You’re probably making the same marketing mistakes life coaches everywhere are making.
Remember when you completed your coaching certification? You were so excited to get out there and coach people. You became a coach to help people, to make a difference in their lives and help them make change where they felt stuck.
Fast forward to where you are now and you feel more like you’re lost at sea than anything else. You’ve done everything they told you after completing your coaching program. You got your website, wrote some pages, figured out your packages and prices. But there’s just a trickle of clients. What gives?
Well, I want to tell you that it’s not your fault. If you didn’t know about marketing and sales before you started your coaching program it’s pretty unlikely you learned it during the program. And that’s just because marketing wasn’t a part of your coaching program. It isn’t with most. And so you make the same marketing mistakes life coaches are making all over the web.
Let’s solve some of that today. Let’s look at 5 common marketing mistakes life coaches make – and show you how to fix them.
Marketing Mistakes Life Coaches Make #1:
Not Defining Your Audience
This one is easy to understand. Most often there’s a desire to be all things to all people. With that comes a fear of not being too specialized either because you’ll miss someone or because you don’t feel your audience is broad enough. If you don’t have a clearly defined audience than, one, you don’t really know who you’re speaking too. And, two, neither does anyone else – including potential clients. Don’t worry, you’re not alone. I see this marketing mistake on roughly 80% of the life coaching sites I see.
The Fix: Define as specifically as possible who you want to coach.
This can be very easy if you describe a single person. Who is your ideal client? What are their most pressing problems and how would you address them? What traits, characteristics and mannerisms do they have? In talking to a single person you can clearly identify who you want to work with. The great news is that there’s thousands of ‘single persons’ out there who need your exact way of coaching. But it’s difficult for you to find each other if you don’t first identify who they are.
Marketing Mistakes Life Coaches Make #2:
No Clear Plan to Acquire Clients
It is very difficult to find new clients if you have no idea how to best acquire them. Or where. While this seems so obvious the gap between wanting clients and actually having them can be so large that the overwhelm can be paralyzing.
The Fix: Create a ‘REAL’ Plan to Get Clients
The same way you need to define who you want to coach you need to also define where they’re going to come from. If it’s networking and referrals, then you need a plan on how to engage potential client at networking events and have a very clear path for referrals. If it’s through your website then you need to figure out where your potential clients are likely to spend their time online and try to meet them there. This means learning how to market on one of the social media platforms like Facebook or learning how to use paid advertising. There’s many, many ways. What you need to do is decide how you want to acquire clients, make a plan that you can do and then set out doing it regularly. And if you need help, just ask.
Marketing Mistakes Life Coaches Make #3:
Being a ‘Lone Ranger’
Look, you can’t do it all yourself. You need help. You don’t have to be business owner, coach, accountant, bookkeeper, website designer, marketing expert, assistant, etc, etc. Feeling stretched in too many directions is only bad for your business. Either you get burned out having to do it all. Or you get nothing done because you’re doing it all – and that will lead to burn out.
The Fix: Get Help!
One thing to learn about your business is you can’t do it alone. Being in business doesn’t mean you have to be an expert in everything. Each bit of lost time doing tasks is lost opportunities for you to be coaching. Hand off some of your business needs to experts like a bookkeeper or website designer. And if you’re not getting enough clients, find someone who will walk you step-by-step to getting clients.
Marketing Mistakes Life Coaches Make #4:
Not Providing What Your Audience Wants
Once you’ve defined your target audience (see #1) you need (must) create products and services they want. It’s very difficult to get people to listen to your offers if they don’t want – or they don’t understand them. Sure, you’re the coach deciding how to present your business. But without clients you really don’t have a business.
The Fix: Craft Every Offer for ‘Them.’
Give them what they want. It’s really that simple. Do a little research. Find out what people say they want and need and craft your programs – and specifically your marketing content – around what they want. Meet your potential clients where they are not where you think they should be. Ask questions, listen, have conversations, etc. The best offers are those that feel to the potential client that they wrote them themselves.
Marketing Mistakes Life Coaches Make #5:
A Stagnant, Out-of-Date, Ineffective Website
A website is a powerful tool – either for your or against you. If your website it out-of-date in content and/or design it’s hurting you more than helping you. If can’t edit your content or add articles at will, it’s neutral a best. And don’t forget that having a mobile-ready website is a necessity in today’s market. Your website is a 24 hour, 7 day a week promotional tool that either puts your best face forward to potential clients or not. And not having a website is really not an option anymore.
The Fix: Get a Professional Website or Get it Updated
Professional doesn’t have to mean extremely expensive. Websites come in at all price points. And while your budget should always be a consideration remember to put your business needs a voice along with your budget. A modern, mobile-ready website that you can edit yourself and that makes your best content easy to find is essential for getting clients online. Be sure you have a blog on your website and use it. Doesn’t mean every day. Write articles when you feel inspired. And make sure to have clear calls-to-action and a way to capture people’s email addresses. Finally, signup with Google Analytics to track your traffic. Even if you don’t have an intention of using it now, you may down the road and having all the history is important.
All these marketing mistakes are fixable.
I always tell my kids that mistakes are necessary part of learning. Without marketing mistakes life coaches never learn what works and what doesn’t.
Each of these points are essential to get right in order to put yourself in the best position to get new clients.
Your next best step is to take each of these marketing mistakes life coaches make and look over your business honestly. Are you really clear about your audience? Do they know it? Are you giving them what they want rather than what you think they should have? Is all this clearly expressed on your modern website?
If not, get some help. You are a coach so you know how helpful it can be to get help from an expert.
What mistakes are you making – and what will you do about it. Let’s talk in the comment box.
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