Just as every client is different and every coach is different, so too are the various lead attraction methods that coaches can choose to use to get new clients. Some will work for certain coaches; some will not.
Here are proven suggestions, all focused on building a solid networking and visibility base so you are able to get new clients quickly, whenever you need them.
1) Offer Your Services on Coaching Sites
While sites like Coach.me are great for grabbing a little goal-setting coaching and accountability partnering. You can offer your services there.
And there are many other referral and directory sites on the net. Choose one suited to your particular field—and be sure to read reviews about the site before joining.
2) Be Yourself
You may think this is one of the most overused and trite phrases, but if you are a wise coach, you will also realize it can be one of the most powerful. You won’t connect with the right people until you are coming from a place of total transparency and honesty. Listen, share and evaluate—yourself as well as others.
So, become even more self-aware. Get coaching specifically in areas you, yourself, feel “stuck” in.
When you are totally yourself, you will attract the right people—and that will make it much easier to not only gain clients, but build a strong relationship with them.
3) Create New Packages
The premise behind this is simple: Offer a fresh coaching deal that has appealing benefits, tell your ideal audience about it—and sign up new clients.
The reality is not quite that easy. It involves coming up with:
- The right offer for your ideal paying client
- The right offer for you
The better you know your clients, the more you’ll accurately be able to guesstimate what your unique new package offer might be—but don’t leave it up to guesswork only: ASK your audience base. Create a simple survey asking your followers what they need help with, or what topic they are most interested in hearing more about, and send an email, as well as publicizing it in other Pages and Groups you own on social media.
When you get the responses to your questions, create a package that offers new benefits in tune with their answers. And provide a simple but irresistible incentive to get your ideal clients to check it out.
4) Use Press Releases
Have you been creating press releases? If not, why? They haven’t gone out of fashion—particularly if you are guesting (or want to guest) on radio shows; or you are planning to run a local event. (If there’s an angle that benefits the community, your local newspaper will be interested.)
Just be sure to read and follow the guidelines of each organization you send the releases to (or—better yet—have your assistant do that while you get back to coaching!)
5) Learn to Listen
As a coach, this is not news to you. Listening is part of your stock-in-trade. But immerse yourself in conversations everywhere and with everyone: Not just in your office. Focus on listening, acknowledging and sharing.
And listen more than you talk.
When you do talk, learn to say only what is needed. Hone the fine art of asking the right questions. After all, it’s about gently prompting clients to think up the solutions themselves (except for when you show them a safe path over a particularly rocky or dangerous set of rapids).
6) Make Yourself Visibly Available for Interviews
It’s not enough to be available for interviews: You also need to assertively let people know you are.
Put it on your website. Have a separate section with archives of your interviews. Use calls to action at the end of emails and in sidebars.
7) Automate and Outsource
Don’t get carried away with strategies. Instead, automate and outsource anything that drains your energy and leave yourself alert and free for those precious moments and opportunities for real, live connection.
It’s the fashion to complain about the time we spend online nowadays, but don’t waste your energy there, either: Instead, use all the wonderful resources, apps, software and services that are available for you to discover and use them to free yourself from the more mundane parts of building your business.
(Don’t feel guilty about outsourcing these either: Remember—what is mundane or draining to you, can set others who specialize in those areas on fire.)
