“I know I need to narrow my niche, but I just don’t know how.”

This is actually a great sign. It means coaches understand that if you’re not getting the results you want with the niche you have, you probably need a narrower one.

A smaller niche will bring you more clients? That’s right. Not intuitive perhaps, but right.

But here’s the catch. Coaches may know they need to narrow, but most often they don’t want to give up what they’re doing, even when it feels fruitless. It’s scary to narrow your coaching niche, even when it’s not working for you.

Yet there comes a time when sticking with the status quo is worse than facing your fears. That’s when a reality check can help.

So, how can you be sure you need to narrow?

Signs of a Coaching Niche that Won’t Go the Distance

Here are some tell-tale signs of a fruitless niche:

1. You don’t know where to find the people you’re serving. You have no idea where your next 20 clients will come from.
2. You can’t connect with your prospects because you can’t get past their “gatekeepers”.
3. To get people to hire you, you almost always lower your fees.
4. Clients are staying for short stints – 1 to 3 months – and don’t come back.
5. You aren’t confident about what your prospects really want and will invest in.
6. You don’t know what actions to take that could get you clients.

I call this trying to build a business without aim. If you are not clear and specific about who you serve, what they want, and where to find them, your efforts are scattered. You’re not building on what you did before. You can’t gather momentum, so it feels like you’re always starting over.

The Upside of Narrow

You can reverse all six of those tell-tale danger signs with one scary, powerful decision. Choose a narrow, viable niche market, and dedicate your coaching business to championing that market. Then:

1. It’s easy to find the people you serve, because they naturally gather in groups. You can easily find out what your market reads, the associations they belong to, where to find them on social networking sites.
2. They love to connect with you, because they are seekers, and you have made yourself their champion.
3. Your clients willingly pay fees that compensate you well. They are motivated to invest in their personal and professional development, and you know how to offer that to them in language they will relate to.
4. Your clients help you promote your programs and refer pre-qualified clients often, because they share resources with the peers they are already connected with.
5. You are focused on a specific, self-identified group of people, so it’s easy to find out exactly what they care about enough to invest in.
6. You are always clear on the high payoff actions – the actions that will bring you clients – because you are always guided by what your market highly values.

Here’s the truth that is so often overlooked. There are plenty of clients in even the narrowest of niche markets to support a thriving coaching business. Those clients will still bring to coaching the same spectrum of issues that you would find with anyone else. And in general, the narrower the niche, the less competition there is for those clients.

How to Choose a Viable Coaching Niche

You know coaching sometimes calls for tough questions. So here’s one for you:

Do you feel that you’re on the right track with your coaching business?

If your answer is no (or a less-than-resounding yes), ask yourself this follow-up question:

Are you targeting a niche market that’s likely to “go the distance” and bring you a consistent flow of ideal clients who pay you well, stay with you a long time, and refer others?

For most coaches, the second question holds the answer to the first one. Get this one choice right, and you’ll lay the foundation for a satisfying coaching business for years to come.

If you’re ready to target a highly profitable niche that’s ideal for you, the best way is to join my Champion Your Ideal Coaching Market tele-workshop. We’ll meet for eight weeks, and work through five exercises that will help you:

• Identify viable markets that would be a good fit for you.
• Get clear internally so you can fully commit to one ideal coaching market.
• Learn exactly what your market cares about enough to invest in.
• Describe what you do in a way that is powerfully evocative for your market.
• Custom design your coaching programs to appeal to your market.

You can do this work on your own if you prefer. But I guarantee you’ll handle it quicker, more thoroughly and with more confidence working with other great coaches in a workshop setting. Join Us. It’s time.

SHARE YOUR COMMENTS ONLINE AT: 6 Signs That It’s Time to Narrow Your Coaching Niche

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• Test Your Coaching Niche – Will It Go the Distance?
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• What a Target Market Can Do For You That a Coaching Niche Can’t

But then there are people like Google CEO Eric Schmidt – the lead architect of the most successful business growth story in recent history. When asked to share the best business advice he ever received, he said “Everyone needs a coach.”

So, is coaching worth paying for? The answer seems to be: It depends on WHO you ask.

I think I know where you come out on this question, or you wouldn’t be staking your career on the power of coaching. But here’s my point:  Draw your clients from groups of people that believe coaching is worth the investment.

So how do you find and connect with those people? The answer may not be obvious, but it is straightforward.

Choose a Niche Market Full of Seekers

Certain groups of people, because of who they are, will readily invest in their own personal and professional development. Here are three examples of niche markets that are full of seekers:

• Mompreneurs know that adding a business to their list of responsibilities is a stretch, and they want help rising to the challenge.
• C-suite executives know they need allies to help them grow into the leader they want to be.
• Coaches too, are hungry to learn, grow and develop themselves in multiple ways.

