Being Credible As A Coach

But I Am Not Credible…

I hear this all the time. People can get all bent out of shape about not feeling credible as a coach, without taking into account the skills that they have that took them into coaching in the first place.

The majority of coaches come to coaching later in life and bring with them a whole lifetime of skills and experience that they suddenly discount in trying to figure out where their niche is and who the ideal client within that niche is.

It’s ok for you Sarah, you have a strong reputation within the coaching industry already!

But I didn’t always. In fact 4 years ago I was an utter nobody. No one had ever heard of me or The Coaching Revolution. I built my reputation and the reputation of The Coaching Revolution slowly and steadily.

• I created my ideal client avatar
• Wrote a marketing message for that avatar
• Putting myself in places where I knew that avatar hung out – on and offline
• Shared my message
• I didn’t give up when things were quiet – and they are always quiet at first
• Then my potential clients started to see me
• They began to understand that I can help them
• Hopping into my inbox and saying Sarah, you’re talking about me! Could we have a chat?
• I am relentless in my marketing activity.
• Always showing up every day even when I don’t want to.
• I use software to make my life easier when things get tough. For example my lovely stepdad died in December 2019, and I was holding his hand when he passed away and no one knew. I didn’t disappear from sight from the point of view of my ideal client, but my personal input was – for a while – a lot less.

We can teach you how to do the same from the position of having done it ourselves! All our mentors have done this for themselves too – they were all our client first.

Being Credible Comes From Understanding Your Client

You can build authority within a niche in 6 months to a year. Becoming known as the ‘go-to’ in your niche. The reason that I can say this so categorically is that we have seen it again, and again, and again with our mentees.

• You get under the skin of your client by understanding the particular problem that your coaching can help solve. This is something that you choose not something that mystically appears to you over the course of several years!
• Put yourself where your potential clients are, and you talk to them – in their own language – about the problem that they have and how it’s showing up in their lives.
• They will hear you. You will be joining the conversation that’s already going on inside their head, and they will be amazed that you understand their position so well.
• Your Ideal client will want to talk to you, because you understand them.

Coaching Skills

The reason we only work with qualified coaches, or those who are taking a qualification is that we are not focused on that side of your business. There are tens of thousands of coaching communities all over the world who focus on improving your coaching skills.

It’s up to you to keep your coaching skills up to scratch.

Our job is teaching you the skills you need for the other side of your coaching business – the skills you need to create the opportunities to actually do the coaching. Then you become credible!

Just Sales And Marketing?

No, we can help you with all of the business side of your coaching business. However, let’s be frank here, unless you have clients, you don’t actually have a coaching business do you? That’s why we start with learning how to get clients.

Yes we look at the following:

• Business structure (sole trader or limited company?)
• Admin (book keeping, electronic diaries etc – what do you need and what can you ignore in the beginning?)
• Email marketing – how to create an email list and what to do with it when you have one.
• Time management
• Mindset – pricing, entrepreneur and all the other adjustments you need to make as you go

But first, you need clients!

Income from clients can be used to build your website – better yet, it won’t just be an online CV (most coaches create an online CV….).

Income from clients can be used to set up your limited company.

You get the idea, right?

If you’re reading this and thinking I need some help! This is my diary