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Welcome back to the podcast! Truly grateful for you listening and fitting this episode into your day. This week, my purpose for this episode is to dive deeper into the last 3 common struggles that I am seeing online coaches have this year. The episode where I laid out all 6 things we may be doing online that is not bringing in revenue - it’s just not working - that was episode 126. Last week, episode 127, I went deeper on the first 3 things you may be doing that are not increasing revenue.

3 Things That Aren’t Working To Get Clients Right Now

There are three of 6 things you may be doing in your business that are NOT bringing in revenue, and they are all trends I’ve seen online.

1. Churning out massive amounts of content

2. Re-branding or revamping a business model just because there are no results

3. Adding more freebies to nurture your audience

You may be wondering if I’m going to provide solutions, so you can increase your sales, and of course I am! In fact, the solutions will be laid out in a free masterclass that I’m hosting on May 17th, 2023. The masterclass is 3 Things Smart Coaches Do To Increase Revenue Online.

I will be spending 2 hours with you so this is more like a getting clients and making money VIP day! The first 90 minutes will be dedicated to each of the 3 solutions to making more sales in your coaching business, and going really deep on those. The last 30 minutes will be for Q&A, where you’re also going to network with your fellow coaches all wondering how to do the same thing.

Reserve your seat and let’s get to the rest of the content!

We learn by doing, failing, and trying again.

Disclaimer here: if you are doing any of these things, I want you to know that this is not an episode to attack you or tell you you’re wrong. It’s just to show you another perspective, and I believe feedback and perspective is one of the best tools we have as coaches. Also, some of these things I have done or my clients have done - and I’ll be telling you stories to illustrate these points.  

Basically, I want you to feel safe and heard as an online coach who’s amazing at what you do, but may be having a hard time doing it right now.

The truth about content in your coaching business

I think coaches might think more posts = clients, and they don’t. Content gets you visible but it doesn’t really matter if it isn’t good.

There are a couple of truths about content in particular that we need to face.

1. Nobody signs up on ONE piece of content - it’s a few or more

2. Nobody signs up with surface level content just to “shut you up” 

So when we understand these truths, here’s what we need to with our content strategy: the content needs to be less, but really good. You do not have to post constantly, but you do have to post consistently, and it has to connect with the reader.

Honestly - posts that are purely engagement posts don’t even get my attention anymore, and that’s true for most people because we are totally over the surface level BS.

I would prefer you post nothing, or post something completely honest and true, than try to look at it from a “getting clients perspective.”

I was talking to a good friend of mine the other day, we met in a group coaching program. We were wondering to each other: whatever happened with creating content for the sake of creating?

We have lost that spark because we believe we need to create for money, but the tide is turning - people want REAL.  IG is making moves to go back to the way it was before you found out you could make things pretty and manufactured and the feed had to look a certain way. They recognize that they’ll keep more people on the platform if they highlight people who are real.

Take this as your sign.  Your content should not be giving you headaches and you should not be spending all day every day on it. Content calendars are surface level and they aren’t enough.

So here’s my solution for you on this one:

1. I want you to write down everything your ideal client currently believes about where they are right now and where they want to be, in relation to how you help them

2. That’s it, that’s the strategy

3. Write that, and then piece it out and make it make sense, repurpose, whatever you need to do

Before you re-brand, read this.

During this series, I talked about a client who was thinking about adding a degree to her business so that it would look more attractive. I say this with an educator’s heart, but likely this will not solve the problem of getting more clients.

We are ignoring what clients really want, and it’s not for you to have more degrees on your wall. THEY have degrees on their wall they aren’t using or maybe they are using, but they are in debt over. If you are between the ages of 25 and 50, that’s mostly how you feel.

Let’s also talk about re-branding or just changing things because they aren’t working. This is very similar to adding a degree - it’s taking your time and your focus. What we tend to do is look at the end result.

better branding = more legit = more/better clients is the equation in your head. Or: certification = more letters after my name = more legit = more/better clients.

So if the common denominator is “more legit,” then we have a problem, because you don’t believe you are legit enough as you are. From an educator’s point of view, you can love learning forever and professional development is always worth it. But if you are only looking at the benefit of being more legit, it ignores the solutions you’ve already provided for yourself.  

It ignores the clients you have gotten, the results you have provided, and what you do love doing. Those are really important data that we are ignoring. When you find solutions, lean into them - as small as they are.

We never want to feel wrong, or feel like beginners, or something is broken in the thing we love to do. Sometimes, we ignore the root of the problem and think we should add debt and time we don’t have to something that isn’t going to work.

Here’s what I want you to do - and this is what we did with the client that was thinking of changing it all, adding on degrees and changing her offers completely because it isn’t working.

I want you to do a really good debrief of your business in the last 6 months - 1 year. Warning: some of this stuff will be uncomfortable.

Here are some things I want you to ask yourself:

1. What have I enjoyed the most?

2. What have I enjoyed the least?

3. What have I not been able to do?

4. How can I get creative about doing more of that thing?

Do freebies work to get more clients?

Someone asked in my FB group the other day what kind of free things people enjoy. I guess she was going to make a freebie and wanted to know what people would sign up for. There were a couple of comments, but I commented saying that I like a GOOD freebie, one that separates the men from the boys.  

I think that’s a good story to segue into this topic of free stuff for your audience. Some of the louder advice in the coaching world right now is to release more free things, because people are in economic stress and they want to really know who’s got the goods, and they will be able to tell by consuming your free stuff.

I agree with the premise - in fact, I signed a private client this week because she watched my free masterclass, got on a call with me the next day, and signed up. But she wouldn’t have signed up if I had a ton of shit on there to watch and download and do. She would still be sifting through it, or be so overwhelmed that she might not do it at all.

So when you’re thinking about freebies, really understand that they are still supposed to be lead generators, and one thing we absolutely don’t do is overwhelm our leads. We also don’t want to attract low quality clients, or just clients that are not on the journey we want them to be so we can stay in our lane to help them. 

Remember that if you are just attracting PEOPLE, your coaching business is short term. If you are attracting YOUR PEOPLE, then you are setting yourself up for long term business success.

My solution for you is to look at what you have now as lead generators and ask yourself: are they quality? Are they helping your people self-qualify? 

This can go into your marketing as well, but it’s also for that next step, or that zero entry commitment.  Now they are in your audience, on your email list, and you will be chasing your tail if you’re just giving away more free stuff because someone told you that people are in economic stress right now and you just want your numbers to be higher.

Want more clients in your coaching business?

To recap, some things I want you to consider in your business today:

• Who is your content for? 

• What is currently working in your business that you can get curious about expanding?

• Are you chasing metrics that mean nothing, or are you truly committing to being seen by the right people?

I’d love to hear what resonated with you from this episode! Please share on social and tag me, I will reshare as a thank you and give you more visibility as well. You can tag me on Instagram @theallisonnelson.

And don’t forget to grab your seat to my free masterclass, 3 Things Smart Coaches Do To Increase Revenue

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