The best way to find people who truly “get” the value of coaching is to focus on attracting a specific group of people that you know will invest in their own development.

Meet Them Where They Live

I know that you didn’t launch a coaching business so you could market. You got into coaching to make a difference. But if you want to do that and financially prosper at it, then connect with people who will invest in your services, and keep connecting with them.

That’s what smart marketing does — it helps you build relationships and trust with those people. Smart marketing starts with listening, just like good coaching does.

When you’re coaching a client you are primarily listening and asking questions, right? You draw out their insights about where they want to go and what’s getting in their way. You listen into what they say. You tune into where they are coming from, so that your questions and responses will land with them.

It’s time for coaches to stop trying to convince people that coaching will help them. Instead, meet your prospects where they live. This approach to marketing plays to your strengths as a coach, because it centers around what the client is seeking, rather than what you do.

Simple Marketing for Coaches

1. Choose a specific, easy-to-find, group of seekers to serve. You don’t need to limit your client base to these people. But do focus your marketing efforts on them and use their language.
2. Find out what they most want and what is stopping them from getting it. What will motivate them to invest in their personal or professional development? What are they seeking as a return on that investment?
3. Then use your powerful coaching skills to help them get what they want.

With this approach, you will never again have to sell anyone on the idea of coaching, or on your particular flavor of coaching. But you do need to believe in the value of your services. This is your chance to show that coaching is worth paying for.

I teach this approach in my workshop, Champion Your Ideal Coaching Market. Enroll now and learn how to connect reliably with prospects who want and will value what you offer.

SHARE YOUR COMMENTS ONLINE AT: Is Coaching Worth Paying For?

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• 6 Signs That It’s Time to Narrow Your Coaching Niche
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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?

Get Your Message Out There with Online Video
“Online video is probably the fastest way to get your message out there to increase visibility and to get clients and customers online. Very simple — find a good camera, there’s lots of different types online. The Cannon Vixia is a personal favorite… make sure your lighting is good and you have an external microphone. Come up with some great content — it can be two to three minutes, it does not have to be a lot. Create content around your area of expertise and then distribute with gusto!”
Shama Kabani, author of The Zen of Social Media Marketing

Repeat Your Tweets
“You should repeat your tweets. I repeat them four times every eight hours. And I see about the same amount of click-throughs for each one. So no matter what people tell you—repeat your tweets.”
Guy Kawasaki, co-founder of AllTop.com

Stop Talking About Your Products and Services
“Everything that you create on the web should be valuable information for those people that you’re trying to reach. And it shouldn’t focus on what your company happens to do or what your products and services happen to do. People don’t care about products and services; what they care about are themselves. And they care very, very deeply about solving their problems.”
David Meerman Scott, bestselling author of The New Rules of Marketing & PR

Talk To and About Other People
“… if you’re looking to influence a certain thought leader, or even just a group of people, talking about them, talking to them, instead of about yourself is something that I find exceptionally powerful.”
Yaro Starak, Entrpreneurs-Journey.com

Start Thought Provoking Conversations
“…engage readers in a conversation. And that means introducing topics that are thought provoking and interesting, and on which people have a lot to say. People look to you to start a conversation, to lead a conversation and to engage them in topics that really catch their interest.”
Gretchen Rubin, author of The Happiness Project, Happiness-Project.com

Earn Trust Through Consistency
“Consistency demonstrates commitment. So, for the people that you’re trying to serve, if you are consistent, they’re going to keep coming back. You’re going to earn their trust because you’re consistent. They believe that you’re committed to them for the long haul.”
Michael Port, author of Book Yourself Solid

The theme that carries through the Influencer Project presentations is what I call becoming a “champion” for your market. Make all of your messages about them – what they care about, what they want most. Your essence, style and story will flow into your messages to attract the people who resonate most with you.

Are you championing your ideal coaching market?

Do they see you as influential?

What can you do in the next 90 days to amp up that influence and connect more with what is most important to your target market?

Share your comments on this blog.

SHARE YOUR COMMENTS ONLINE AT: How to Be Influential in Your Coaching Niche

RELATED ARTICLES:

• Test Your Coaching Niche – Will It Go the Distance?
• Coaches Comment on Highly Profitable Niche Series
• 6 Signs That It’s Time to Narrow Your Coaching Niche
• What Keeps Coaches From Narrowing Their Niche Enough?
• What a Target Market Can Do For You That a Coaching Niche Can’t