Originally Posted on The Coaching Tools Company as How I got 12 New Clients by Creating a Coaching Program (and why it was a turning point!)
How do we ‘concretize’ coaching? How do we demonstrate the value and power of coaching in a tangible way? Well, in the early days of my one-on-one coaching business, I had a major turning point—when I created a coaching program that got me 12 clients in just 2 weeks. In this article I share how, what and why I think it worked…
I created a Life Coaching Program Outline and Flyer in just one day!
All too often we agonize over making things perfect—which is a great way to avoid taking action…
Remember that once we run something—we usually see new ways to improve it right away. So all you need is something good enough to get you started, because you’re going to improve your offering over time anyway!
So, this program literally took me one day to put together: I spent a morning planning and outlining what I would offer. And I spent the afternoon to create the poster and words.
My first new client signed up that very afternoon. Our mortgage broker stopped in to get some paperwork signed and I had just printed off a few posters. She saw them and said, “Sign me up!”. I didn’t believe her at first, until she got her cheque book out…
Click to download the original flyer in Microsoft Word!
Why Creating this Coaching Program was a turning point for me
This coaching program (although it had many flaws!) got me 12 new clients in just two weeks.
And when I look at this poster now, it takes me right back to when I was setting my practice up, questioning myself, struggling to describe coaching—and get clients. I was on a tremendous learning curve and kept wondering if it would all (ever) work out.
So, getting 12 new clients was a huge confidence boost for me. Up until this point I had been getting a slow, small and steady stream of clients: I would have 3/4/5/6 one-on-one active clients in my practice at any one time.
But it was launching this program (and getting 12 clients) that made my coaching business finally feel real.
The Overnight Success that took 2 Years…
But although it only took me a morning to outline the program, it was actually the culmination of 2 years of hard work, growing my business.
Here are 5 of the key things I did in the 2 years leading up to my coaching program included:
1) Building a newsletter list
At this point my newsletter list was about 750 people—all of whom I had actually met in person!
- I had been networking regularly at events my ideal clients would go to.
- At every networking event I went to, I would talk to people and ask to add them to my newsletter list if there was a connection.
2) I ran a lot of workshops
- I reached out to local networking groups, regional events that had speakers, local stores that held events, fitness centres and gyms—and more!
- Many (most!) of these workshops were free.
- And I used my workshop feedback form to get people’s permission to email them my newsletter (and stay in touch).
3) I took branded coaching tools AND printed newsletters to every event I attended
- So, at every event I attended, I would take my coaching tools and printed newsletters and leave them at the back of the room.
- And at every event most of the forms and newsletters would be taken home by people.
4) I had been sending a regular useful monthly newsletter for about 18 months
- This was in 2007, before newsletter creation apps like Constant Contact, MailChimp etc. were even a thing.
- I had been creating a two page newsletter in Microsoft Word, saving it as a .PDF and emailing it out as an attachment, without fail, every month.
5) I had been creating coaching tools for my clients and workshops
- Lastly, I had been creating coaching tools around common topics and issues I saw both in my workshops and with my clients.
- So at this point I probably had 30-40 coaching exercises as ideas to help create the coaching program.
Why Create a Coaching Program?
The difficulty I had been having was explaining what coaching was to people. You meet someone. They ask what you do. And when you tell them you’re a coach/life coach, they say, “Oh what’s that?”.
And then I would get so tongue tied or give these long rambling explanations. I was so frustrated!
Because the best way to “explain” coaching is to demonstrate it, for example:
- giving a great sample session
- taking people through a coaching exercise
- or running a workshop or webinar
But first you have to get people interested enough to show up so you can give that demonstration!
The Challenge with Selling (and Describing!) Coaching…
Of course the problem we all have when attempting to describe coaching is that it’s not tangible.
Coaching is not something you can touch or see: instead coaching is an experience, a relationship, a process!
Coaching is about transformation. And crucially, the most powerful coaching is a transformation of the mind—how we see things, what we believe is possible, how confident and motivated we feel, what we’re willing to do, or try to do… It’s about courage, personal growth, getting to know ourselves deeply—and aligning our relationships, lives and actions with who we truly are.
How can you describe that to someone you meet on the street?
So it was all about Concretizing Coaching!
The day I created the coaching program I had thought: OK, I’ll just create a transformational coaching program using my coaching exercises—at least they’re ‘concrete’!
