May 22, 2009
Your job as a coach is to get your clients to take action and make changes in their thoughts, behavior, ideas that will lead them to greater fulfillment and happiness. We know that people make decisions based on emotion primarily and logic secondarily so to be effective at getting new coaching clients you must use emotionally charged language to encourage potential clients to become coaching clients with you.
There are some very basic emotions that motivate all people though they motivate each of us differently. Using words that appeal to these emotions will increase your ability to move potential coaching clients to take action and sign up for coaching with you.
Fear of Loss
Fear is one of the strongest and most basic human emotions because it helps us survive as a species. Appealing to the fear of something or the safety of something is a dynamic way to speak directly to the heart of an issue. You want to let the client know how your coaching will help them to overcome that fear. Words like protect, save, avoid, conquer, overcome, and safe address a person's fear of loss.
Greed or the Fear of Not Getting What You Want
This is a powerful emotion that can drive us to take action even to take inappropriate action. If people did not have greed or the need to get what they want few would take action to do much in their lives. So this emotion does serve a good purpose. Get, amass, proven, results, more, all, and everything are all words that appeal to the emotion of greed and motivate people to take action so they will get or not lose out.
Leave a Comment May 18, 2009
Marketing and advertising are not one in the same. Marketing is part of every aspect of your coaching business. Advertising is only one component of your marketing plan. Successful marketing required a well thought out plan and a marketing mindset.
Getting rich on the internet is possible but doing it overnight with little work is not the way it works. You have to set your intention on success and then follow through with consistent action.
Be determined to succeed
I would like for this or that to happen is not enough to succeed. You must be absolutely determined to accomplish your goals. You have to be absolutely resolved to succeed in your endeavor and in your marketing. Visualize what your success will look like and
Leave a Comment May 13, 2009
Choosing a
domain name for you blog is a key step in starting your blog and branding your
business. Branding your business means making you business consistently
identifiable and different from other coaching businesses in the same niche.
One way you can make your business identifiable is by choosing a great name and
a great domain.
Short, Long, My Name, Catchy, Key Words…?
Your domain
name should represent your niche and your business. The best domain names tell
the customer
Leave a Comment April 23, 2009
I can tell people all sorts of wonderful things
about my coaching and give them many reasons to coach and when I add a
testimonial from another person I give the statements credibility. When I add
several strong testimonials with website addresses and photos I give the
statements a lot more credibility.
If you do not have testimonials on your website you
are cheating yourself and your potential clients. You will get more clients
when they see that you have helped other people and those people want to tell
others about you and what you can do to help them. There are many ways to
Leave a Comment April 16, 2009
What is the single thing that will predict your success or lack of it? Is it the way your website looks, how perfect your promotional materials are, how perfectly you reach your target niche, or if you have just the right headset? Is it any of those things? No, it is just one simple thing…take action!
What I can gaurantee
I can guarantee that if you do not take action absolutely nothing will happen! You cannot wait until you have very thing is perfect to start taking action in your coaching business. You have to get out there and do the first things first and the second thing second. Just start by getting your blog up and writing in it every day. You don't have to write
Leave a Comment April 12, 2009
