We need to talk.
There is so much information circling the internet in today’s age about coaching and marketing and starting a business, and everything in between that it can become rather confusing on what to listen to and where to get your information from. It may seem so overwhelming that it would be better just to quit but at the end of the day, we need to remember that we became coaches in order to help people.
We’re going to simplify and break down what is actually important so you don’t constantly feel behind or overwhelmed.
Here is what I call the 10 commandments for the modern day coach:
1. Give less advice.
I know, this seems backwards. I mean, as a coach your job is to give these people your advice right? Wrong. Far too often, we jump right in and try to solve someone’s problems right away. The issue with that is we never get to go deep and get to some of the root cause of what we are seeing being played out in their health. More often than not, clients are coming to you with just needing that extra push. Obviously sometimes you need to input your advice it shouldn’t always be the first thing you jump to. Try instead to get an understanding of where they’re coming from and then help them come up with an action plan. This leads me to my second point:
2. Ask more questions.
Asking questions is huge for establishing a plan with your client. By listening, you can guide them along the way and help them realize the concept they know is right and by letting them figure it out themselves, they’re going to be much more apt to stick with it instead of someone else just telling them what to do again and again.
3. Meet them where they’re at.
This actually has two different meanings. One, meet them where they are at in their habits. Most clients coming to us are not regular gym goers. Most of them have unhealthy eating and lifestyle habits and we can’t expect them to instantly fall in love with working out and eating healthy. Meet them where they are at and guide them into a new lifestyle with new sustainable habits. Second, meet them where they are at communication-wise. If your clients are always on their smartphones, than adapt to that and make doing business with you easy.
4. Focus your education on focus.
This sounds a little funny but what I mean by this is most clients do not need more education. They don’t need more information. What they actually need is someone to tell them what to focus on because they have already heard too much, and seen too many articles that they don’t know what is actually important. Hone in on what will actually create real change with your client, and teach your client those important basics. Tell them, “Okay for the next two weeks here’s what I want you eating and these are the workouts.” Being a fitness encyclopedia to your client will not change their habits.
5. Give your client a community.
We all have this deep down desire to belong to something. So, regardless of your style of coaching, we can still make our clients feel like they belong to a group - that we’re all in this together. Think about ways you can incorporate community whether it’s physically in your gym, or an online community through platforms like Zoom. The more you make them feel like they are a part of something, the longer they will stay.
6. Start with the end in mind.
Typically, our clients come to us without knowing what they want the ending to be. They don’t know what kind of person they want to turn into eight months down the road. This is where we need to step in and help them figure out who that person is that they want to become. Then, we can start working backwards and create small action steps to get to that end goal. Clients don’t typically just want to lose 10 lbs, they want to keep that off and keep losing more! They want to progress their life into a new direction and to do that we need to know that vision clearly. Make sure to start with the end goal in mind in order to know how to work backwards to achieve that goal.
7. Focus on smaller time periods.
The shorter term wins. What I mean by that is instead of focusing on this huge, 24-week program, instead focus on little increments of time and set up goals for each increment. Slowly but surely, your client will progress each increment and reach the end of those 24 weeks but if you start with that, they’re likely going to quit before they see the finish line. Let your client hit their goals week to week. Slow and steady wins the race.
8. Know that your client is purchasing you, not your coaching.
Your relationship with your clients is probably your number one asset to your business success. Focus on being more personal. Put yourself out there and create an authentic personal brand that shows who you are. You’ll need this in this day and age. All of us coaches have similar things to say. We know the rules of nutrition and training to lose weight, get more lean, gain muscle etc. They’re not looking for you to be just like every other coach. They can find that information anywhere. What they are looking for is something they can trust and build a relationship with. The sooner you realize you are not the best fit for everyone, the better your business will be. Focus on your niche and give your authenticity to them. People aren’t shopping for coaching, they’re shopping for a coach.
9. Process, not outcome goals will win the race.
Far too often, we set these huge big outcome goals of I want to lose x amount of weight in y amount of time. These are great to have but sometimes all we do is throw that number out there and expect it to happen. This is not magic, and there is a system behind it so teach your client the steps in which they can achieve that outcome goal. Follow the process in order to get to the goal.
And lastly,
10. Hold them accountable.
This is the biggest reason people are coming to you. When you first start asking them questions, you will likely get “Well I tried this for 4 weeks, but then life just got busy.” or something of the like. They aren’t coming to you because of your expertise. The reality is they have tried to do it on their own and they quit, so they need you to hold them accountable. It’s easy to let ourselves down but it’s much more difficult to let someone else down. Hold your client accountable daily. Check in on them. Don’t just use an automated message but customize it and make it sound personal. It’s okay to automate data collection but they need to know there’s a real human behind it in order for them to feel responsibility.
10 Commandments Plus:
Figure out some way to give them a short term happiness.
What I mean by that is most times when we are trying to make lifestyle changes and eat healthier, or lose weight, we are needing to put the long-term over the short-term. This is usually very exciting in the beginning, but later on it seems more comfortable to just eat a bag of chips and watch tv over putting that long-term goal first. So we need to figure out a way to give a quick spike of short-term happiness after those things that we do that are going to benefit us in the long term. Think of ways you can incentivize your clients to practice those good behaviors that will benefit them in the long term.