Archive for July, 2010

Do Your Next Coaching Clients Want What You’re Offering Them?

I know you know what your current coaching clients want. But do you know what your prospects want? There’s a difference. Discovering exactly what prospects want from you is the key to enrolling lots of clients easily.

an offer with no takersSo many coaches miss this, because they already know what they’re selling – their coaching services. It’s a natural way to think, but it’s also a classic marketing mistake. They try to sell coaching as the solution before they’ve even asked what the prospect sees as the problem.

You have a profound appreciation of the power of coaching, and that’s essential. But if it leads you to try to sell coaching, you may be setting yourself up for poor results. The basic law of the marketplace is supply and demand. You can supply all you want of something you think has value, but if there is no demand for it, it won’t sell.

That’s why established businesses do research before they launch a new product. I realize “market research” sounds pretty off-putting – technical, boring, expensive. But at its core, it’s just listening to people to find out what they want. What could be more coach-like than that?

I call this “listening to your market” – and you have everything you need to start doing it. To prove it, try these steps:

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How to Be Influential in Your Coaching Niche

Influence is a new watchword in the world of client attraction. It turns out that being influential is not about knowing it all, having all the answers or being right. It starts with getting meaningful conversations going with the people you serve. Coaches are good at this, so I invite you to apply this with your niche market for 90 days and see what happens.

be influential with your coaching niche

Recently, a company called ThoughtLead offered “the shortest marketing conference ever”. The Influencer Project featured 60 thought leaders who offered sixty seconds worth of their best advice on how to increase your influence online. I’m impressed with the creative way that ThoughtLead offered value, started a meaningful conversation and built more influence with their market.

Six Tips to Build Influence With Your Coaching Niche

Here are six influence tips that you might not have thought of before. The first two are social media tips. The last four tips have a common theme weaving through them. Did you catch it?

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3 Ways to Find Courage for Your Coaching Business

It takes ample courage to be an entrepreneurial coach. There are critical decisions to make for your coaching business, such as choosing your niche or hiring a virtual assistant. Every day you get up the gumption to connect with prospects and enroll coaching clients. And there are so many learning curves to ascend.

Here are three ways to raise courage on demand, for all the leaps you need to take as you build your coaching business.

finding courage for your coaching business

1. Realize That You’re in Good Company

There are millions of intrepid coaches and other business owners who have traveled this path before you. They have done and are doing exactly what you’re attempting now. And they felt just as spazzy about it as you feel now. But they did it, and thrived.

Tap into that collective fortitude. You can do it too! And you’ll not only live to do it again, you’ll become good at this (whatever it is that inspires fear today). Bank on it.

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Got Resilience?

There’s a vital business asset that almost never gets talked about, because it’s so hard to define. You could call it reserves, staying power, bandwidth – or resilience. Resilience is:

  • When your computer crashes, you know who to call to help you recover.
  • When your workshop doesn’t fill even though you worked hard to promote it, you focus on the lessons that will help you fill the next one.
  • When something just isn’t working, you get twice as interested in how to make it work.

resilience brings success

Whether you can define it or not, you can cultivate resilience. And you’ll be glad you did.

The Importance of Being Resilient

Almost everyone who starts their own business will get pushed to their limits, not once but many times. Face it, this stuff is hard. If it was easy, everyone would be doing it.

To a large extent, the ones who succeed will be the ones who are the most resilient – the ones who can go to their limit and find that they still have something more in reserve.

Life’s not fair, and some people have been given a stronger constitution than others. But as always, the more interesting part is the part that is in your control. What are you doing to build your resilience today?

Continue reading Got Resilience?

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    • COMMENTS

      COMMENTS

      • Barbara "Thank you for responding.  Yes, I'm still doing pro bono work. I have not taken this to the level where I'm getting paid.  You make a good point and although there are a vast number of women in this category, it does make me wonder if you're on the mark here. I was told to focus in on..." in response to How to Attract Clients in a More Coach-Like Way
      • Barbara "Wonderful article Rhonda.  I have been a "pro bono" coach for as long as I can remember.  I have gone through a program, hired and worked with a mentor coach, have a company and domain name,  business cards and a Pay Pal account.  Sounds great you might say!  Well, I haven't been able to take it..." in response to How to Attract Clients in a More Coach-Like Way
      • Angela "I truly truly credit you Rhonda with making me realize how incredibly important this is in business.  Now I run around telling everyone how much THEY need to do it!  Still working on my rebranding but it's coming together soon :) ..." in response to How to Attract Clients in a More Coach-Like Way