And then, when someone asks what I do, I can tell them that:
- I run a coaching program that helps people get happier and embrace life.
- We have coaching sessions and homework to explore what they want from life, what’s getting in the way.
- The goal is to come up with a set of powerful goals to create a life they love and work on that together (Life Visioning Exercises).
- We’ll look at what drains their energy (Energy Zappers Tool), create some new positive habits (Daily Success Habits Tool), look at who is draining them (Detox Your Relationships) etc.
Suddenly, it felt easy!
So, I gave myself a morning thinking—and listening to my intuition—to answer the questions: What do my ideal clients need help with? What would I put in a coaching program for them?
How to Create a Coaching Program
Here’s the process I followed to create my very first coaching program:
- I sat down and thought about the problems and goals my clients and contacts tended to have and made two lists:
- Common goals
- Common issues, problems and blocks to achieving their goals
- Then I considered what activities we could practically do that would help.
- I made a list of the coaching tools and exercises I’d already created that could be useful.
- I thought about the processes, quotes and nuggets of wisdom (reframes) I could potentially share that would help.
- Next I wrote a bulleted list of steps we could work on that would help people with these problems and goals.
- I chose 9 steps as I worked with my clients for the first 3 weeks of every month (the 4th week of every month I spent working ON my business, and clients had space to work on larger actions or reflect).
- So 9 steps meant this would be a 3 month coaching or 12 week coaching program!
- I came up with an overarching theme for the coaching program.
- My program was about identifying what you don’t like in your life, finding your vision, connecting with your strengths, learning where you get in your own way and taking action to move towards a more exciting version of your own life.
- I realised that most of the time people were unhappy because didn’t know (or were too busy to see) what they truly wanted or got them excited about life.
- So my program was about getting happier and connecting to and getting to know yourself!
- Then for each of the 9 bulleted steps I decided on 1-2 practical things we could do.
- This meant choosing specific coaching exercises, ideas or processes that I could share with them.
And now that I had concrete exercises and steps, it made it super-easy for me to be confident when I talked about what I did… Because all I had to do was explain my coaching program to potential clients.
Finally: Name and Price the Coaching Program!
- I chose a name.
- I know people felt trapped in their existing lives, not realising they had more power than they realised to change things!
- So I decided to call the program, Free Yourself and Get Happy!
- I chose a price.
- I gave this program a special promotional price of $195 monthly (for 3 sessions a month).
- I wanted a price point that I thought was a fabulous deal, so that I would be utterly confident in the value that I offered.
- Check out this article for ideas on how to decide what to charge for a coaching program >>
| TOP TIP: Any time you offer a fabulous price, always have a good “reason” so that people understand why the price is lower than they might expect. This way you maintain your “value” while offering a price that’s easy for people to like! |
Why offer such a low/fabulous price?
Well, the ‘catch’ (my reason for the special price) was that:
- It was the first time running it, so I wanted feedback so I could improve the program.
- I asked for a time commitment of 6 months (3 months of the program, followed by 3 months of follow-on coaching at the same price).
- And I wanted a testimonial if they liked what we did together.
And it worked!
The important thing is to make sure that the “catch” or reason you offer such a great price is highly beneficial to you.
Here are the benefits I received from my “low” price and the “catch”:
- Some of those clients stayed a lot longer than 6 months.
- Some clients told their friends and colleagues, so I got new clients.
- I got some awesome testimonials—in fact I still use some of those testimonials to this day!
- And I got helpful feedback so that I could improve the program—and raise the price later.
But there was one benefit I wasn’t expecting!
- Finally, possibly the most important benefit of this coaching program was the boost it gave to my confidence both as a coach and as a small business owner.
It was a Success, yet this Coaching Program had Many Flaws!
The coaching program was far from perfect.
Now that I have more experience here’s what I would do differently:
- Make the program simpler (I included far too many coaching exercises when I was planning it).
- Make the program more specific to a particular problem, goal or issue.
- Be ready with a specific follow-on offer or next steps program.
But this program—as it was—got me 12 new clients and left me feeling proud and confident for the first time in a long while!
For more ideas, listen to this teleseminar I did for Noomii.com: Beat the Coaching Obstacle Course: Practical Business Building Tips with Emma-Louise Elsey
So, why did so many people sign up for this Coaching Program?
Here’s why I think this Coaching Program worked so well:
- At last I could clearly and confidently describe what I do!
- My excitement and enthusiasm were infectious. I truly believed in what I was offering and knew these clients would learn a lot about themselves in my program.
