choice magazine - july 2015 marketing article

QUANTUM BUSINESS MASTERY TRANSACTIONAL VS. TRANSFORMATIONAL COACHING FROM ESSENCE

VOLUME 13 NUMBER 2www.chOicE-ONLiNE.cOM

Fuel Your Business Vision

Find Your Calling

Overcome Self-Saboteurs

BE the Coach in Your Marketing

Business BuilderEverything you need to steer your course toward success

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choice_v13n2_1_11_final.indd 1 2015-06-24 11:24 PM

VOLUME 13 NUMBER 2 20

Business is a ChoiceChoose to steer your course toward success

Welcome to our annual business builder issue, supporting the coaching profession, one coach at a time. This robust issue gives the real take-home advice on how to be the best coach, attract your best clients, create a profitable business, get more organized, face your technology fears, where to go for answers, best resources and everything you need to know to have a happy coaching life.



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Feature

hether youre a new coach or have been in business for years, you work hard

to get new clients. For some this pro-cess is easy, but for others it feels like an uphill battle. My work with vari-ous coaches and small business own-ers has allowed me to understand, more and more, the key barriers to get-ting new clients. I would like to share those with you, and offer you some tips on how to make it easier to get new clients and grow your business.

Problem 1 Your mojo doesnt match your marketingMojo is what makes each of us unique. Its our own brand of energy, creativity, voice and mission. Its the fire that motivates us to be a coach, and its what distinguishes us from everyone else. Many business owners arent getting the clients they want because theyre too busy blending in,

or theyre using marketing methods that are out of alignment with who they are. When this happens, the clients dont bite, the business owner gets frustrated and either gives up on marketing or keeps going but shows frustration, which turns off prospects.

Solution Bring your personality into your marketing As a coach, you are your brand. Yet I talk to countless coaches who dont even have a photo of themselves on their homepage, let alone any-

where on their website! Make yourself visible in everything you do. Whether its a photo or a video, if you dont have at least one image of yourself on your homepage, put that up now. Then, you can begin to think about whether the overall branding (logo, colors, mes-saging) of your business reflects who you are now, and what youre about.

More importantly, consider whether your marketing strategies allow you to powerfully showcase your exper-tise, or just check a box.

Problem 2 Youre working hard, but not focusedAnother key problem I see is coaches who want more clients, but instead of focusing on revenue-generating activi-ties, are trying to do every marketing activity that exists. Even worse, theyre writing a book and developing a pro-gram when they have only one client.

One of my favorite clients, before

From Marketing Struggle to Business Success5 mindset shifts to get more clientsBy Heather Markel, CPC, ACC

W When you go to networking events, connect with people you find interesting, and follow up.



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we started, was paying a social media expert. I asked her how many clients she was getting in exchange for pay-ing this expert. Her answer: none.

Solution Focus on revenue-generating activities. The key is to focus on activities that have an immediate impact on getting clients. A book might get you clients when its done, in a year (or three), but not today. Networking, calling and speaking, however, put you in front of your target audience and position you

to immediately begin sales discussions. My aforementioned client stopped

paying her social media expert, and after we realigned her focus on rev-enue generating activities, she got six clients in four months. Focus is a powerful business tool.

Problem 3 Youre afraid to make phone calls or ask for clients. Instead of picking up the phone, you rationalize why calling is too pushy and invasive. You send emails, and hope for referrals, but youre still not making enough money to make ends meet. Everyone is busy, and no one reads all of their emails. So relying on email alone is a guarantee that you wont be heard or seen.

Solution Ask for business. I know that sales can conjure up negative images like a used car sales-

man or a forceful makeup counter employee making you feel insecure about the bags under your eyes. Ag-gressive and manipulative are simply methods. They do not have to be your approach.

I love helping my clients tap into their unique style of selling. At the end of the day, our role as coaches is to help our clients succeed, in the way they define success. If you base the start of any relationship on genuine interest, it dramatically shifts the selling process.

From now on, when you go to net-working events, connect with peo-ple you find interesting, and follow up. When you meet them (because you called to set up the appoint-ment), learn more about what they do and look for the problems they have. Offer solutions to those prob-lems. Youll be amazed how offering solutions can lead effortlessly to sales conversations.

Relying on email alone is a guarantee that you wont be heard or seen.



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Problem 4 You link your fees to time rather than value. You can be great at asking for clients, but when it comes to asking for money, you choke. Worse yet, when you state prices by the hour, you open the door to a negotiation.

That causes you to lower your rates to the point that you show up to ses-sions feeling devalued. This ultimately impacts your performance and causes your clients to stop showing up to sessions because they arent receiving your best.

Solution Increase your value. Its important to remember that your clients are paying for a transforma-tion, not an hour. Focus your pricing discussions on the value you bring, and the results each person should ex-pect to walk away with, and how long (months) that takes. Remember, for every hour of coaching you provide, you also do prep work in advance, and follow-up activities afterwards. Be willing to say no to prospects that want to negotiate your prices instead of a payment plan. Invest in a busi-ness coach to confront your own fear of investing in your success, so you can be better positioned to handle price objections.

Problem 5 You dont have a money plan. You say you have a business, but you have no idea of your income and ex-penses. Money is a moving target, and though you know youd like to make $100,000 a year, you havent consid-ered what that means to your busi-ness strategy, so it remains a number you never obtain.

Solution Track and target your money. Waveapps and QuickBooks are two great resources to track your money. If youre not already using one, start to-day. At the very least, take out a piece of paper right now. On that piece of paper, write down how much money you want to earn from coaching in the next 12 months. Divide that number by 12. You now have your monthly revenue target.

Now, think about how much you charge for your services. Write down how many paying clients you need to reach your monthly money target. Using the $100,000 example above, that would be $8,333 a month. If you

charge $500 per month, youd need 16 clients every month to hit that target. Now you can begin to understand how to develop a strategy to get those cli-ents, or shift your mindset to do some-thing radical, like raising your prices.

Owning a business takes work, theres no way around that. But if you align that work with your personality, and take focused action towards your goals, there is no reason you cant get more clients and have a blossoming business.

Resources:

Waveappps www.waveapps.com

QuickBooks www.quickbooks.com

The key is to focus on activities that have an immediate impact on getting clients.

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choice magazine - july 2015 marketing article

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