- I gave my program an inspiring title that would appeal to my audience (even thought it was a bit grandiose and vague!).
- The timing and topic aligned well. It was spring and people were ready for a sunny “Free Yourself!” type of program.
- The special deal price was great (and knowing it was a really good deal, helped me talk about it without embarrassment).
- I listed the topics and exercises as clear steps that people could imagine doing. The client understood what they were going to get from working with me.
- I put a fixed timeframe on the program. This means the coaching was not some uncertain, going-on-for-years activity.
So, we have excitement, enthusiasm and confidence from me.
And clear and relevant topics, good timing, great pricing and a time limited commitment for the clients.
What else did I do to get those clients?
Of course it didn’t all happen magically. Just some of what I did to get those 12 clients to sign-up included:
- I printed and put the poster up around town (in coffee shops, local gyms, stores, dentist and doctor’s offices etc).
- Sometimes this means going into places and asking if you can leave the poster or put it up somewhere—I got many more “No”s than “Yes”s.
- I put it in my newsletter. This is where most of the coaching program sign-ups came from—people who already know and follow me.
- I emailed my contacts, and asked them to let anyone know who they thought might be interested.
- I told friends and people I met about my new coaching program.
- Lastly I put it on my website.
So, it was a lot of work!
But it was totally worth it to get 12 brand new clients in under 2 weeks don’t you think?
And this was before I was even on any Social Media channels! So there was no Facebook, no Instagram etc.
And yet, not as much work as it could have been…
I didn’t spend days creating a detailed, rigid program that gave my clients all the answers. I just created a simple framework that told people what I would do with them to move them towards their goals and solve problems they might have.
I still coached people towards their self-defined goals. I still ‘danced in the moment’ during our sessions. But the program’s steps gave us a focus—which took the pressure (to perform) off me, and gave my clients something concrete to picture themselves doing.
This is how the Renew You, Love Your Life Coaching Program was born!
Our Renew You, Love Your Life! Coaching Program Template is a 12 week coaching program developed out of the original Free Yourself & Get Happy! program.
“Renew You” is the ultimate expression of this original 12 week coaching program:
- We begin by identifying goals for the client and the client works towards their goals over the 3 month period.
- Then we do some fun and deep coaching exercises each week as homework.
- The client takes action towards their goals and meaningful change in their lives.
Learn more about Renew You, Love Your Life! here:
Add to cart
$147.00
You could also create your own Coaching Program!
Especially when you’re starting out, a coaching program is immensely helpful to help you clearly and confidently describe what you do in a way that people will understand. It’s a client journey that you can explain, feel good talking about and use to market yourself and get some new clients!
Here are some free resources to help you get ideas for your own coaching program:
- The ACTUAL Life Coaching Flyer Template used. This life coaching flyer is from 2007, and is exactly as I used it. I have learned a lot since then. It is in Microsoft Word.
- And here is the ACTUAL 3 Month/12 Week Coaching Program Template I created for this program. You’ll see I was clearly trying to do TOO much, but it felt great to have so many options up my sleeve and lots to inspire my clients!
PLEASE NOTE: I haven’t updated these documents since I used them in 2007. So they are intended for inspiration, not as a template for you to use. However, you have my full permission to use as much or as little of the wording or documents as you like in creating your own coaching program!
Changes I recommend you make to this poster/promotion
- I would recommend listing only 5-7 areas where you will work with people.
- Come up with your own program name that addresses a specific problem or goal your ideal clients have.
- Pick colours, images and wording that ties in with your business.
- Include how your clients will feel once they’re completed your coaching program!
Wrap-up
So there you have it: an “overnight success” that took 18 months+ of hard work! And all of it done without Social Media.
In particular, I think working hard to build a small (750 people), but personal newsletter list was an important part of my success. That, and creating a regular monthly newsletter that was helpful and interesting. And sending that newsletter every month without fail, builds trust.
So I hope coaching program tips, examples and ideas are helpful. And I wish you the very best with growing your coaching practice.
If you liked this article about creating your own coaching program to get clients you may also like:
- How to Decide What to Charge for Your Coaching Program – 5 Steps with Specific Examples to help
- 10 Easy Steps To Create Your Own Seminar Handout – Use to create a seminar handout, or your own Coaching Exercise for your new program!
- Create a Spring Clean Your Life! Coaching Program or Workshop with our Seasonal Toolkit
